In the cold and dark days of December and January the warmth of the summer months can seem a very long way away. As teachers, we know that the exam period comes around much sooner then we’d like. However, most of our students, who are entering their first official exam period, still think they have […]
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For the first few years of my teaching career, I would set revision lessons without much expectation. If you were going to do a test, you should at least give some chance of success by providing the lesson before for ‘revision’. I would often provide a list of suggested activities that students could pick from: […]
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With exams looming on the horizon, David Shanks is back to share his top 4 exam preparation tips for teachers… With just six short weeks remaining until the speaking examination window opens, we are firmly in the ‘home straight’ as we head towards the first sittings of the long-anticipated “more challenging” 9-1 MFL GCSE exams […]
Read moreIn a previous blog post , I listed five errors pretty much guaranteed to make teachers scream. In the first part of this blog , I explained how students could overcome four of them, but never explained the last one. In this blog, everything should become clear. Again, feel completely free to share with your students – in fact I would positively encourage you to. […]
Read moreTaking exams is like wiping your bottom. It’s not the point of the exercise, but it’s a very important part of the process. In my last blog , I listed a few errors are almost guaranteed to make us teachers scream. In this blog, I’ll explain how students can avoid the errors and even how they can write […]
Read moreOur regular blog author, Jill Carter, has prepared some revision tips and advice for your students – pass it on! You have two English Language exams so get clear about what each of these requires. Look for patterns so you can prepare more effectively for both. For both exams, you will need to be able […]
Read moreOur regular blog author, Jill Carter, has prepared some revision tips and advice for your students – pass it on! You have two English Language exams so get clear about what each of these requires. Look for patterns so you can prepare more effectively for both. For both exams, you will need to be able […]
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Planning and teaching the new GCSE (Eduqas A at my school) has highlighted the importance of the AO3 objective: ‘apply knowledge and understanding to interpret, analyse and evaluate geographical information and issues and to make judgements’. My Year 10 students have been developing their AO3 skills but many have struggled to include everything required in […]
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I am able to commit a huge amount of information to memory in a very short space of time. I can memorise the order of a shuffled deck of playing cards in less than 2 minutes, a list of 240 random words within a 15-minute time limit and, given an hour, I can memorise the […]
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Extended writing is becoming more important at GCSE where the new specifications are demanding students to think at a higher level and to structure their written answers. As a result, I have been trying some techniques with my current Year 10 students that I hope to integrate into our new GCSE schemes of work. Explode […]
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