Being a 'gifted child' has set me up for failure in my GCSEs

Literally my life wtf, minus the whole Minecraft and D&D, I was more of a Roblox kid!
I totally get you tho, I was really struggling to revise for English especially since I’m a massive procrastinator and I don’t revise for anything, but I managed to somehow pull it all together during the exam this morning!! The issue is, cause I go to a grammar school, there’s this expectation that I’ll give up my whole social life to revise, and my parents also think I should be doing that too, which I find really annoying!! I’m really scared for A-Levels cause idk what I’ll do about this whole revision issue
Good luck for the rest of your exams, and I really hope you get those 9s 😁

Thank god im not alone

For my A levels, I'm really going to pull my thumb out. I've learned from my mistakes, so this summer I'm going to change myself. I'm going to start learning about my A level courses, get an overview of them, then start revising the second I get back to school. Hopefully I can turn it round, but I think that there's no chance of fulfilling my dream of going to Oxbridge now

See the thing is, i am planning on doing that, the whole 'proactive learner' mindset and stuff; and i will do it, I just dont know how long its gonna last tbh. Also yeah i totally understand, I've always wanted to get into oxbridge, (and i wanna do med aswell so its tough), but yeah im hoping i can somehow focus myself and turn it all around. We'll see on results day anyway!

I think I'm going to use the failure of my GCSEs as a motivation to rebound and build strong foundations in the summer that will last for the whole of my sixth form experience. I've already got a strong case for head boy at my school, and I'm going to make a linguistics society at school, since I want to do Philosophy, Psychology and Linguistics at Oxbridge. Hopefully commitments like these will force me to stay focused on my future, and Oxbridge will be able to see that I've turned myself around from my GCSEs if I get A*A*A* and A* in an EPQ on linguistics, alongside a plethora of super curricular activities like a linguistics / philosophy / etymology focused further reading list, starting a linguistics society at school, and taking part in linguistics challenges like the UKLO (UK Linguistics Olympiad which I've already taken part in this year). Hopefully they can look past my abysmal GCSE results to see that I have a genuine passion for the subject.

Woahhh, thats actually really cool! You seem to have a lot planned out. As for me, I would really love to do med at uni (i wanna specialise in neurosurgery), but I do occasionally have doubts as to whether i'll actually get a place, so I was thinking of Philosophy, since I am doing it for A-Level, and I absoutely ADORE the subject in general. I'm planning on getting some regular work experience at hospitals and clinics after GCSEs, to boost my application for when I do actually have to apply to oxbridge. Me personally, I would absolutely LOVE to get 4 A* at A-levels but i guess we'll have to wait and see once year 12 starts, and how im actually coping with workload. Also about the head boy thing, my parents really want me to go for head girl, but i'm not too sure, because I've got family friends who were head girls in the past, and it did really good for them (one went cambridge, one went oxford) but it really messed with them. As well as doing tough a-levels, they constantly were busy with meetings with senior leadership and other stuff, and it did affect their mental health because they were so worried about their grades. In the end they came out alright, but idrkkkk. What A-levels are you taking btw?

Alright. I don't have advice when it comes to revision strategies, because I haven't had to revise anything for a long time, but I just wanted to put something down about my own experiences. A lot of this sounds very familiar to me, so I want to give you an idea of what this can look like 20 years on.
Just briefly, but I was the 'clever one' too. Excelled at a small primary school, moved to a private school and still excelled. When it came to GCSEs, I actually still didn't put a huge amount of effort in and got (at the time) all As and A*s. I got a bit of an awakening at AS Level, where I definitely got complacent and my grades were not nearly what they should have been, but I did resits and pulled things around for A-Levels. Didn't get into Oxbridge, but I was never overly keen on Oxbridge. Went to a RG university and studied Law. Again, there were times (far more than there should have been) where I just didn't apply myself and I made things much harder for myself academically. My ambition was always to become a barrister, and it was the Bar course where I really started to hit my potential. The previous missteps academically made things harder for me, and definitely impacted on my early career success. But in the end I overcame those. I am now a barrister, am pretty well regarded for the work I do, and have made a good career for myself. Could I have done 'better' if I'd realised that potential and applied myself sooner? Probably. I am genuinely happy with my career and life now and don't have any regrets at all. A lot of people are envious of what I have both professionally and personally, and I don't feel any envy at all towards those who have more than me. But my path could and probably would have been different if I'd applied myself sooner.
What's the relevance of that to you? Well, two things. First, it is important for you to shake this complacency as quickly as you can. You're never going to make perfect decisions all the time. You're a teenager. Even the smartest teenagers make awfully stupid decisions from time to time. That's just part of growing up. It's also a matter of science that your brain isn't fully developed until your mid 20s, and that doesn't help in some cases. But it also isn't an excuse for you not to generally change your view towards work and academia. Yes, you can compensate for them as I have done, but you shouldn't be in a position to have to do that, and if you are you're always going to be more in need of some good luck to correct course. It does sound to me like you have the right attitude going forwards, and that's good, because your GCSEs are not nearly as important long term as they seem now. But you need to keep that attitude going forwards.
The second thing is that when you do make these mistakes, you can recover. As I've gotten a bit older I've shifted naturally from focusing on the next exam or qualification to being engaged in the longer term goal of developing my career, and in that I've just tried to become better in most aspects of my life. Mistakes, whether avoidable or not, are part of the learning process, but providing you do apply yourself when it matters and consistently work to better yourself in an academic, personal and professional sense, you shouldn't ultimately regret these times when you've not acted as you should.
So yeah, hopefully you've found some of that useful as someone who is about 20 years ahead of you on this. One thing I will say, though, is don't lose the reading. As you get into your career, get married, have kids etc you will lose time for recreational activities. I was a big gamer and have the gaming rig of my dreams sat next to my feet gathering dust as I write this, because I just don't have time to play it at the moment (and by 'at the moment', I mean about the last two years). But I still read. Fiction, non fiction, graphic novels. You will always have time to read, and you should always read. Best of luck with your GCSEs. I'm sure you'll do better than you think.

Could always read the book/watch the episode
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Better-Than-Life-Red-Dwarf/dp/B002J3I33C
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00bp2hb/red-dwarf-ii-2-better-than-life
There may be a moral somewhere ...

Hi!! Thank you for coming, just a warning: I've written a whole massive biography. You can just skip to the end if you want, most of this is waffle, I'm just getting my feelings out.
Here's my story: In primary school, I was the 'clever one'. I literally never revised for any test, all my teachers were happy with me, and the only thing I did in my spare time was read books. My reading and writing ability were literally better than one of my teacher's (she literally got me to proofread her work so often). I absolutely sailed through the 11+, I'd even go as far as to say that I enjoyed the experience thoroughly. Throughout primary school, my parents severely limited the amount of time I was on screens for. I had one hour on Minecraft a week, and that was it. My first piece of technology that I owned was my phone, which I got in year 6, after getting my 11+ results. I was only allowed on that for half an hour a day.
Going into a secondary (grammar) school, I was very excited. I felt like I would be able to truly excel and find people like me. I quickly settled into a little nerdy group of D&D players, and that was the best time (academically) of my life. I was consistently scoring pretty much full marks in everything, reading a **** ton of books at the library, and just generally having a great time.
This was when disaster struck. Covid 19. I was at home. No school. No friends. I quickly read all the books I had to my name and couldn't get any more due to the lockdown measures put in place by Boris. It was at this time that I started playing Hypixel skyblock, a game that one of my friends told me about. It's a sort of minigame on the biggest Minecraft server in the world. Except it's not mini, it's gigantic. There are about 30k daily players. There is no 'end' to it, and it is literally the grindiest and most addictive game I have ever played. I would spend multiple hours just to see a stat go up by 1%.
During the lockdown, because we were in year 7 and the school didn't really care about us, they didn't set us any meaningful work, so all I did was play skyblock. I think due to me not having access to anything like this before in my life, I sort of felt that I should make up for it. So make up for it I did. I played consistently about 10 hours per day, and, when coming back from the lockdown in year 8, I had nothing to show for myself other than a crippling addiction to a Minecraft server.
My grades, however, since I was still intelligent, and it was only year 8, so the work was easy, somehow stayed high enough for my parents to not care. The only thing that changed was that I had completely lost interest in all of my hobbies and aspirations. Reading? Nope, the only reading that I did was on the Hypixel forums. (Which is probably why I've taken such a liking to TSR - I love forums - you get such a strong sense of community and belonging. TSR, however is so much better because there's no toxicity whatsoever and everyone is so passionate about their studies and goals; it's great! ). D&D after school? No thanks, I'd rather play Minecraft. It got to the point where I would sneak downstairs at 1:30 AM to play until 7 AM and go to school on 0 hours of sleep multiple days a week.
I took this attitude with me up until the end of year 9, when I entered probably the worst patch of my life. I entered a deep depression due to not having any real friends in real life; the group that I had in year 7 split up because most of us weren't put in the same classes. My grades were very bad compared to what they used to be, too. So in the summer, I made the really hard decision to quit.
It was probably the hardest thing I've ever done, seeing those thousands and thousands of hours all gone in a moment. I said goodbye to all my online friends, and went cold turkey. I've never looked back, something I'm really proud of
In year 10, I took a completely different route. I decided I wanted to have friends, so I became popular. I messed about in pretty much all my lessons (apart from French, I love French!). I became friends with the 'popular kids', who smoked weed and vaped (thank God I resisted their temptations). Life was enjoyable again. I was having fun every weekend, messing around in town, and school was fun again, but not because I enjoyed doing work, but because I was a class clown. Still, somehow, my grades were all 8s/9s. Because our school only tested us on 1 topic at a time, it was extremely easy to cram the night before and get full marks.
Going into year 11, I knew that my GCSEs were imminent but I never revised. I stuck with my attitude of "It's fine, I'm clever, so everything will be fine". November mocks came and went, I did alright. February mocks rolled around, and this time I actually revised, so I got pretty much all 9s.
So what's the problem here? Is what you may be enquiring (Well done for reading this far btw ). Well, all the tests I had had were all 1 paper at max, so I could cram for them easily. So, rewind. It's just over a week ago, and I realise I have my GCSEs. "I should probably revise" I say to myself. "No, it's fine, I'll just do it the night before". So that's what I did. RS on Thursday went exceptionally. Biology went very well - definitely grade 9 worthy. And then I realise: I have English on Monday. I have to revise 2 whole books full of themes and characters and quotations that we haven't covered in for years!! Night before revision is not going to work. I need to know how to get information into my head, and large amounts of it.
And this is where the whole point of this post lies. I have never once actually sat down to properly revise for something. Sure, I've looked through my notes, and that's enough for a small little test, but, believe me, this WILL NOT work for GCSEs. So I have the most important exams of my life so far, and all I can do is procrastinate, because that's all I've known. I can only go half an hour max without folding and checking something. I don't know how to revise. I've learned blurting, and it worked wonders for my Biology, but I've always had a knack for Biology. In everything else, I'm not so lucky. I'm blurting the ever-lasting **** out of every topic, but I don't think it's going to work. English was awful today.
I really need advice for how to effectively cram large amounts of information in your head. I'm fine with exam technique and linking information together, I just need to KNOW the information in the first place. So please, tell me all about your revision strategies
So, my message for everyone in Y7-10: It might not seem like it, but time passes by in the blink of an eye. Before you know it, you'll be sitting your GCSEs too. Please don't squander your talents and opportunities like I did, I could've been so much more than what I am now. Thank you for listening and I hope you've learned something
-Aspect

Thank you for writing this, like others have said already I'm happy that I'm not alone with this kind of experience. Thankfully I have never had a crippling skyblock addiction, although I am familiar with it and totally get what you mean lmao, and my school has been pretty competent and useful throughout years 7 to 11 so thankfully I haven't struggled as much as you have. Nevertheless, thank you for making the right decisions; you are right to be proud of them. Don't treat your GCSEs as a failure yet, you have the right skills and technique so you can definitely do well enough for Oxbridge to accept you! I think it's best to have this kind of revelation before exams and before sixth form since I doubt universities will care about what you did during years 7-10 anyway. Just keep up the good work through sixth form and you'll (probably) be okay!
With regards to the cramming thing, my only real advice is to have good notes already and to realise you probably know more than you think you know already.

That's a good idea to get some work experience after GCSEs! I've already sorted mine out for this summer, I'm working 3-4 days a week at an opticians this summer, and I've also done lots of work there previously so it should balance out the fact that it hasn't really got anything to do with PPL.
I think getting 4 A*s is perfectly achievable. If you space everything out, stay organised, and work consistently from the beginning, then you'll probably find A levels a piece of cake, especially seeing as you're even considering doing medicine at oxbridge. Plus, it might be a good idea to have a high workload, because I'm sure oxbridge won't exactly be easy on the workload, so it would be good to see if you actually can deal with it.
As for my A levels, I'm doing Biology, Psychology and French next year, alongside an EPQ that will be linguistics/etymology focused. I'm aiming for A*s in everything because I know I'm fully capable of doing so, especially considering how good our 6th form facilities are.
Just keep your goals in mind and you'll do well!

wow okay, yeah i haven't really managed to get WEX anywhere yet, but it's good ur so proactive! i find thats becoming increasingly important the older we become, especially with decisions about our future. also, thanks for the affirmation, i really hope the 4 A*s are achievable too!
your a levels are quite an interesting mix- and not a very common one too! i think they're quite a nice combination actually, -and an EPQ around lingustics/etymology? that actually sounds quite fascinating, good luck with it for y12!! i've picked biology, chemistry, philosophy and music for my subjects (and to be honest im really excited to start the courses!) - in the long run, just keep on working hard, and having a consistent pattern, and i'm sure you'll do great : )

Oh my lord I could never do an A level in music 😭 GCSE theory is enough to make me want to fling myself off a cliff and our teacher made us do 3 compositions instead of 2!!! Luckily Music is my last exam, so I can spend the whole weekend revising for the listening, so feeling confident for an 8

THREE??!?!??!?!! gosh that sounds like a lot, i barely managed to reach the deadline for two. yeah sometimes the theory can be annoying but once you learn it its sorta satisfying ygm. Yeah unfortunately i've got further maths after music so imma have to revise like crazy for that 😭 what were your compositions like?

I got 42/60 for my compositions (It's so difficult for piano players!!!), but made up for it with a 57/60 in performing