Revision Tactics From One of the Top 200 Students in England!
Emily
Hi Sir,
I opened my results to see 10 x grade 9s and 1 x grade 8.
My two 9s in English are both because of your videos helping me understand, plan, and stretch my mind to think more tactically about my English papers (timings, key ideas, including key words, paragraphs).
My favourite video was your video about how Mr Hyde is actually not evil, that idea is what I ultimately used as a starting point in my exam, which enabled me to write a response to the question about not agreeing that Hyde was evil.
This response, as well as my Romeo and Juliet one, allowed me to get 100% in lit paper 1 64/64!
I genuinely cannot thank you enough for posting your videos sir, you are truly helping thousands.
Thank you so much,
Emily
Me
Wow, only 125 students in England got 11 grade 9s, so you must be in the top 200 results in the country! Amazing!
Thanks for letting me know what helped you.
What were the top 5 ways you revised or approached the papers?
I’m planning a video on this, so also let me know if you would like to be named or anonymous!
Congratulations again!
Emily
Thank you! I actually did one gcse last year so it was only 9x grade 9s and 1x grade 8 this year, but still very proud!
Top 5 ways and approach would be:
1. Making a plan before of rough themes and linking them all together with quotes, key ideas ect (as you do on your videos).
2. Ensuring that I had key “wow” words associated with each book I studied. So I had a glossary of vocabulary for each book which I learnt and embedded into my answers.
3. Also making sure I had a key thesis statement at the start of each essay to constantly refer back to and link each new idea in with. I found that this made me “waffle” less and stick to answering the question.
4. For quotes I revised by flashcards and then blurting out as many as I could remember. Also only learning quotes which had 3+ links between themes and characters.
5. Also ensuring I stuck to my timings and moved on as soon as the time ended, even if I hadn’t fully completed my conclusion.
I’m fine with being named in the video! Thanks again so much and I hope you’ve had a great summer.
Emily
My Thoughts
Emily is a classic Entrepreneur.
Just think about it. Who has the time to get 11 grade 9s? Someone who makes time. Someone who looks for systems, who looks for the smallest work which leads to the biggest gain in marks.
So, Emily pays attention in class, and does her homework. She knows how to write. She doesn’t need to write loads of practice essays.
Instead she practices the key things that are going to go in them.
She is pragmatic, and not a perfectionist. Notice that she takes my advice to move on as soon as the time is up. That can feel emotionally hard. But, it so makes sense. The marks at the beginning of the next question are really easy to get.
(I used to have an Emily at home - although he is called Harry - and he ‘only’ got 10 A*s and 100% in AS maths. He is pragmatic too).
Try this way of revising for your mocks and see if it works!
There are plenty of grade 9 essays on my guide to Jekyll and Hyde