people who have done/are doing A-level biology with eduqas is it bad?

my first choice college uses eduqas for A-level bio but i’ve heard bad things about eduqas like the fact that there are way less revision materials for it compared to larger exam boards like aqa. i guess what i’m trying to ask is whether this has negatively affected you or if the course is still manageable with the few resources that are out there.

my second choice college uses aqa but as i said it’s my “second choice” so obviously i’m more keen on the first :/

Reply 1

15crashcodyFs

15

I did EDUQAS Geography, and it wasn't great. There was no official all in one textbook, and whilst there were some revision resources, it was not compiled neatly. There were plenty of past papers available, and luckily for me, most of the content crossed over with other exam boards, so I coped, but it was more stressful revision than my other subjects (all Edexcel).

I would look up available resources and actually see if you can find a complete textbook and/or complete revision guide, as well as practice papers. If you can find all those, you will be fine.

Also worth noting that a good college will provide you with all the resources you need. My teachers compiled slides for the entire course, so even though there was no book I could still revise from the slides.

(edited 2 years ago)

Reply 2

gabzorulz

3

Original post by killcupid

my first choice college uses eduqas for A-level bio but i’ve heard bad things about eduqas like the fact that there are way less revision materials for it compared to larger exam boards like aqa. i guess what i’m trying to ask is whether this has negatively affected you or if the course is still manageable with the few resources that are out there.

my second choice college uses aqa but as i said it’s my “second choice” so obviously i’m more keen on the first :/

I did Eduqas A-Level Biology and it wasn't the best. Biology mark scheme are always super specific but eduqas is the most specific i've seen. They do more context based questions (which are the hardest type) than other exam boards. My teacher gave our class OCR biology question for practice and it was a breeze compared to eduqas ones. The grade boundaries are pretty low because of how hard it is but it doesnt really make a difference. They also have an awful sepcification. There are some positives, they have "Blended learning" resources which are really good for learning entire topics quickly, sometimes they re-use exam questions from the old spec, and there are no multiple choice questions.

Reply 3

spelkop

1

Original post by killcupid

my first choice college uses eduqas for A-level bio but i’ve heard bad things about eduqas like the fact that there are way less revision materials for it compared to larger exam boards like aqa. i guess what i’m trying to ask is whether this has negatively affected you or if the course is still manageable with the few resources that are out there.

my second choice college uses aqa but as i said it’s my “second choice” so obviously i’m more keen on the first :/

I currently do eduqas biology A-level, and it's not the best.
Pros:

•

Less people do the board (42 schools do eduqas A-level biology out of about 32,000 in the country), so grades could be easier to achieve

•

PPQs repetitive, there seems to be a very finite amount of them out there. Downside to this is different boards are used with us on PPQs which isn't helpful.

•

Wider reading is useful and required (a bit of a con if you don't enjoy the subject enough).

Cons:

•

Very few resources are reliable, I've found the blended learning platform to work for me, but I've been told that official Eduqas resources have mistakes that haven't ever been corrected (this is also in the powerpoints they give out)

•

Very specific mark schemes

•

Very few questions are not application of knowledge, and aren't too specific on what points you need to make.

•

Very few relevant PPQs, which means they often end up being reused in topic tests or revision (the ones we use haven't been updated much from June 2009-2011 exams).

•

WJEC PPQs are similar, but apparently entirely different content and mark schemes (the blended learning pages for each are basically the same, and we end up using WJEC questions, OCR, even AQA, which is a bit useless).

(I also did Eduqas/WJEC (its main board?) Geography for GCSE, and it was similar - no definitive textbook, very few resources (luckily the powerpoints the teachers made were good).)

We've been recommended a couple of textbooks that cover all bases - 'Advanced Biology' by Mary Jones and Geoff Jones, 'Biological Sciences 2', etc. We've been encouraged to read 'Bio factsheets' alongside the topics, and also read papers like 'Biological sciences review'. Hope this helps!! Good luck doing Eduqas bio.

Reply 4

Hdisn

3

Original post by spelkop

I currently do eduqas biology A-level, and it's not the best.
Pros:

•

Less people do the board (42 schools do eduqas A-level biology out of about 32,000 in the country), so grades could be easier to achieve

•

PPQs repetitive, there seems to be a very finite amount of them out there. Downside to this is different boards are used with us on PPQs which isn't helpful.

•

Wider reading is useful and required (a bit of a con if you don't enjoy the subject enough).

Cons:

•

Very few resources are reliable, I've found the blended learning platform to work for me, but I've been told that official Eduqas resources have mistakes that haven't ever been corrected (this is also in the powerpoints they give out)

•

Very specific mark schemes

•

Very few questions are not application of knowledge, and aren't too specific on what points you need to make.

•

Very few relevant PPQs, which means they often end up being reused in topic tests or revision (the ones we use haven't been updated much from June 2009-2011 exams).

•

WJEC PPQs are similar, but apparently entirely different content and mark schemes (the blended learning pages for each are basically the same, and we end up using WJEC questions, OCR, even AQA, which is a bit useless).

(I also did Eduqas/WJEC (its main board?) Geography for GCSE, and it was similar - no definitive textbook, very few resources (luckily the powerpoints the teachers made were good).)
We've been recommended a couple of textbooks that cover all bases - 'Advanced Biology' by Mary Jones and Geoff Jones, 'Biological Sciences 2', etc. We've been encouraged to read 'Bio factsheets' alongside the topics, and also read papers like 'Biological sciences review'. Hope this helps!! Good luck doing Eduqas bio.

How have u been revising so far cuz I'm cooked for the exams. I honestly hate my school for choosing the examboard. I need an A to get into uni and it's not looking good so any advice would be helpful. 😭🫶🫶

Reply 5

spelkop

1

Original post by Hdisn

How have u been revising so far cuz I'm cooked for the exams. I honestly hate my school for choosing the examboard. I need an A to get into uni and it's not looking good so any advice would be helpful. 😭🫶🫶

I am yet to adopt any really good revision techniques, but blurting has always helped me. Mindmaps, etc. Our teachers give us PPQs (but they're from different boards, so again, not incredible). Free science lessons and other channels give good context on the content, as it's similar content but with different given answers. They don't recommend learning mark schemes, but it's worth looking through to see what they allow and disallow for certain types of questions.

people who have done/are doing A-level biology with eduqas is it bad?

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