How I survived my first GCSE exam

Exams can be some of the most stressful events in students life. Really important exam such as gcses, a levels, and finals can especially take a toll on your mental health. Here’s a guide on how I survived my first GCSE.

What is a GCSE?

For the Americans in my audience who might not know what a GCSE exam is, GCSEs are a set of exams that you take on a variety of subjects at the end of year 11 (or grade 10). Later, students can choose to take A-levels. These are similar to GCSEs, except more rigorous and students take 3-4 subjects. Most students will take around 8-9 GCSE subjects, each of which has between two or three exams, though there can be more or less. Because I’m good at maths, I could do my maths GCSE year early, therefore meaning that in year 11 I will be sitting my further maths GCSE.

Knowing what to revise

It’s very important to know what you have to revise. The majority of students sit mock GCSEs, and based off of these, you get a list of topics to revise. When your real GCSEs roll around, make sure that you focus your revision on the topics you did worst on during your mocks. As well as this, always have something to study lined up; you never want to be in a situation where you don’t know what to do next, and you waste precious time searching for practice questions.

Past papers, past papers, past papers

Past papers are the best way to revise for GCSEs since they give you a glimpse of what other years have gone through, and they can help you predict the questions that will come up on your test. It’s very easy to find predicted papers online, and look specifically for papers that’ll challenge you. Here’s where I got some very difficult questions for my revision. The rest of my past papers I found on revision maths, and physics & maths tutor.

Managing burnout

Although I only had to sit three exams for my maths GCSE, these very spread out timewise. There were three weeks worth of other school exams in between my first and last maths paper. I was only sitting one GCSE, but I still came very very close to burning out and being unable to motivate myself further. I was able to comfort myself knowing the fact that after the last maths paper I would be free to do what I wanted and that I only had to do a couple more practice papers before it would all be over.

Though GCSEs are incredibly important, they’re not worth sacrificing your mental health over, and you need to take care of yourself during your GCSEs.

How I motivated myself to study

For my math mocks, I received a grade 8. Although that still counts as an A*, I wasn’t happy with it because I know I could’ve achieved a grade 9. As well as this, after the first math paper I was incredibly stressed, since the questions or some of the most difficult I had ever seen. In order to motivate myself to study further, I thought about how much I want to achieve a grade 9, and how much studying and practice papers it would take for me to get there and overcome my bad performance on the first paper. Whenever I thought about giving up or procrastinating, I remind myself that just a couple more weeks of past papers, and my first GCSE would be over – I would no longer have to study as much.

Dealing with grade anxiety and stress

As I mentioned previously, I don’t think I did very well on the first maths paper, and this stressed me out a lot. Quite frankly, I (and the majority of people I know) cried after the first mask maths paper because of how difficult and stressful it was to sit. I haven’t yet gotten my maths GCSE results back, and I know that if I get a grade 8, instead of the grade 9 I was hoping for, I will be devastated.

However, I try to remind myself how important it is to not base your self-worth off of your grades. Remember, that you are not the grade 9, the grade 8, or the grade 3 or 4 you get on your GCSEs. You are a whole, complex, and beautiful human being, and no examiner can put a grade on your value.