Y11 2025/26 The Final Stretch

Oh no @NotDarkGothicMama poor boy, what awful timing. Hope he's okay.

@Caddycat I love that idea! Tbh my DS doesn't seem to be too stressed but it is a tricky time for Y11 and you're right, you want them to peak at the right moment!

Re the 30 minute thing I don't think it matters whether it's one subject per 30 minutes or 3 separate sets of 30 minutes on the same subject - I think the idea is that apparently humans can generally only focus effectively for 30 minutes at a time - so after 30 minutes, even if they're still technically working, they're in theory not actually working effectively or absorbing information. So the key is to take a short break in between those 30 minute slots. Key being a short break though and not one of DS's epic 'just going to the loo' type hour long breaks!

I also agree re the 789 grading thing. Originally I think the idea of it was to identify the true top performers for courses like medicine and vet med. But inevitably then some students just want to chase 'the best' grade and see anything else as failure, even when it's anything but.

PE moderation today was "fine" except for another boy breaking his ankle! Terrible timing - I hope he gets full marks.

Interested in the 30 min slots - DS2 has naturally adjusted to that himself . Now I am helping with anthology poems I can see him fade around then so am cramming each poem into 30 mins

I agree with the grading system. Dd thinks anything below a 7 is “pointless”. Madness.

And then having done the number system we now jump ship immediately back to letter grades for alevel?!

What a brilliant technique @Caddycat !

I never did GCSEs @36and3 so I feel I'm doing them at the same time and should get some sort of honorary award 😂
Well done to your son for his speaking exam @Wincher
@Tebheag that's expecting a lot of them on top of school hours. DD does probably about that, although I don't know whether her concentration is 100% for the whole duration. She's still super stressed, I dread her crashing at the time she should be peaking... There's little point telling her to relax, because she is only "relaxed" when she is revising and feel in control. I feel rather than a set number of hours, advice on how to divide their time would be more useful. DD does long stretches on each subjects rather than say 3 x1hour.
I agree about the new grading system @Jmaho . My DD feels a 6 is a failure and in her mind a 7 is a B, and only a 9 would be an A.
@FlyingPandas it sounds sensible, would that be different topics for every 30 min slots?
DD was getting a little overwhelmed doing long stretches, so we did this one day to try and keep it fun: We pretended each period of study was a "waiting in the queue" at Disneyland. We used one of the random spinning wheel apps with all of the attractions, picked one at random, check the queue time on the disney app, she studied for this set amount of time (typically 30min to 50min), then we watched a "on board" video of the ride on YouTube, before "heading" to another attraction. It was silly but lightened her mood and helped switching things around a little.

DS is doing similar to some of your DC: 1.5 ish hours on a school evening, another 3 maybe up to 4 on each weekend day but not more than that, definitely not 6 hours.

I try to get my DC to follow the recommendations given by my eldest DC‘S lovely deputy head, who used to say to Y11, do 3 half hour slots on a school night, and aim for 6 half hour slots on each weekend day. (He was very witty and funny and showed a PowerPoint breaking each day down into half hour slots to show Y11 just how many slots they had in a typical weekday afternoon and weekend day, and point out how many hours they’d still have for themselves even after doing revision slots. He also recommended copious bribery with chocolate which obviously went down a storm with DC!).

That always seemed a sensible balance to me, obviously some will do more, some less, it’s just that tricky balance between doing enough and not burning out.

One of my teachers gave me a good tip when revising which I've shared with my DS but he's disinterested.

Write down when you start, to the minute. As soon as you find your mind wandering. Stop, write down the time, walk away. Do something else then come back to it.

To start with you will only concentrate for 10 mins tops but it will be 10 quality minutes. Then you'll find the time naturally builds.

Don't feel guilty about the short time, most people might spend an hour but only actually revise for a tiny proportion of that. Then they spend their rest time feeling guilty about revision rather than concentrating on that.

I still use this tool now when I'm working from home which I do a lot especially when I feel like I'm being unproductive. It was only recently I picked it up again but I probably tripled my productivity with it.

But of course anything his mum recommends is automatically dismissed. 🙄

I think my DD is doing about the same as yours MayasJamas

Just found this thread and it's exactly what I needed! I'm finding things tricky at the moment to get balance between ensuring DD does revision and doesn't get too overwhelmed. Also under the Art mountain at the moment that a lot of you are dealing with. Hopefully on track ish with that but exam not until 5/6 May so I just hope too much revision time isn't lost.

I worry a lot about whether she'll get the marks to get into 6th form. She's great at the subjects she wants to do (Sciencey subjects predicted mixtures of 7/8/9s) but it's English Language that will be a struggle. So hard to help her with that and the thought of not being able to do A Levels and having to retake is awful (for her, I know things will be ok in the end). That seems really harsh when she doesn't want to study any essay subjects and she is clearly literate and quite bright. She has had confidence massively knocked in poor mock results in English Language (3!) and freaks out when trying to do past paper questions at home now.

Good to see others aren't spending all evening revising with no breaks. I was very conscientious at school so find it hard to know what is normal!

DD isn’t doing 24 hours/week. She does do 1.5-2.5h on week nights (including after school sessions on some days and maths tutor). Has Friday night off. Does 3 hours per day at the weekend, sometimes 4. She could not focus for 6 hours a day at the weekend, no way. She’d burn out before the exams even started. They are all different but that’s what suits her.

As predicted, DS's French speaking exam today was "fine" and he "can't remember" any of the questions. He's currently asleep. Roll on PE moderation tomorrow.

I never did that as a child and my DS isn't doing that much. I think it's possible some kids are but also by this point every lesson he's doing is revision in every subject. Some kids will need to do more than others for sure but I think actually demanding your kid does that much will probably be counter productive in some cases (certainly with my stubborn DS).

I'm worried about my DS too. He's our eldest so first time we're going through it.
He's extremely defensive whenever I mention revision and swears he is doing some every day.
He scraped 5's pretty much across the board in his mocks (lower in PE and music) with little revision so he is a little cocky that he will do much better in the real thing.

He has only applied to one sixth form as they all wanted the same grades and that's the one he is set in going ro.
He needs 6's in pretty much everything which im worried about.
I'm not sure how I feel about the grading system.
In the old system a B sounds great but a 6 doesn't sound that good when there's a 9 up for grabs.

I've got 3 younger children and next year my DD is doing her GCSE's.
I'm not sure im going to survive!

I just hope DS2 doesn’t make the mistakes I did … at the mo it’s looking pretty likely .. he’s as bored as I was and now there is gaming and smart phones which there wasn’t back in the day

I personally think we need some sort of mums celebration when this is over. After all, we’re all basically doing our GCSE’s again!! I hope I do better than I did 22 years ago!!

Well done all those completing speaking. Dd's planning on doing German A level @Wincher if she goes somewhere that offers it. There's only a few places.

She has been doing a couple of hours a day this week but it's only been the time thief that is art rather than revision. She has to hand in everything on Friday so at least it'll be over then.

to all those DC with physical disabilities, it's a lot to contend with.

Speaking exam went well, the teacher actually called me to say how he had smashed it, which was really lovely to hear (they like to call home at our school when kids have done well!). He was nervous but knew he knew his stuff. Very proud of him. (“I never have to speak German again!”).

No study leave here, they are expected to attend normal lessons all through, it seems. I did speak to the head of year a while back and she said there will come a date they announce as the last day they have to come in outside of exams, but not sure if that will be half term or what. I always thought I’d ask for study leave for DS but tbh I think he needs the social interaction and routine of school more than the possibly more productive study time he would get at home for now. He enjoys school, gets on with most teachers and has a great bunch of friends so I think he’s probably happier there for now (except for the execrable teaching he has in science from a succession of cover teachers, but he’s taught himself the entire curriculum anyway)

DS had today off revision as it is his birthday. They have finished all the content at school so all school time is revision and exam technique anyway. He is doing about 1.5hrs a night and maybe 2 to 3 on a weekend but they don't have study leave so will be at school right until his last exam on 15th June which is definitely the best for him.

My DS did nothing tonight after the French speaking this morning. However he’d done an hour before school. Yesterday evening he probably did 4 hours total. We have worked out we go with the amount of energy not a timetable. It only took 5 years.

On rest breaks, being part of a physically disabled community the advice parent to parent and student to student is if you get them work out when you’ll take them. Sometimes time eg every half an hour. Sometimes pain related. Sometimes question related but factoring into the prep and timings has really worked for DS, otherwise it’s another thing to think about when already overloaded.

Hi everyone, can join? DD Y11.. Not long to go.. 2 weeks left til study / exam leave. It wasn't that long ago they started Y7.. time flies!!

Art first!

Mine is doing about 1-2 hours a day perhaps a little more at the weekend - nothing tonight - too tired apparently. The older one did a bit more - probably 2/3 subjects a day 45mins - 1 each and he was burnt out by the final week . Trust your instinct about your own child . No point knowing every fact if too exhausted to think on the day itself

Just had email from school about revision they have recommended 1.5 to 2.5 hrs an evening and weekends 6 to 7. That's a possible 24hrs a week. Am I completely underestimating the studying she should be doing now.
I did go back and thank the school then asked what the plan is for getting the syllabus finished. DD thinks it's 3 classes that they still have learning to do.