Normal Chemistry Mock

9

Hiya, My school has just finished up mocks and the chemistry mock was abnormally hard compared to the As past papers I have done (I have done 6 papers and average around 80%ish). This mock seemed to take all of the hardest questions from previous years plus a few and mash it into 1hr 30 minutes of hell. It was utterly barbaric. It was also 94 marks in 90 minutes of that 17 marks were multiple choice (tending to have the harder questions that definitely take longer than a minute). Is this normal, like does every school do this or are my chemistry teachers just psychopaths? For context - I go to a grammar school where 73% of chemistry grades are A or A*.

Reply 1

HManFr123

6

I think normally schools give last year's a-level paper for mocks, but I have heard of some schools mixing up qs from different years. I think it's quite obvious that y13 content is harder than y12, so ofc A-level papers will be harder than AS, but tbh it is natural to feel like they are impossible, just keep working hard and your scores will increase again!

Reply 2

a'swithaafiyah

12

Original post by HumanBeans

Hiya, My school has just finished up mocks and the chemistry mock was abnormally hard compared to the As past papers I have done (I have done 6 papers and average around 80%ish). This mock seemed to take all of the hardest questions from previous years plus a few and mash it into 1hr 30 minutes of hell. It was utterly barbaric. It was also 94 marks in 90 minutes of that 17 marks were multiple choice (tending to have the harder questions that definitely take longer than a minute). Is this normal, like does every school do this or are my chemistry teachers just psychopaths? For context - I go to a grammar school where 73% of chemistry grades are A or A*.

Nope, totally normal for them to be horrible.

BUT, if it makes you feel better, teachers - especially for chemistry - do choose hard questions from either topics everyone struggles with or just topics everyone neglects. They also usually use unseen questions from specimen papers or from the paper from the previous year so students are unfamiliar with the questions to imitate what it will be like in the actual exam. They usually make the mocks harder than the past papers to give you the shock of your life that we need every once in a while. 😭
And considering you go to a grammar school - they probably will be just that teeny weeny bit extra just to be sure.

Because they can.

Honestly, unless you don't have a paper 2 like ours was this year, you'll be fine.

Hope this helped, and good luck - you've probably done better than you think 🙂

Reply 3

Kingston Eve

Official Rep

12

Original post by HumanBeans

Hiya, My school has just finished up mocks and the chemistry mock was abnormally hard compared to the As past papers I have done (I have done 6 papers and average around 80%ish). This mock seemed to take all of the hardest questions from previous years plus a few and mash it into 1hr 30 minutes of hell. It was utterly barbaric. It was also 94 marks in 90 minutes of that 17 marks were multiple choice (tending to have the harder questions that definitely take longer than a minute). Is this normal, like does every school do this or are my chemistry teachers just psychopaths? For context - I go to a grammar school where 73% of chemistry grades are A or A*.

Hey @HumanBeans,

That definitely sounds like a tougher mock than normal! However, as a'swithaafiyah mentioned above, it could have just been a way for your teachers to encourage you to study more in preparation for your final exams. A-Level Chemistry is a challenging subject at the best of times and if you attend a grammar school with a high percentage of A*/A grades, your teachers may feel under pressure to maintain that previous percentage with your current cohort. Try not to take it to heart - if you're averaging 80% across past papers, you're doing fantastic! 🙂

Best of luck,
Eve (Kingston Rep).

(edited 1 month ago)

Normal Chemistry Mock

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