Is it too early for an A level support thread!

[HereWeGo2023]

Hello all, apologies if there is already a thread but I can’t find one.
May had finally rolled around and the first exam is a mere 2 weeks away. Exam stress has hit our house! It’s feels like everything is about waiting at the moment - waiting for the predicted grades, waiting for the uni offers, waiting for the exams to start, and then the long wait for the results!
This is our youngest DD but the first one in further education so would love to chat to other parents going through this

Oh dear. Ds1 also did Aqa physics this morning, waiting for him to come home (and then I have to be all casual and not pounce on him)

Same here - he will have come out about 2 minutes ago.

I’m so with him as he does these exams, I’m feeling it

He’s a bit concerned about the hot days as the hall gets really heated and has no windows

Someone on TSR is claiming that the AQA paper was leaked on Twitter at 7.30am?

DD did Eduqas sociology and it's the first paper where she's actually come out buzzing and felt it had gone really well. She's got two more left now English poetry (her nemesis) and sociology paper 3 which she expects to be quite tough, but luckily has a nice gap until Wednesday for revision.

Trolls - saying there were leaks gets a good rise out of everyone

Hope so, that would a complication nobody needs.

Yeah I think there have been supposed leaks of practically every paper that's happened so far. Not worth worrying about.

@MarshaBradyo I'm glad that next week when the weather's warmer the papers are first thing in the morning, that will help a bit. DS was in the full sun this morning and the invigilator asked if he wanted to move, but given we are in Yorkshire and it was only 14 degrees when he finished, he was able to tough it out!

Tribpot we're in Yorkshire too, I think next week's heatwave may reach the low 20s?

ds1 just came in, said it was "alright" but he was smiling

@JellyBabiesSaveLives we're forecast 25 all week, but around 21 at the point where the exams will finish each day (DS has exams Wednesday, Thursday and Friday).

Only just found this thread but DS has vilify down as his weakest of 4, maths/further maths are the only others done so far and he loves maths so I didn't worry.

He said biology "Yeah it was okay to be fair, at the back there’s 15 marks of long answer questions and they were very nice"!!

He was happy enough but disappointed nothing on the heart as that's his favourite topic!?

Break since then til chemistry on Monday

Biology - vilify!?!?

DS has done OCR and said he looked online on the way home. Everyone saying AQA was another bad one. General concensus for OCR seems to be it was lovely. Sorry for those with AQA who seem to be acting fairly twatish to the Physics students this year!

DS reckons AQA physics 2 was OK - phew! I guess the right topics came up for him.

Ds says physics was good but thinks next week’s one may be the harder one for him

It was OCR so that fits with pp

@Hellohah @MarshaBradyo
My son also thought the second OCR Physics was a lot nicer than the first

It's 25 here and much hotter in the sun - I looked at my daughter wearing a cardi as she headed into the tube and thought 'hmmm'. Forecast to be 28 degrees for her last exam next week.

Hot here too. DS walked into school for a revision session for comp sci to find it was cancelled but no-one had let them know which was a bit of a shame. (exam is next week)

His nasty Hives have cleared up though thankfully.

DD will be in the midst of her History paper right now on Russia and the satellite states. The school made the decision for the year below to do a different topic as it is so very hard with a vast array of satellite state info and long range in time too. I lived through some it and makes me feel old having helped DD revise on Glanost!

DS back from History and saying not bad but weirdly both about Culture not Econimics/Politics etc - he's only got the History paper on Tuesday then he's done 😮

DS2 happy with AQA physics 2, lots of people online saying it was horrid but perhaps not as bad as paper 1.

DD got home from the history exam. She said it went ok but said she really doesn’t see where her A star is going to come from.
no one in our family has been to uni before and she has an offer from Cambridge. I’m trying to tell her it really doesn’t matter if she doesn’t get there, but she is putting so much pressure on herself. She burst into tears last night with the stress and I’m starting to wish she hadn’t aimed so high. I just want her to be happy :(

@HereWeGo2023 - DD said similar. The paper was fine, but questions weren’t exciting enough to reallY showcase what she could do. She knew the topics so well she could have attempted some more exciting questions!

It's stressful all round isn't it. I'm wondering the opposite- maybe DS aimed too low with the offers he firmed and accepted this week but he thinks it might be more realistic.

It's so difficult to advise but at the end of the day it's their decision. He's taking a year out so says he can always apply again through UCAS next year.