The Student Room Group

Save me from a level torture

HELP ME PLEASEEE 😭😭 (this is going to be long stick with me)

I’m on Easter break so I feel like this is the best time to try adapt onto some new revision techniques before my next mock in June.

Im currently in year 12, im doing biology chemistry and psychology my current grades from my most recent mocks in Jan are ACD I was 3 marks away from a C in chemistry and I didn’t even finish my paper, (which is terrible) so time management on the multiple choice is really something I need to work on. Im really stuck on how to revise for chemistry i love the subject so much but as soon as i finish revising the content i get so lazy when it comes to questions and when i don’t get one i give up and just leave it for another time. I really struggle with being motivated to do something that i find hard idk if anyone can give me tips on what to do i really want to get a B by the end of the year if that’s even possible. I even go tuition and they help me a lot but again im just not doing enough!!

And any tips on how to evaluate in psychology would be a God send!!! I really enjoy psychology but my evaluations are really pushing me down the gap between a C - B is huge😪😪.
Original post by stemgurl
HELP ME PLEASEEE 😭😭 (this is going to be long stick with me)
I’m on Easter break so I feel like this is the best time to try adapt onto some new revision techniques before my next mock in June.
Im currently in year 12, im doing biology chemistry and psychology my current grades from my most recent mocks in Jan are ACD I was 3 marks away from a C in chemistry and I didn’t even finish my paper, (which is terrible) so time management on the multiple choice is really something I need to work on. Im really stuck on how to revise for chemistry i love the subject so much but as soon as i finish revising the content i get so lazy when it comes to questions and when i don’t get one i give up and just leave it for another time. I really struggle with being motivated to do something that i find hard idk if anyone can give me tips on what to do i really want to get a B by the end of the year if that’s even possible. I even go tuition and they help me a lot but again im just not doing enough!!
And any tips on how to evaluate in psychology would be a God send!!! I really enjoy psychology but my evaluations are really pushing me down the gap between a C - B is huge😪😪.

Hi, I’m also in year 12, I managed to raise my chemistry grade from C/D in October to a high grade B in February. This is what I think will help you, especially with time management:

. Use the mark scheme as guidance. Should be 1 minute per mark roughly.
. For chem, if your exam board has multiple choice questions, do these at the end! They can tend to take up a lot of your time if you attempt them at the beginning.
. Time yourself when doing past papers. It’s difficult to do all the time but try at least twice.
. as soon as you read a question, you want to be underlining key words and jotting/annotating down your thoughts. This will enable you to have something to refer to, it will help you answer the question quickly, instead of having to read the question again. Not many people do this, but I have and I feel like it’s definitely made a difference!

For revision resources:
. I would recommend Allery Chemistry for Chemistry, and also the organic chemistry tutor and Tyler de Witt.
. for notes use chem guide.

Hope this helps!

Reply 2

Hi I am a year 13 student about to sit my a levels in may so I hope my advice is somewhat of help for you. The only common subject we have is psychology which is my best subject at the moment, have you been given any acronyms to use to evaluate such as GRAVES for evaluating studies eg im not sure if you have done social influence but P- (state it is a weakness of the study) not generalisable E- (elaborate on your point) Aschs line test used only 123 male participants which cannot represent females or cultures T- (come to a final concl) therefore it is not useful to apply across and we cannot assume the results are the same for all… lacks gender bias/culture bias this bold bit is very important as involving issues and debates can help you stand out so much from other individuals however if you haven’t learnt it yet don’t worry about it too much for these mocks focus first on structure rather than blurting out all the knowledge because the knowledge is very limited marks and it will cap your answer. For theories explanations and all sorts you can google evaluation acronyms for each one and it will help you so much especially when ur on the spot and may forget ev points you can write out the acronym and it will give u some marks.

Reply 3

Original post by kitty15
Hi, I’m also in year 12, I managed to raise my chemistry grade from C/D in October to a high grade B in February. This is what I think will help you, especially with time management:
. Use the mark scheme as guidance. Should be 1 minute per mark roughly.
. For chem, if your exam board has multiple choice questions, do these at the end! They can tend to take up a lot of your time if you attempt them at the beginning.
. Time yourself when doing past papers. It’s difficult to do all the time but try at least twice.
. as soon as you read a question, you want to be underlining key words and jotting/annotating down your thoughts. This will enable you to have something to refer to, it will help you answer the question quickly, instead of having to read the question again. Not many people do this, but I have and I feel like it’s definitely made a difference!
For revision resources:
. I would recommend Allery Chemistry for Chemistry, and also the organic chemistry tutor and Tyler de Witt.
. for notes use chem guide.
Hope this helps!


Thank you so much, i use allery chemistry and I find it very helpful so I’ll definitely try out the others

Reply 4

Original post by kitty15
Hi, I’m also in year 12, I managed to raise my chemistry grade from C/D in October to a high grade B in February. This is what I think will help you, especially with time management:
. Use the mark scheme as guidance. Should be 1 minute per mark roughly.
. For chem, if your exam board has multiple choice questions, do these at the end! They can tend to take up a lot of your time if you attempt them at the beginning.
. Time yourself when doing past papers. It’s difficult to do all the time but try at least twice.
. as soon as you read a question, you want to be underlining key words and jotting/annotating down your thoughts. This will enable you to have something to refer to, it will help you answer the question quickly, instead of having to read the question again. Not many people do this, but I have and I feel like it’s definitely made a difference!
For revision resources:
. I would recommend Allery Chemistry for Chemistry, and also the organic chemistry tutor and Tyler de Witt.
. for notes use chem guide.
Hope this helps!


Thank you so much, i use allery chemistry and I find it very helpful so I’ll definitely try out the others

Reply 5

Original post by bsg2088
Hi I am a year 13 student about to sit my a levels in may so I hope my advice is somewhat of help for you. The only common subject we have is psychology which is my best subject at the moment, have you been given any acronyms to use to evaluate such as GRAVES for evaluating studies eg im not sure if you have done social influence but P- (state it is a weakness of the study) not generalisable E- (elaborate on your point) Aschs line test used only 123 male participants which cannot represent females or cultures T- (come to a final concl) therefore it is not useful to apply across and we cannot assume the results are the same for all… lacks gender bias/culture bias this bold bit is very important as involving issues and debates can help you stand out so much from other individuals however if you haven’t learnt it yet don’t worry about it too much for these mocks focus first on structure rather than blurting out all the knowledge because the knowledge is very limited marks and it will cap your answer. For theories explanations and all sorts you can google evaluation acronyms for each one and it will help you so much especially when ur on the spot and may forget ev points you can write out the acronym and it will give u some marks.


Could I ask what GRAVES stands for? I remember my teacher gave us an acronym called GRENADE ( gender bias, reductionist, ethics, nature vs nurture, animals, determinism vs free will and eurocentrism) I actually forget to use this because I focus so much on AO1. But other than that tysm x

Reply 6

Original post by stemgurl
HELP ME PLEASEEE 😭😭 (this is going to be long stick with me)
I’m on Easter break so I feel like this is the best time to try adapt onto some new revision techniques before my next mock in June.
Im currently in year 12, im doing biology chemistry and psychology my current grades from my most recent mocks in Jan are ACD I was 3 marks away from a C in chemistry and I didn’t even finish my paper, (which is terrible) so time management on the multiple choice is really something I need to work on. Im really stuck on how to revise for chemistry i love the subject so much but as soon as i finish revising the content i get so lazy when it comes to questions and when i don’t get one i give up and just leave it for another time. I really struggle with being motivated to do something that i find hard idk if anyone can give me tips on what to do i really want to get a B by the end of the year if that’s even possible. I even go tuition and they help me a lot but again im just not doing enough!!
And any tips on how to evaluate in psychology would be a God send!!! I really enjoy psychology but my evaluations are really pushing me down the gap between a C - B is huge😪😪.

Hi! I'm also in year 12. What i'm doing to try and improve is just focus on exam practice and doing as many questions as i can and identifying my weaknesses to i can work on them especially those maths questions 😭. I'm using a website called science skool. It's got a ton of questions separated by topic and it's good practice to use them even though they're from the old specification. I'd definitely focus on mechanisms as well because those are an easy couple of marks to get in the exam Hopefully this helps.

Reply 7

Hey stemgurl,

I hope you're getting on ok with your A Levels. For Chemistry I would recommend you go through your textbook and the CGP revision guide and then lots of past paper questions! Also youtube videos are quite helpful! What exam board are you doing? I am a private tutor and should have availability to tutor you if you would like some help!

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