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IB 1st year and 2nd year regretters??

Hey,
Well just wondering for those who are either in the process of the IB or have finished it....if u have but 5 words to describe what you should have done during the IB(lin other words, mistakes) what would they be??
Any extra advice would be great !! :smile:

Like I am going to start next month, and I really wanna blow it UP!!

Reply 1

CATIII

There's nothing I really regret. If there was a next time, I would choose my Extended Essay subject by competence of the supervisor, rather than by my interest in the subject.

Reply 2

Smeh

CATIII

There's nothing I really regret. If there was a next time, I would choose my Extended Essay subject by competence of the supervisor, rather than by my interest in the subject.

Bloody hell 44!
Well done!

...I dont even know why i'm here I just finished AS :ninja:

Reply 3

bondj02

lol. well done with 44. Seriously.

Well I made an aspirational mistake. I wanted to work in videogames, changed my mind half way through the first year because I realised I wasn't any good at the subjects I needed. It was too late to change.

I ended up with 31 points: a 7,6,5 in Psychology, English and Japanese.

The subjects I chose for videogames? Physics (4), Computer Science (4) Maths SL (4)

I'm clearly not mathematically minded, but this wasn't so obvious because I could handle GCSE fine. I got an A in maths and A* in Physics. Its a big jump, and one I looked at naively in year 11. I will have to pay for it now. I had an offer from Cambridge and everything....

So yeah, my choices in the IB have somewhat screwed up my life. I don't regret it though. It was me, not the IB, and I wouldn't have been able to Japanese if it weren't for this wonderful qualifcation. For clarification, it is Japanese I plan to go on to study at uni.

Reply 4

Agneisse

Leave and do A(dvanced) Levels :tongue:

More seriously, make sure your HLs are appropriate for what you think you might want to study at university, don't procrastinate, learn to worship the rubric (science lab reports :love:

), and pick an EE area where you will get a good supervisor who knows the rubric and can teach you to write the way IB wants (which is not always the same thing as writing a Good Analytical Essay). Cultivate a good relationship with your IBC + teachers, it helps when you want extensions for deadlines or recommendations for stuff. Don't overpile yourself with work like take 7 subjects or 4 HLs unless you have some overwhelming desire to do so. If you have bad teachers/teaching then coming online for study guide pdfs or coursework samples is very helpful too. Do past papers (also found free online).

Oh, and good luck :biggrin:

Reply 5

Sam...

I always regretted taking IB right up until I got my results, which were better than I was expecting.

My advice would be don't take higher maths and learn to BS in essay subjects. You'll do fine :smile:

Reply 6

sonia121

CATIII

There's nothing I really regret. If there was a next time, I would choose my Extended Essay subject by competence of the supervisor, rather than by my interest in the subject.

Congrats!! Well then, what do you think is the most important thing about students in the IB to score high ??

Reply 7

bondj02

sonia121

Congrats!! Well then, what do you think is the most important thing about students in the IB to score high ??

To that there is no response. Who knows what the IB is thinking? I look at my grade boundaries, and not a single one seems right. No matter how hard you try, you are not doing as they want. If you don't try hard, often the IB will work in your favour.

Its a mad mad world.

Reply 8

CATIII

sonia121

Congrats!! Well then, what do you think is the most important thing about students in the IB to score high ??

1. Don't rely on your teachers
2. Be resourceful (i.e. know your syllabi, have as much material as possible about your subjects, etc.)
3. Do loads of past papers
4. Get lucky with the questions on the exam and the examiners grading/moderating your internal assessments

Reply 9

ragnar_jonsson

CATIII

fantastic post; definitely don't rely on your teachers for a) the necessary information/material, b) examination prep & c) IA guidelines.
basically, don't trust your teachers absolutely to provide you everything you need.
try study guides, various textbooks (my books: 5 bio, 3 che, 3 phy, 2 eng, 1 tok, 2 mat, 3 fre, 6 psy)

especially for the social sciences and mathematics. :smile:

Reply 10

ysbera

I regret not taking down notes when reading books and starting early to study English and Chinese. I should have read study guides earlier, not 2 weeks before the exam...

Reply 11

EKP90

I regret doing an EE in Economics - though I was warned beforehand, I thought I would be different. Our supervisor told us that it was basically a 50 / 50 chance whether you'd get an A or a C. He said all of our essays were excellent, yet half got As and half got Cs - and I got a C, totally ruining my hopes of getting above 1 bonus point.

Reply 12

nordam

After my first year I can say that the best advice I got from a teacher is: " you won't be able to complete all your work all the time, make sure you put your effort into the work that is worth more/more important"

i.e dont do a piece of work for one teacher just because they get angry if you have more important work to be doing. IB is a time when you have to weigh up the importance of certain things in your life and you have to manage your time carefully.

also dont forget about predicted grades (given at the end of year 1), because ultimately that's what will get you into Uni.

Reply 13

Yasmeenax

Hmm... hearing some of this stuff is kind of scary (i.e. the whole no matter what you do you're likely to do bad philosophy). I'm planning on taking what I know are difficult subjects, and I plan to use every hour available to study/work from the start. It seems that won't be enough however!
I mean, surely hard work most overcome everything (including natural ability - and anyway, isn't natural ability 1% and work 99%, as they say)?

Reply 14

Yasmeenax

ysbera

I regret not taking down notes when reading books and starting early to study English and Chinese. I should have read study guides earlier, not 2 weeks before the exam...

I'm going to be taking the same HL's as you (shockingly well done, btw!!), and just wondering, wouldn't you say that it's hard work that got you the 7's? Or..? (following on from my previous post - sorry for double posting >__< )

As a side note, I'd be really grateful if you have any tips?

Reply 15

satisfactionatlast

wish I took Biology instead of Physics. I really really regret taking it.
And I wish I took Business instead of ITGS, cuz #1 it's most proabably gonna be my major, and #2 ITGS is easy but so much work and lots of memorizing and basically it's pointless. I mean why bother learning about CPU or what the USB stands for? Business would have been so much better! :frown:

Reply 16

Evelyn_Pannell

1 - Quickly learn which teachers are incompetant so that you know in which subjects you're essentially going to have to self-teach
2 - Work out your sleeping pattern. Don't think you can go weeks with 3 hours a night. It only lasts for so long.
3 - Pick subjects you're good at, for god's sake :woo:

4 - Do revision as you go along. Same goes for CAS, don't leave it till the last minute. You WILL regret it lol
5 - Befriend someone who gives a good back massage

Reply 17

Aphotic Cosmos

Pick Higher levels that you are already good at, not subjects that you want to become good at.

I chose Computer Science HL. I got a 3. If I had taken my other choice of History instead [which I have always been good at and could easily have achieved a 5 in], I would be celebrating acceptance into UCL.

:frown:

However, I still don't regret doing the IB even after not making it into either of my choices, because my grades were good enough to make it into Leicester through clearing, and I know that they are good overall.

Reply 18

Chapu

Well I finish in 2010 but I now have 1 regret (so far...)

WOOORK!!! in your first year! and try to finish evrything you can

e.g. CAS and most EE or something

I didn't...and it's killing me now...