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Your experience of the A Level exams in Physics, Chemistry, Biology

Hello everyone! I really hope I don't incite any particular re-experience of trauma here!
I'd really like to hear your experience of the Science A Level exams, preparation and/or content, especially specifying the board as well. Please do note the objective, comparable kinds of details rather than only things like 'it was absolute hell' or 'it was good'! See below for more details as well (eg context for why I ask and some ideas)

Thank you!

Reply 1

iamachickenmeow

As ideas (brainstorming here):
Exam style of questions (ambiguity? consistency? techniques for that? how to be read - pedantically or not? unclear logic? almost like an english comprehension paper :') being pretty wordy? more maths/calculation heavy :biggrin:

etc); when preparing, what did you think of the mark schemes? inconsistent? too specific without reason (ie. not so much terminology but strange wording?).. anything really, please do note if you can!; emphasis of questions - more devising of practicals rather than analysing practicals (i think edexcel physics does this more for example)? was there anything in there that was not on the spec and not explained in the paper when it should have been (ofc I doubt this but just in case)?;

(edited 2 months ago)

Reply 2

iamachickenmeow

Content - I have ofc read their specifications, but from previous experience, where there might be some bullet points for each covering one concept, as you learn the content, you realise that some of the bullet points have so much more to cover! So ideas to note for content:
Emphasis in particular areas (eg. AQA physics seems to have a strange attachment to particles.. putting it before mechanics which I found alarming)? Any topics which had particular perks but were unfortunately given quite a lot of weight! They're the worst!

i find it way more logical to not really go for so many details (like 'this particle, that particle, pion and kaon') which are not involved in any kind of logical relationship - ie. can't really be derived/deduced from A Level knowledge or, like a useless axiom, can't be related to/used to help deduce other knowledge at A Level.
I also prefer to avoid things such as the 'socioeconomic' bits or 'this device and that device...' because for this stage in learning, I far rather more depth in the actual fundamentals of the concept - could be equations or whatever...
Obviously it wouldn't be perfect for any particular exam board, but I'd like to minimise it.

Reply 3

iamachickenmeow

CONTEXT: I am self-studying A levels and need to choose my exam boards pretty much ASAP, which I have been trying to do, but I really need to be sure of my choices. Nothing is better than information from the experience itself of the exams and preparation for the A Levels, so your help would be really, really appreciated!
Other reasons: I want to avoid trying to look into the past papers in too much detail for hopefully obvious reasons, and the 2023 papers (which I can't have access to) were apparently very interesting to say the least. So yes, many are reasons why I would be very grateful to hear from those who have experienced it.