Overcompensating For The Snow By Making My Study Setup Extra Tropical 🌵🌿

28/01/2020

Yikes 😬

Break the problem down

From personal experience, life is hard and stress hits you like a tonne of bricks. Exams are coming, deadlines are forever nearing and you feel like one thing is coming at you after another and you can’t possibly finish all this in time to the best of your ability but omg everyone will be mad or disappointed if you don’t and AHHHHHHHH

Stop that.

When you are overwhelmed by stress and believe you cannot possibly succeed, face that shit objectively. Write your stress source down or talk it out and belittle it as much as you can.

For example: “holy shit I have to sit an A Level in Maths and I’ve been learning the content for less than a year all on my own. I don’t have many practice materials and that shit looks hard. I will run out of time because I also have 4 other A Levels to sit and I will fail.” (Me irl bc I’m crazy)

Becomes: “It’s a few questions on a sheet of paper. All you have to do is work on your weaknesses. You should make a timetable to prove to yourself you have time. It’s not A* or bust - do your best.”

Because that’s all it is. Take the emotions away from the problem. Temporarily take everything that’s riding on that one thing away and strip it right back to what it’s really about. Make yourself believe that it is not above you. Once you convince yourself you can do it, actually doing it becomes a hell of a lot easier.

*I’m not saying those things are not important or not a big deal. I’m saying for the sake of your sanity, make it manageable.*

06/09/2018 When you want to be productive but your 5-year-old laptop decides to take half an hour to respond and you’re stuck working on a coffee table.😑

Sorry, I’m moaning. I did get to finish the first chapter of A2 maths so I’m on par with the rest of my year ready for the 10th!

Notes aren’t the prettiest but they’re functional and ok to look at. Also thanks for the love my little account has been getting as of late!

13/09/18 My sixth form brought sweets for us!

01/02/2020 - 1/100 days of productivity

Happy February! New month, new me? I’m going to do the productivity challenge again.

My mum visited me at uni today so I spent the afternoon with her in Birmingham. I decided to condense 3 handouts from my lecture course on carbonyl chemistry onto one summary page this morning before I met her, and I finished it off after she left to get the train home.

I decided to write up the mechanism for Swern oxidation even though it’s beyond the scope of the first year course; it helps me remember the conditions if I actually know what each reagent does!

Congrats to OP on finishing finals! Also, I have to share because LOOK AT THAT CAT OMG 😍

23/6/2020

My finals are over!! Yes yes yes! I am so glad I made it through (successfully?) So here is an old photo of my cat interrupting my study session.

Good luck to everyone still studying and trying their best! You can do it and you will!!

KEEP UP TO DATE WITH FILING

No, seriously. Have a system for your binders, datestamp and label those notes you just took with the topic up top and bung them in a folder in the correct order.

I did this in year 12 and it helped a lot. I gave up on it in year 13 and just had a pile of papers that came up to my thigh from the floor across all 5 subjects. What happened? I lost all my revision materials right there.

A Levels is a lot different than GCSEs and here are some tips from a recent graduate.

It needs a lot more revision.

The jump from GCSEs/O Levels is enormous.Even though you go from having 8/9 subjects to ¾, much more studying is required. There’s a lot more to cover and all the topics are more elaborated. Overall, everything is just more difficult. Knowing this ahead of time can really be beneficial. Don’t think studying a week before midterms or exams will be a good idea because it won’t be. Your best bet would be to study as you go along.

Do not skip classes unless absolutely necessary.

The second mistake was skipping classes. So the first time I ditched, I told myself it would only happen again if it was an emergency, but alas, not the case. After my first time ditching, I almost stopped attending Economics classes completely because I thought I could study on my own, because I didn’t like my teacher. I regretted this when we had our mock, where the questions that were given to us had already been gone through in class.

Don’t waste your free periods.

I had a lot of free periods, and in all of them, I’d chat with friends, walk around the school, do nothing of sustenance, basically. These are ideal for studying or revising because you’re technically already in the right mindset seeing as you’re in school. Also, if you get enough done at school, you’ll end up having to do a lot less at home! I’m not saying do this every single time, but just realize that there’s more to free periods than social gatherings.

Pick subjects you enjoy.

Every subject is going to be difficult in it’s own way, and you’re going to most likely get fed up of everything. By picking something you enjoy, you may be able to deal with it a lot better and spend more time working on it. I spent the most time in AS on Economics because I loved it and it was so interesting to me, and much less time on Psychology just because it didn’t give me the same excitement. This was blatantly obvious when I got my AS results.

Your friend group will change,

I thought I’d be friends with the same people all throughout it. I was wrong. Over just two years, I lost a lot of people I considered to be close friends, but I also made so many new friendships. Friend groups change and it doesn’t have to be due to drama or whatever, it kind of happens naturally. Don’t be alarmed if this happens, because you’ll meet so many new people over the course of your A Levels.

Ask questions.

Don’t be afraid to raise your hand and clear your concepts if you’re confused. That’s literally what your teacher is there for! If you don’t want to ask in front of your class, ask in their office hours! It’s better to have accurate information than flipping through different books a week before the exam trying to make sense of it.

Join extracurricular activities and clubs

A Levels isn’t going to be fun if all you do is stay locked up studying. To make new friends, meet new people, just have a better time, you can join a club or an activity or something sports related! I joined like three clubs in AS and ran my own in A2, and let me tell you, it was amazing. I met people I would’ve never been friends with if it weren’t for the clubs. Yes grades are important, but some universities may prefer it if you seem like an all rounder.

If anyone has any other tips on starting A Levels please mention them! 

25/9/19 Good morning

Induction day 2 :)

I love quiet mornings that just go your way. I also love staying dry... yesterday I got soaked to the extent of having actual puddles in my still-sodden boots and I sat through three hours of talks wet through and cold haha

Kidneys - with hand-drawn diagrams!

02/09/18 - Preparing for Year 13 with a practice German essay!