actual revision for actual gcses.....

[Backintime4breakfast]

hi all. now that mocks appear to be over, wondering when yours are going to start the long hard revision slog up until May? was thinking of giving mine the rest of this term, or until half term- off but I really don't know what is reasonable. thanks!

I’m thinking after half term too. We’re away during actual half term week so I am thinking that once we’re back will be the time to crack on.

They have started revision classes. 1 hour every day at the end of school. And extra bits, questions and papers have been handed out.

DD has just finished mocks and will make sure homework is done but no further revision until half term.
Come the Easter break it will just be past papers, past papers, past papers...

DS has second set of mocks at beginning of March.

So revision for them and revision for actual GCSEs is going to pretty much blend into one!! (I'm thinking of suggesting he has a week "off" after mocks).

My DD was still completing the syllabus for most subjects until after Easter. Be guided by your school. Many run revision classes at half term & during the Easter holidays.

DS has second lot of mocks early Feb. First batch were last November. They have optional drop ins after school & lunchtimes. As he’s now decided to change his a-level choices, I think he’ll go to Chem drop in.

We have parents evening Tues & DS has A-level taster day on Thurs (he had to pick 5) and then 6th form interview after his mocks in Feb.

The school are great for exam prep, but that also comes with a lot of pressure.

School also do sessions in Easter hols

This half-term is the main one for sports matches and so more practice. If he does more than just homework I will be surprised. After the half-term break he'll have to do himself a revision timetable and get his head down.

Don't underestimate the benefits of downtime as well. My DD had 28 papers over a 5 week period with May half term in the middle. She would have gone loopy if she had started structured revision in February.

Mocks in December and second set in March. He had Christmas 'off' and the first two weeks of term. They have had revision classes after school since October. He is starting extra English tuition this week.
We are going for little and often at the moment, will start ramping up over half term.

DD2 is in y10, and DD1 did GCSEs just before the switch.
We thought in 'phases' with DD1 and set goals for each, eg

Now to end of term: Sort out skills /topics / subjects which showed the biggest issues in mocks, plus learning any topics not covered for mocks
Easter holidays to start exams: learning for all exams prior to half term, some skim learning for those after half term
First exam weeks: refresh prior to exams
Half term to end: final learning for second half exams

I think it helped to break it down with shorter term goals, but with more exams now I don't know how well it will translate for DD2 next year.

My daughter has coursework due in this week and a 2500 word essay due in Monday which she hasn’t started yet!

Mocks were also pretty poor apart from English language so she is going to have to knuckle down and we are both stressed. Can’t wait for it to be over.

DS has a second set of mocks straight after half term. He pretty much had Christmas off, we've had the first set of mocks results, and parent's evening, so it's revision for the next set of mocks now.

@FAQs
A 2500 word essay
Which subject?

General advice is to allow 25 hours of revision per subject. What we did is plan it out on a calendar, initially putting a realistic number of revision hours on each day (starting low, say just 1 hour per school day and ending up high, say 6 hours on the day before an exam, with maybe 3/4 hours per day over Easter and weekends), and working backwards to see when he had to start, which turned out to be the mid Feb half term. Then once the hours were settled, we allocated the hours to the subjects to ensure the 25 each were spread evenly. With some exams being several weeks after others, we weighted those to later in the plan. It all worked out pretty well. Lots of "fine tuning" - some days, he was planned to do, say, Maths, but had school revision" homework" instead for Physics, so we swapped them around on the calendar to keep track. It brilliantly highlighted the "pinch points", i.e. where there were 3, 4 or 5 different exams in a single week, so we had to plan around that to avoid last minute panics where it was impossible to revise in the day or two before an exam because of other exams.

@FAQs drama, she is currently in bed nursing a headache

Drama is very aptly named in our household at the minute...

Weird it tagged myself ha, yes lots of drama going on, more avoidance skill technique with overly dramatic eye rolling.

FQAs
Lord!
I would forget about mocks, homework and anything else unless it’s a component of course work that counts towards her GCSE

After half term here also in the z2020 household.

We are currently fine tuning the revision timetable and I have juggled my work diary (american Co so can shift my hours to coincide with USA hours) to be able to be around for much chivving and encouragement.
After GCSEs were off for the entire summer to decompress.
Good luck everyone.