This is what your teenager needs to do over the Summer
This is the time to get your s*** together
Whether your teenager is going into year 11 or year 13,
Year 10 or Year 12,
Or one of the other years at secondary school.
They should be using the Summer holidays to get prepared,
And therefore a step ahead of most other students.
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Perhaps surprisingly,
I don’t actually believe as a default the average student should be doing consistent revision throughout the Summer.
This isn’t to say a little bit of getting your notes in order over a couple weeks isn’t a recommended step.
Or to say that students who didn’t do as well as they would have liked in their end of year exams,
And are now entering a more pressurised year,
Shouldn’t have a revision plan,
But on average I do think that having a period of time with no work at all is important for most teenager’s wellbeing.
However,
I think every student,
Should be getting prepared.
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What preparation should your teenager be doing during the Summer?
Almost all students that I speak to entering into a new school year have no idea how the exams will work at the end.
This is a HUGE mistake.
Besides the obvious advantages of having more time to mentally and literally prepare for what is to come,
Understanding how you will be examined fosters a greater degree of motivation and focus.
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What information do you need to know?
The answers to the following questions for each subject is the minimum requirement for effective preparation:
- What exam board are they studying? – This question is number 1 in my list for a reason.
- How many exam papers will they have?
- How are the exam papers different from each other?
- How long are the exam papers in terms of time?
- How long are the exam papers in terms of questions (a rough number for an objective subject like maths and science and a exact number for a subjective subject like English or history)?
- For Essay Subjects Only: What is the recommend structure (number/type of paragraphs) for each of the different essay questions?
Your teenager needs to obtain this information either from Google, their school website or by emailing their Head of Year to find out what exam boards they are studying for each subject.
Once you have the exam board you can find out the rest of the information yourself through Google/YouTube/Exam board websites or your teachers.
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I highly recommend organising the answers for each subject on a separate document (printing them out and storing them somewhere organised for bonus points).
If done properly,
A student will have the basic understanding of how the exams work,
Which so many students still don’t have half way through the year.
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I hope you have a great week ahead,
Best,
Joel