Y10 Revision advice from school

[differenttoyou]

Received an email today from school telling parents that a revision assembly had been held this morning for Y10 with advice for how they should study for end of year exams.

Furthermore, in response to questions from parents the following recommendations were issued:

During the half term it is recommended that the DCs should be doing approximately 5 hours of focused revision a day.

Between the holidays and exams the recommendation is for between 2-3 hours revising per evening and 5 hours on a Sunday.

They had stressed the importance of consolidating knowledge as they are now half way through their GCSE courses. The exams in question are internal exams, no external exams are involved.

Would any of your DCs devote this amount of time to study at this point or does this sound like overkill? What has been the advice from your schools?

Y10 is the time to learn how you revise best and what resources you find useful and what don't work for you.

It's the time to badger DM into buying you revision guides and your own copy of the text book when there is no guide (excel Geog we are looking at you).

It's time to learn your way round the schools computer system, if you haven't already (DDs teachers have been very slow getting to grips with it themselves, so you have to keep looking).

It's a time for drawing mind maps and writing record cards. It's a time for badgering the teacher about topics you just don't get.

Y10, now there aren't stupid modules, should be about learning how to revise in a way that suits you and finding that you have learnt the work along the way.

Y10 revision isn't measured in hours spent staring at books, but in skills learnt.

Of course DC should have learnt all this in Y8 and Y9, but they don't, certainly not completely. Because subjects they loath and are going to give up get in the way and because they haven't yet knuckled down to the compulsory ones they dislike.

Y10 is for real, use that fact carefully, do not set tar keys DCs will instantly see as impossible.

As for HT, my DDs trampoline, cycle, swim, go out for the day. See DFs, DD1 often spends three days of her 1/2 terms on music courses.

Teens don't just face book and play on their Xboxes, they have a life.

And smug teacher up thread, no DD1 won't get As she's dyslexic. If she revised 12 hours a day she wouldn't get A in written exams. (She would with 2hrs a day and a scribe, but she doesn't qualify for more than extra time).

There is more to life than A* as I know all to well.

Tar keys= targets, sorry.

Nocomet Yes Yes Yes to all that you wrote.

I'm old enough to have done O levels so I have experience of terminal exams.

We have been teaching DD revision techniques throughout secondary.

She has revision notes for all completed 'modules' for all relevant subjects.

She needs if anything essay practice, not fact learning.

She could revise 10 hours a day for the next year, and I doubt she'd get any A*.

DD1's school has end of year exams every year, they are taken very seriously. They offer useful suggestions for revision - technique, sources, support within school. That is far more helpful than saying 'do X hours a day'.

She (and I) are quite glad modules are going.

I got away with just x hours a day for my O levels, but I didn't get especially good grades for physics and maths A levels.

I'm very of bite sizes, khan academy etc. it would have been lovely to have had worked examples and animated graphs of a lot of what we did.

A youtube video or a colour coded worked example would have been so nice. My notes were messy and our maths teacher rather rusty. Not his fault our head of maths died and the Deputy HT hadn't taught for ages. A CGP mechanics book would have been bliss.

Our DCs are very lucky to have the resources they have, they need to learn to use them wisely.

DD1 has just cursed me for saying she needs to practice Geog spellings with good old fashioned pen and paper.

Well if I'd been revising for 5 hours at that age - a lot of it would have involved: playing radio 1 and singing, sneakily reading a novel, sneakily reading the "other" stories in the anthology, sharpening pencils, tidying my desk, having to sort my folder (stick ring re-enforcers on all my pages), spend ages looking for one obscure quote I thought I remembered, hunting for the correct colour notes to stick to the wall for Chemistry and so on.

As we went into one of our final exams for our degree my whole class thought we'd probably do better being tested on the Radio 1 show the previous afternoon.

Admittedly I did at A'level often do 6 hours in a day (or maybe more). As I would do one 3 hour past paper in the morning and then another in the afternoon.

Exactly 3hours, on 4 days of 1/2 term (ie 12hrs learning) is hugely more use the 5hrs x 7 days of mucking about in their rooms hating mummy and thinking their teachers are unrealistic idiots.

Y10 is for learning what you can and can't get away with, so you do a decent job in your mocks and the real thing.

It's no good forcing DCs to sit and study for hours, they need to find what works for them.

Gentle nagging is one thing, expecting DCs to give up everyday of the spring 1/2 term of Y10 is quite another.

Surely Tiggy you know how evil they will be by July if you don't give them some down time as it gets warmer.

I'm nagging today as DD has Eng lit, Geog people and drama. All of which should be nice clear Bs if she answers all the questions (as mentioned up thread her dyslexic writing means A understanding doesn't result in A grades).

So one days brushing up and crossing R's however much she says she knows it is worth it.

Very little Drama revision will be done on Thursday as she is singing and she's singing in half term too. Then a couple of revision sessions in half term, music and maths and a bit of science. She could sit science today, it's her thing and what she's doing next year.

HAHAHA

For school internal exams? No way. Yes it's work towards GCSEs but still nope.

And it does beg the question, why schools roganise year 10 exams after half term.

Both my, DC at different schools, have done theirs and got their results.

Half term is free .

Y10 exams are after half term because before half term the exam classes take priority.

Also, our Y10s sit their exams in a proper exam hall with invigilators. Can't do that while they're full of GCSE and A-level students!

AElf wrote it isn't a game, it isn't pretend. it is the foundations of the rest of their lives

Exactly why I wouldn't expect them to be revising 5 hours a day for 7 days of their holiday. My dc live very busy live, doing all sorts of varied activities, all of which contribute all sorts of things to the rounded young people they are.
How sad to think that some people think sitting staring at books all day during your holidays is a good foundation for the rest of your life. Nope - there's more to my family than that.

My dd (in Yr10) has already done her Yr10 exams (in the hall, with proper exam desks and invigilators) - they do them before the GCSEs and ASs and A levels kick in.

Yes, my year 10 probably does, however that is not happening over half term as they have had mocks for the last two weeks and so there will be a revision free week if I have anything to do with it! Unfortunately they will have other ideas..... :(

We have done the year 10 mocks but ds 1 has his science in early June

Any advice as to how long he should study for the one exam?

I was thinking of 45 mins per subject a day and test papers at the weekend or over half term (as additional revision)

Didn't there used to be revision flash cards for o levels??? Might have a google

Same here backforgood at both my DC's schools.

Rufus good luck to your DS. My friend's DS has his science GCSE then but mine doesn't, maybe it's different for triple science?

5 hours a day doesn't seem excessive, especially as it is over a limited period. They have the summer break to recharge their batteries. My DD year 8 did about 3 hours a day for a week during Easter and it didn't kill her! She's relaxing now after the end of year exams and pleased with herself as she did well.

My DDs yr10 exams were after Easter - she probably did more revision than that but over two weeks so not too intense.

DD1's school has end of year exams in mid-July, so they don't get in the way of anything else but they don't need to spend their entire half term cramming. They have also been told that they will not have homework set but will be expected to revise instead.

Thanks spottie

It is different for triple science

I'm a bit unhappy about that as it happens, he could have done triple but was put off the idea and could not do the statistics GCSE the school in their wisdom had attached to triple science

Never mind, I was bricking it through his mocks god knows what I will be like through his actual GCSEs!!

Some parents really just don't get it.

I meet dozens and dozens of these parents every September, during 6th form enrolments.

Many of them are sobbing.

Parents sobbing at 6th form enrolments? Whatever for?