It’s just about the end of GCSE, AS, and A-level mock exam season. You’ll probably be getting your results soon, if you haven’t already. But there’s still 3(ish) months until the day exams start – what should you do now?
Reward yourself
After your mocks are done, take a break. Hang out with friends, watch a movie, go to a restaurant – anything fun. By doing this, you’re still being productive – technically. If you don’t take a break, you run the risk of becoming burnt out and losing motivation, thereby making you less productive. Don’t tire yourself out before the actual exams have even started.
Review your results
So you’ve gotten your mock results – what now? Go over your grades to see if you achieved your targets. Look over the papers themselves as well to see what type of questions you’re getting wrong and why you’re missing marks. If you’re doing your AS or A-level exams, check that all the questions were marked correctly, since your school might take your mock results into account when deciding your predicted grades, so check that the grade is correct!
Consider how you studied
Now think about how you studied:
- How much time did you spend studying?
- What topics did you target?
- What study methods did you use?
- What worked and what didn’t work?
- What needs to be improved?
Remember to put your grades in the context of your effort. If you got a 9 in history but barely studied, there’s a chance that you got lucky – don’t get complacent! That being said, don’t get disheartened if you spent hours pouring over your biology textbook but didn’t get the grade you wanted. Right now, you can’t change your mock results, but you can change how you study for the real thing.
Set realistic goals
Now you know what you need to work to improve, you can set goals for how you want to study. Specify when you need to start studying, what study methods you’ll use, as well as what milestones you want to achieve. My goal is to start slowly studying significantly before my AS exams, especially for history.
Put it into action
Now, slowly start to put your plan into action. There’s no need to do a ton of practice papers all at once, but start to make and review some flashcards – or whatever your goal is. Try to do a little work daily so that you don’t have to cram before your exams.
