So sorry I've been so inactive on my blog! But I am now back with some tips on how to prepare for A Levels. For anyone living outside of the UK, A Levels are qualifications students take aged 16-18 and Sixth Form College after secondary school. In year 12 (aged 16-17) students take what are called AS Levels. They take 4 AS Levels which are effectively half an A Level. In year 13 (aged 17-18) the student will usually drop one AS Level and continue to study for 3 A Levels.
I have almost completed my first year of AS Level and before I begin my top tips I must add that everyone's experience of A Levels and Sixth Form is completely different, depending on who you are and what the 6th form is like. I personally attend an extremely academic college with over 2,000 students, which is something I expected to love.
1) Prepare for a lot more work. When I was in year 11 I heard many people tell me that A Levels were far harder than GCSEs but refused to believe 4 AS Levels could be more work than 9/10/11 GCSEs. When I first got to 6th form I still believed this as the work did not seem to intense. However, once revision started creeping up it became apparent there was a lot more contents than I had originally realised. Of course, this all depends on which subjects you take (I took English Language, Sociology, Religious Studies and Performance Studies). You may also find a lot of gaps in your work which at the time was just 'pointless homework' or 'independent study time'. Teachers will expect you to enhance your own knowledge and certain subjects will only give you the very basics. Be prepared for some extra reading
2) Utilise your free lessons. After secondary school, free lessons seem like a Godsend; a time to relax with friends and forget about your ever immanent exams. NO!!! Okay, at first most A Level students do use their free time in this way before the work load gets to intense, however as you get deeper into the year I would strongly advise spending as much of your free lessons working. By doing this you will be able to have more free time after college and at weekends for sleeping and eating, what could be better?! Just think, spending your free last lesson on a Friday finishing off some homework could completely free up the rest of your weekend...
3) Get organised!! It's best to find this out before 6th form rather than half way through AS... organisation is vital! Most sixth forms wont provide supplies so a trip to Staples may be needed. My advise for getting organised in purchasing 5 big ring binders (the ones which have the levers in the middle, I'm sure they have some fancy name which I don't know..) and leaving four at home, one for each subject, and taking one in your college bag for everything. Invest in a pack of page dividers (you will be amazed how quickly these need replacing) and divide your 'general' ring binder into your 4 different subjects. It would be a good idea to transfer the notes from your general school file into your home files ever 3-4 weeks so your notes stay clean and tidy. Of course, you don't have to follow this tip, but I would advise thinking about how you plan to organise your notes before starting A Levels. Make sure you date all your work so if your notes do get muddled it will be easy to organise them again. A piece of stationary which I believe is a MUST is a hole puncher. The amount of unpunched sheets of paper you will be given is insane and there's never a hole punch in sight when you really need one...
4) Decide what you really want out of sixth form. This is something that will be entirely dependant on who and which sixth form you go to. My experience wasn't the best, I found my college was too big too meet anyone new. Okay, that sounds like I'm completely contradicting myself, but what I found was that everyone already belonged to a friendship group and weren't willing to mingle. Some of my friends who went to small sixth forms have made tonnes of new friends, as they all socialise together. However, small sixth forms are usually part of a secondary school which can also have it's disadvantages, often you'll be treated much less maturely and you'll be surrounded by younger children. That's one thing I love about going to an independent sixth form, you get treated like an adult. I am able to leave the college site when I like and am free to spend my time how I wish. My advise is REALLY think about what you want out of sixth form. I could go on and on about this point as there is so much to say, I could make a separate article about choosing the right sixth form if you feel it would be helpful? Let me know!
I hope these tips helped you all, just enter A Levels with some of these things in the back of your mind and you should be fine! Please let me know in the comments if this article was helpful, I would be happy to do some more posts like this such as Revision Tips or Preparing for GCSEs if people wanted me too? Just pop a comment to me! I will aim to upload a new post this time next week.
Katie xx
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