GCSE supporting - to half term, and beyond!

[SheilaFentiman]

Making a new thread to support half term revision and the set of GCSEs afterwards!

Regarding my last comment on studying to pass or studying to learn, (I have watched two YouTube blogs now ! Can’t believe I’m doing this in-between gym and running errands) :

I take it back a little… some guy on YouTube doing degree (and got four A* at A levels) in Cambridge said yes, past papers are key! So I stand corrected. Aherm!! I guess as a sort of mental exercise it is good. And it’s good to see what’s coming up.
What I meant was, that feels like just memorisation. And you will most certainly come across a problem in a paper that you have never seen before. So you have to use your past knowledge of a topic (eg trig), and your own logic and reasoning skills to try working things out. Same as in History. Understanding Détente in Cold War is better than memorising some answers to specific questions that might come up. That’s why I think History went better than Maths yesterday.

I'm glad it went well.

I think it might vary from subject (not involved in education, just a parent), maths I think its mainly keep doing maths so past papers are a really good way to revise, probably science is the same. Not so sure about other subjects. My kids school more or less had covered the content by February and then shifted to revising topics in lessons and setting past papers as homework to hone exam techniques and spot gaps in knowledge. Seemed pretty sensible to me.

I take it back a little… some guy on YouTube doing degree (and got four A at A levels) in Cambridge said yes, past papers are key! *

Surely it's getting very used to the format and also testing what they actually know not what they think they remember.

Maths and science and welsh actually-past papers or work books full of past paper questions - work really well for DS- English and RS much harder to judge how correct the answers were.

@Letskeepgoing he MUST attempt all questions. With the writing being worth half of the marks, missing it is catastrophic.
He needs to move on even if he's not finished

I'd be grateful if you could tell me if there's a Welsh workbook you've found useful.

DS messaged to say PE went very well - he's ditched the school revision sessions (much to my disappointment) and ordered himself a birthday Deliveroo lunch. I'm still optimistic (hmmm) that some revision will occur.

You can't do all your revising by past papers, as you'll miss out details / topics.
But past papers are a good way of checking quality of learning and also your skills at pulling out / using the relevant information in the right way from your revision.

@MerylSqueak

This is one we had:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0008326940/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

There seems to be another version now with revision and workbook
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Second-Language-Revision-Practice-Collins/dp/0008227462/ref=pd_bxgy_img_sccl_1/262-7969271-1030558?pd_rd_w=RyVx4&content-id=amzn1.sym.40f919ed-e530-4b1a-8d7e-39de6587208d&pf_rd_p=40f919ed-e530-4b1a-8d7e-39de6587208d&pf_rd_r=9WQ6WEHAC2QB06MXMW05&pd_rd_wg=7flwO&pd_rd_r=15c3c268-221d-4f9f-ab91-213350442a8a&pd_rd_i=0008227462&psc=1

Which might be worth looking at - not sure you'd have to look at differences and what other books you have.

We also had this welsh revision book as well which was also good:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/WJEC-GCSE-Welsh-2nd-Language/dp/1844196887/ref=sr_1_19?crid=XQNSUVUPTS6R&keywords=wjec+welsh+revision&qid=1686226727&sprefix=wjec+welsh+revsion%2Caps%2C168&sr=8-19

Second book seemed to help particularly with first oral exam - his teacher seemed thrilled and slightly shocked how well that one went- we had p/t meeting just after.

Ah lovely! Happy birthday to your DS, and I’m glad his PE exam went well too. Sounds like a very well deserved Deliveroo lunch there. X

@DontForgetToBreathe thank you. X

I've been trying to drum into DC that so much of GCSE relies on technique. Obviously they need some knowledge, but a large amount rests on things like:
-Knowing how the exam will look before you get in the room (and how much time there is, what % the paper is worth etc)
-Allotting your time correctly
-Picking the order you attempt questions
-Reading the question
-Annotating/making a plan (for essays)
-Using technical vocabulary
-Show workings in technical questions
-PEA/PEEL paragraphs (or whatever technique)
-Bullet point your main points/conclusion if you run out of time in a question
-CHECK your answers

There are lots more, some subject specific. I'm not sure how well the school is preparing them for some of these - I'm not impressed with the endless setting of past papers with little to no marking or feedback (at best they have to mark this own papers)
I bang on about these so much in the hope that some of it sticks in their minds when they get in the exam room!!

In the beginning, somewhere last year with mock exams - DS did past papers as a way of timing himself under exam conditions. Great for practicing exam questions under pressure … but DS has become increasingly reliant on these instead of getting back to the workbooks and learning content in depth, especially with topics like urbanisation in Geography, (History was huge and needed full knowledge as they may be asked about the Berlin Airlift just as much as Berlin Wall.) There’s only so many Geography past papers available also. Biology too! So, perhaps revisit the topics instead of constantly answering brief questions (which may be a calculated guess at times!) and refresh the memory.
That was my thought on it.

@TripleDaisySummer Many thanks!

Ds delighted he will never have to sit a welsh exam again!!! Feel like the end is near now.

I wish we'd had that last Welsh revision book! It looks much better than the one I bought :( DS hasn't been well enough today to go back in after Welsh for his geography revision, although he's been studying at home. I'm suddenly wracked with anxiety about how well he's going to do overall though. Just doing the exams is a massive achievement, given how ill he's been, but we've had so little help from most of his teachers and the special consideration is so paltry. I wish he'd been able to defer them for six months or something. The timing of this illness is so blooming unfair but he was adamant that he wasn't repeating the year and the school were useless about whether that was even an option.

Sorry. As you were. Just needed a wibble.

DS still has another 9 exams left. It feels so drawn out and only Drama and English Literature are completely finished so far!

Same here- still 9 to go but a lot of it is maths (maths, statistics and further maths) so it's sort of less than if it was other subjects.

Flipping heck! Only four to go here, and two of those are tomorrow.

Altogether DS will have sat 25 exams (including spoken Spanish) as well as completing an NEA for Drama worth 60% of the total and a Spoken English assessment that is worth 0% (so quite a waste of time).

Just counted - my D’s has 9 to go . Last one on 20th

5 left here
biology, chemistry, physics, Latin & further maths on 21st…
All her friends finish on 17th so am fighting a losing battle against 2 parties that weekend.

Only 4 here left, but then ds sat some last year which makes a huge difference. Ds has just told me he has left his geography text book in school, so revision now a bit stressful for tomorrow!!

Still 8 to go here, 😅🥳 last one on 19th, so tying DD down to revise for that one when "all my friends will have finished and will be having fun all weekend" will be fun ...

6 left here, Biology, English, Business, Latin, Chemistry and Physics.