0:00 Trailer
0:47 Mocks season and why people panic
3:50 Why mocks hit hard (identity vs feedback)
9:13 What mocks actually measure (knowledge, technique, state)
11:36 Revision that works (active recall, sleep, avoid cramming)
16:12 Biggest mark leaks (where marks are lost)
21:21 Build a “mistake map” (the one action to take)
24:44 What parents should do (and what to avoid)
34:41 What students should do next (simple action plan)
39:08 Retakes and why Maths and English matter most
45:01 Outro

Intro

When I used upon Mox, it wasn’t often because of the knowledge. It was more mymindset going into it. Mox can kind of act as a I don’t know wakeup call. Learning happens from themistakes. You have to use it as feedback. Yeah. Not your actual identity. At the end of the day, as a parent,don’t take it too much on your shoulders. only your child can go intothat exam and take it and do well or you know fail it. If there’s one thing and you only do onething after your mocks isthe Education Lounge podcast.

Mocks season and why people panic

So we’re back and we are in February. Yep. Which means one thing. Well, January,February, mocks. January, February. So, the people are still doing some in February. There might there might be a fewschools. Most of the kids that I know are are in the we’re in the process of doing themin January. That’s the standard time, but I think there are some schools thathave some in February. So, loosely, it’s this sort of time. Fair. Well, I mean, by the time thiscomes out, it will be Yeah. End of Feb. So, yeah. Let’s just jump into some thoughts because a lot a lot of people will beginto panic. Yeah. Um I and we’re going to give some advice bythe way like on what to do. Obviously if you’ve seen the title of this it’s going to be what to do after the mark. So wewill give some advice but um yeah so people will be some people will be panicking I assume. Definitely usuallydefinitely um there are some people who I think Idon’t know about you from your personal experiences with mocks. I don’t know how you remember this, butI just generally bombed my mocks. Like I always did terribly in my mocks and theywere like no reflection of they like as I get with certain peoplethere’s like um of a mapping point. So they they they do their marks and then it’s some indicatorof how they’ll do in the real thing. But I I don’t know if it is. I genuinely don’tremember what happened in my mocks, but you have to you have to remember it’slike what six months, no what, four months before the actual thing. Yeah, it’s not much time.It’s a it’s a lot of time to to make improvements. Make improvements. I guess it can kind of act mocks can kind of act as a Idon’t know wake up call or like like oh I need to get I I tell I tell myself that like Ifailed my mock so I could like kick myself up the backside to get me going for the real thingright um and I think it worked cuz sometimes I was like oh my god I did so badly I gotum but I literally would sometimes like not do anything during Christmasbecause it’s really I I think we alluded to It’s a difficult time to get goingagain. I feel like I don’t really get started in my Do you know?Yeah. In your year. Yeah. Until the uh the all the um activation energy thing,wasn’t it? Yeah. Um, I was full of turkey. Like I’m taking to my mocks and then I’m justlike, “Yeah, I’m full of happy uh Christmas things and not really thinkingabout, you know, exams and that kind of thing.” Yeah, we kind of spoke about it in the last the last episode about welldopamine and octoin and all that. Yeah. All that fun stuff. What is your thought on why mock exams hit some people so

Why mocks hit hard (identity vs feedback)

hard? So mock exams are I guess your first real taste of theexperience. I know that’s definitely true for 11 plus parents as well, not just GCSEswhen they’re doing mock exams. It gives at least the parents a lot of the timethe first indication of how their child is really doing. Yeah. Um, there are some schools that dothem in the summer of year 10 as well. I think that’s quite common anyway. But Iguess the traditional time when you’re taking all the exam papers is duringthose January times or uh January and February times and itgenerally gives a fairly good indication but I think it’s is dangerous to make ittoo predictive. I’ve had a few times when I’ve done really well in mocksand I got a bit lazy as a result of you know doing so wellbecause you you tend to just project forward generally for me it was always better actually to not do as well so I Iknew but is is that because when you say you get lazy and that sort of thing is that because your brain is like oh I knowthis is not real like I know it’s not the real thing I think I think there is an element of that because I always kind of I alwayssay this about exams. If you’ve got absolutely no urgency at all,then I’d say that’s sometimes a bad thing. And in mocks, I literally Ididn’t really care about them too much. Like I was just I was just like these are mocks. Like they don’t meananything. Yeah. Unfortunately, I was kind of like that with my real my real exam. I didokay, but that was my But that’s what I was like throughout. Mocks even mocks even more so, but forsome people it hits well for some people it hits a lot harder. Especially if you’re the sort ofperson where you’re I don’t know your score grades are yourscore grades intelligence is like linked to your identity. It becomes like a anego hit I guess to some people. Um, I do have some advice, some advice, someadvice, some advice, some advice. I have some advice for people in that in thatI think the main there’s a few main points. I mean, you have to use it as feedback.Yeah. Not your actual identity. Yeah. Don’t be have your feelings hurttoo much by an exam. That’s regardless of what it is. I think that’s especially in that’s important in thereal thing as well like they you know an exam doesn’t define you. Mit’s yeah it I mean your your actual learninghappens from the mistakes which we’ll come on to and we spoke about this quite a lot inyou know 11 plus and uh well several other episodes but your learning comesfrom the errors right you got a lot of learning to to do ifyou make a lot of errors well kind of I mean it depends what I you find the bigger things and then youyou work on those. Um, you need to have a bit of hidden bit of belief in yourself though cuz likedespite even if I got like an E or somethingwell like a three or whatever they do now. Yeah. Yeah. I always felt like that was a badperformance and I could do much better. M and I think for some for some childrenfor some students having the resilience to think in that way isyou know difficult that’s that’s that’s their struggle that’s the sort of thing that comes withage growing up and it usually does but comes with some selfthat’s what I mean it come that’s it comes with age like I always knew that Okay, this is athis is just a a mock. I wasn’t really like in the mental space. So, I knewthat I had not peaked and that knowledge helped helped me go, okay, well, youknow, if I bomb in this, it doesn’t really make much difference. I could go from an E to an A. Like, it’s notI I didn’t see as a big step up, but then some people do. Yeah, some for somepeople it’s like if they get that F or well you or or two or a three or afailing grade in modern terms of say to some children a four or five is bad.Yeah. And to others it’s it’s amazing. So so it’s it’s yeah it depends on onthe person and their how how they receive it depends on their personality and what they’re used to and theirexperience. Definitely. But always believe that look, it’s still amock. You can do better. Well, that’s the one thing I did well.Yeah. Again, I can’t remember my marks to be honest, but um

What mocks actually measure (knowledge, technique, state)

I think let’s look at what marks actually measure becauselike like we said, a lot of people will take it as a measurement of their intelligence or their identity and that sort of thing. What it actually measuresis how much you know at that given point in January, February. So your knowledge,the application of that knowledge, can you use it in like exam situations, exam technique, are youable to work with the timing and the pressure and the structure of the paper and that sort of stuff? And like we saidlast episode, how you’re doing, your state like sleepand stress and your confidence, your internal belief, all that sort of stuff.Um, especially for people children that age. I think itsaid something like 9.5 hours is the optimal is the amount of time thatshe asleep at that age. Yeah. Let me try and find the I don’t like it just depends on the person. I thinkmost teenagers need about 9 to 9 and a half hours sleep a night. Yeah, normally it’s between 7 and 11.They’re like growing. Yeah, cuz you’re growing and that sort of stuff a lot at age. But that’s like the thing. One of one of the biggestunlocks might not be like cram. The one of the easiest boosts might bejust sleep better and and stuff like that rather than another worksheet.Yeah. Like as in when when I bomb Mox, I when I used to bomb Mox, it wasn’t oftenbecause of the knowledge. It was more my mindset going into it. Yeah. Like it ithas a massive like if you if you stay awake trying to like revise the night before, which weobviously don’t recommend, but um that will m like you think you’relearning. Yeah. But what actually is happening is you’re making your sleep worse and youactually need space the night before to absorb information that that doesn’t go into your memory at that short period oftime. I have done some last minute revision. Yeah, I did too. But like knowing what I know now, I wouldn’tI I’ve realized now were quite sophisticated atin the way I was revising was extremely active. I didn’t realize what I was doing at the time, but I did this thing

Revision that works (active recall, sleep, avoid cramming)

called I think I was talking to Ibrahim who he he was in the medical class.Yeah, I’ll put plug it out there somewhere. Um, and I was saying I I usedto like it was a technique that I used if I had like a history exam or something with a lot of information.What I tend to do is I’d start I’d write the topic and then I just like write as much as Iknew about the topic off the top of my head before. So that active recall type thing. It it’s very much active recall. Andthen I did that for different topics and different things, especially ones that I struggled with. Yeah. And then that was my main way ofunderstanding the topic or getting a good grasp of the topic. And I did that the day before the exams and I foundthat extremely helpful. No, I’ve I’ve gone into exams and got like A’s and A stars from from justdoing that. Yeah. Well, I mean I did that for Yeah. Well, minus the I didn’t writeeverything out. Just sort of Yeah. read and hope something went in basically. So that’s well they they call it passivebut I I don’t think it’s so much passive. It’s just if you’re not making an effort to formthose to create those connection or strengthen those connections yourself,you know, going over them each new neural pathway again and again and again,retracing that’s then it it’s not getting stronger. And then with reading,it’s like reading is actually really good as in but it’s notbut that’s when you’re learning material, not when you’re about to take an exam.See, I didn’t when I was I didn’t have all this sort of help when I waskind of just left to my device. I don’t think I don’t think we generally did. It’s like sometimes I kind of think I didn’t really knowwhen we went into MOS like past papers were they were a bit of a thing but Ijust remember sometimes the teacher would give you one but it wasn’t like now where it’s like if you want to payfor data and stuff. No, I see I didn’t know how to revise and I didn’t reallydidn’t really Mhm. revise. Um I did okay. No, I got A’s andB’s. So, what what’s that the equivalent to now? Sevens and eights. Six to eight.Probably like six six seven six to sevenlike now and eight eights and nines are like a star and a star.Okay. So, like sevens and sevens and Yeah. Yeah. sixes as well. Um,so yeah, but back to what I was saying. Um, one of the biggest unlocks could just besleeping well. I know bit tangent. Um, the other things wereeating well as well. Yeah. So all that sort of stuff. Soyeah. So that’s what marks actually measure. Your knowledge, your application, your technique, exam technique, your state of mind and howwell rested and stressed and stuff you are. but they measure your where you are currently at that time.They’re not a reflection of your actual potential. As a tutor, what I really want from mystudents at this stage is to know that the time isn’t aproblem. time pressure because I think that’s one of thehardest things to fix per se getting like with somethinglike an essay writing subject like you know I’ve got the moment I was worried abouthim not finishing and you know knowing he had extra time aswell but I was still I’m still worried about it because it it’s it’s somethingthat played At the back of my mind, I was like in sessions and stuff like that. We do do timed bits, but becauseof how long takes to get going, that’s the thing. It’s kind of it’s it’sa it’s kind of annoying if you like know you have the knowledge, but you can’t apply it in time. That’sYeah. Yeah. I mean, that’s how I feel in in life generally. I’m like, I know howto do this. I just can’t can’t do it quickly. Quickly. Yeah. Let’s move on because what I want to talk about next is the

Biggest mark leaks (where marks are lost)

the biggest areas where you can lose marks, right? I tell you what, let melet me ask you a question and then we’ll see how many how many things you say that are already on my list. So,what what it’s called mark leak. So, where do you where do marks get leaked? Where doyou see mark leaks um again and again like over the last what 101 15 years? WhatSo you’re kind of asking like how many different types of errors? Well, what do you see what’s most common? What do you what do you see likewhere people lose their marks? Uh I’d say in subjects like maths and science a lot of the time it’snot showing your workings properly clearly enough and um accurately enough.Okay. or not even showing them. That’s quite a common thing in maths.Not on my list, but it’s a good one. I’d say obviously lacking key knowledge.So that if you lack knowledge, then you can’t anything. Um,in subjects like English, I see a lack of a lack of depth of analysis orexplanation. That often where people lose marks. Isee uh people misreading or misunderstanding or misinterpreting questions.Yeah, that happens across the board. Yeah, that’s one of the big ones on my list. Um Okay. Obviously like not checkingback is a big big one. Okay. Um cuz you can I I’ve had wholepapers where I I’ve lost so many marks and I’ve checked back and then I went oh I lost that mark inthat is only possible if you have if you if you’ve worked well with yourtime. Yes. No as well. So so that’s the next one. So if they’re not able to work andfinish on time and also have enough time to check back. It’s not necessarily about I mean ideally that was what thatis what you would do but like think about a math paper where youhave like a lot of marks frontloadedlike arithmetic quick arithmetic questions. You can you can bank a lot of marks quite quite early on just by goingthrough and doing those quick questions that are worth one mark and then I because there could be there could belike two mark questions that are quite long and two mark questions that you can do quite quickly. Well, I’ve always saidthat the key to foundation is getting within foundation maths. Yeah, foundation maths oris really and and actually the key to passing higher as well is to in the first 12 13 questionsget those that they’re not easy marks, but they’re just, you know, they’rethey’re tend to be based more around calculation. they tend to be a bit more foundational so they’re easier to getthrough and then you save a lot of time for those five, six markers, fourmarkers where you can maybe go into the higher grades. So students who at thefoundation level get high fours and fives thatthey they know to save a lot of time and they’re really good on their foundation. So the first 13 questions are breeze andthen they they can step it up and save energy for those.Yeah, you can questions. Yeah, which is basically what I was saying. Yeah. Yeah. I mean you could you could you couldthink of it as we spoke about the activation energy in the previous episode. You could think about it as getting in the zone like getting andthen and then building up into the longer four or five mark questionsthat take a bit more time. I’m just trying to think like where where else would you I can give you the rest of what I haveon my list. No, I must know. I I do know them though probably.Um I guess like if you don’t when you’ve done most of them if if you don’t have a good understanding of where the marks comefrom. So I find that a lot of students they’ve never really seen a mark schemeand how the marks are allocated and where they come from. And that meansthat their answers are immediately subpar when they couldexam technique. That’s s something you look at before. Yeah. Um the exam. I think my list is literally just when you’re in the examword and mocks. Great. But yeah, that is that is a good one. Yeah, there’s a couple more. Careless errors we’ve mentioned.Revising a lot but never really fixing your mistakes and reattempting. are. Sothese these are before the exam as well, not just prior to So that was kind of prior tothe exam. Um not when you’re taking it. That one is Yeah, actually.Yeah. And and similar to that, recurring mistakes, like keep making the same mistake over and over again withoutthat’s costing you marks and you’re not really fixing it. Like if there’s if there’s one thing and you only do one

Build a “mistake map” (the one action to take)

thing after your mocks, it’s to create a mistake map, right? Get basically yourcommon mistakes. Get them all down. See where you’re losing your marks. Look in the mark scheme, what they’re looking for,make them like map out for each subjects where you lose your your marks, where your mistakes are, and focus on thatbecause that’s where improvement comes from, right? the improvement will come fromfiguring out where you’re making mistakes and fixing those mistakes. Yeah, I I think that’s so that’ssometimes a good point. But what I’ve what I’ll say issometimes I think in certain subjects it’s quite difficult toEnglish is a very good example. Yeah, that that kind of means this whole whole section really.Sometimes I find that students they don’t really get what the mistake is because it’s veryit’s so technical. It’s like when you go through an English mark schemere really how it works is you’ve got those sort of technical indicators thatsomeone’s writing well. Are they picking the right evidence out? are they making the right points that they need tobut there’s a really sort of more I’d say holistic element which is are theywriting at the level that they need to be writing are they saying it in a sophisticatedmanner and that’s really for for a student with a few monthsI think that’s incredibly difficult for them to nail down yeah I mean obviously this is aeasier when it is when it’s maths then it’s like okay there’s a particular topic or math or science where it’s like therethere is one answer and that’s it English historyessay writing like obviously you have to work on your uh well your writing in general but thatis a mistake it’s a type of mistake and that would be one thing you put down on your mistake map for English orhistory or or whatever else writing subject you’re doing so it does it’s still applicable I It’s great when youcan find a mistake that’s highly applicable across multiple exams. So,one thing that a lot of students struggle with is working with formulas. So, algebraic manipulation.Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s something that you can learn is a particular skill. Um, very easy to pindown. You might need some help with it, but at least if if you if you masterthat, then it’ll help you in your math exams. It will help you in your physics exams. It will help you in a chemistryexam. Help you in your biology exam. Although there’s less of it. So those sorts of skills are reallygood. There’s also topics say maths that come up in multiple places. And if youhave a good grasp of that topic then well with that one it’s not even justwithin that subject. It will come up in chemistry and yeah physics and like ratio or something like that. Ifyou improve your grasp of ratio then yeah then it will improve several different areas.

What parents should do (and what to avoid)

So we’ve spoken quite a lot about the student experience and we’re going to come back to thatin a bit to give some more advice but just before we do that let’s talk about what the parents should do.Okay. Well let’s yeah let’s talk about what they should do and I’ll talk about what they probably shouldn’t do in a minute.But what do you think like a supportive supportive parents do differently afterMox when it comes to talking to their children, working with them and maybe revising with them or what do they dodifferently to Well, I’d say like the initial thing is if your child getshigh grades Mhm. then Yeah. praise the effort that they’ve putin. So during Praise the effort, not the outcome. Yeah.Always. Is it going to get bad or good grades? Praise the effort, not the outcome.And then criticize it if it’s they’re just not really cuz cuz like to be honest for my my parents just left me.Like they were just like, “Yeah, same. Get get on with it.” Like they they were concerned like and I kind of think itwas it was kind of funny cuz at parents evening I just oh no, that’s just awful. LikeI think everyone has that. Like shout that out again. Yeah. But everyone has that.Um even now I hear kids talking about that. Yeah. Yeah. It it is very relatable. Iwouldn’t criticize the attainment level too much. I’d be like, “Okay, you didn’tget what you wanted, but what what can we do differently in this intervening time? We’ve got we’vegot a few months.” This was so that that grade was quite bad. So we need to workquite a lot on that. Your teacher said you because a lot of the time they’ll have like a talk with the teacher.They’ll be in contact in some way especially if they you’ve got quite concerning grades.Some parents give a lot of support to their children during like a lot. Butit’s at the end of the day as a parent, don’t take it too much on yourshoulders. It’s still their responsibility. Mhm.Only your child can go into that exam and take it and do well or, you know,fail it either. Either way, like it’s up to your child. Yeah. So you’re you’re just giving themthe supportive environment in which to thrive. So yeah. So that would be in school athome. Yeah. And potentially somewhere like here. Yeah. Where we But it’s important to not thinkof it as outsourcing the responsibility and the because obviously tutors and coaches and stuff cangive you the knowledge and the tools but they can’t make you do the work. Theycan’t even make give you the knowledge. It’s what do you mean it’s well it’s like the well they can teach you the knowledgelike the well they can deliver and deliver the knowledge but whether you take itbut that’s still it can obviously it can be taught that I think I think working with atutor can can give you first first of all like it’s not completely up to thetutor like it at the end of day it’s still always up to the child the child well that’s what I’m saying you can’tthink of it as out forcing the responsibility. The child still needs to do the revision and the everything else. And a really good tutorsort of allows the child to take responsibility in some way like empowersthem. Yeah. That’s really that’s really my key goal. If if children come in and they’restruggling and they’ve got they’re bombed at their mocks, then my immediate thing is how can I get their confidenceup so they can go, okay, well, I can do better than this. Yeah, that’s what parents should do.They should just use the mock. Same as a child really. Use the mocks as information andjust help them build from from there. identify the mistakes, help them build from there and not jump ahead to likethe final grade sort of thing, but to think, okay, what we doing this week? Yeah.Chunk it, break it down into blocks. I do think sometimes schoolsthey they can be a little they don’t they’re not necessarily honest with parents.Yeah, because it shows as if they were it’s more of a save your own neck sortof thing. I think like just because it kind of makes parents think that they’re not doing their job, which is not true,but like there’s there’s times when I think in year 10 I’m like I can see problemsahead of time. Actually, this happens has happens a lot. I can see the warning signs. Um,and the school might not be completelyhonest in like they might say, “Oh, I was doing fine.” Yeah. They’re comparing it to 30 other children. It’s like, “Yeah, if they’refine, you know, they might be in the middle or in the bottom 40% or whatever,but yeah, they’re doing okay.” Well, the I I get it from an educator’sperspective. They don’t want panic to set in and I think that is important,but Definitely. I think as a society generally we need to be better at receiving you knowfeedback and not the best news at times. My child is struggling or yeah yourchild is in danger of failing this exam.They’re not applying themselves early on. They’re not doing this or they’re really really struggling with this. Theyneed extra support. That comes back to taking it as an ego hit.Yeah. Because that’s why people don’t like bad perceiving it. Yeah. Yeah. So, I understand why teachers andeducators are sometimes unwilling to give that feedback, but it’s usuallya good thing if delivered correctly. Yeah. Well, that’s what parentsshould do. There are a few things they probably shouldn’t do and some of them we have seen. Umyeah, especially at school. Well, and here and here as well. Sothings like labels, labeling your child this or that. Yeah. Which is why I don’t necessarily alwaysagree with label them with ADHD, label them with this, label them with that, because it becomes part of their identity. Um andit puts them into a fixed mindset, not a growth mindset and all that sort of stuff. So, I don’t necessarily agree with labels. It’s useful if you needextra time on an exam, but the label thing. Yeah. Um, comparisons,comparisons with siblings. Yeah. Comparisons with their friends. That that is very common. Yeah.Why Why is he having so much trouble? He’s like his brother just sailed through these and I hear that a lot.Yeah. But people are different. Um, people have different skills in different areas. Not everyone’s going to fit into one needle box. That’s not howlife is. So, don’t know if I’ve seen this, but threats, but it’s kind of they No, to be fair, Ihave seen it like I’ve seen it like as in if you don’t do your revision or if you don’t getthis grade, you’re like your PlayStation’s going. I’ve seen that sort of I’ve seen I’ve seen I’ve seen that like forest.Yeah, I’m talking about now like now. No, but as in I guess it doesn’t change like this has always beenbut in it’s like a it’s competitive.The thing is competition is is good competition in depending on how it’s done can Ispark spark improvement but when it’s yeah when it’s done in anegative way that doesn’t really build you up that’s something that youobviously shouldn’t do. I think when you’re learning a subject, competition isn’t particularly helpful. Like forachieving a high level in a subject really it’s more your interest in likefirst of all it’s your interest in the subject but it’s also like the desire to do the best that you can for yourselfand that’s probably the most like competition is justyou know it’s it’s a substitute for that. It’s a weak.It’s a weak form of a lot of people say it’s a weak form of motivation.Like Cristiano Ronaldo wouldn’t be as as good without Messi and that sort of thing. And I guess in that waythere’s a different context. Yeah. But it’s uh it’s still about performing. Yeah. But they’re they’re literally in acompetition sport. This is true. You can’t apply competition sport to like doing a biology exam. But it’s likethose those two um they believe that it’s also a lot of self-belief. Soyeah, but this is what I’m saying. The things literally the things that parents shouldn’t do are the four or five thingsthat bring down the the child’s self-belief. Yeah, that’s I think that’s what you can take awayfrom it is if if the thing you are doing labeling, comparing, threatening to take away stuff they enjoyis taking away from their self-belief improving,then you shouldn’t be doing it. Okay. Okay. So, just to wrap up, well, just before the wrap-up, we’ll talk

What students should do next (simple action plan)

about back to the students and and what they should be doing like advice advice forthem to what to do next basically. So, we’ve spoken about the map, the mistake map and the biggest mark leaks um andthe self-belief and selfidentity side of things. And we’ve spoken a little bit about the state of mind, thesleep, the rest, and that. Let’s just go on to some finalbits of advice. So, what students should do, do you want me to go through my listor do you want to jump in? Yeah, go you can add to it. So, fix the biggestgaps first because there’s going to be, you know, 10 subjects. Each subject isgoing to have several different gaps and your brain will want to fix all of it immediately.You should be targeting the biggest weaknesses first. Counterintuitive because what people want to do is like,oh, I’m good at this. Usually, usually if they’re good at it, they enjoy it. And that’s what they want to do. Is what they should be doing isthe opposite. Finding the biggest biggest gaps and fixing that first, nottrying to fix everything at once. And you build up from the biggest gaps up to the smallest problems.Yeah, I think getting to add to that because sometimesin my experience the big especially the I’d say lower level students the onesthat are more trouble they they really need proper detailedfeedback like they that’s the thing they don’t actually know what to work on like ifyou if you were to ask like the average foundation student Well, like what topics are you struggling with and thatkind of thing. They often might not know exactly.There’s there’s there’s a distinction that I’ve seen here. There’s two different questions. It’s what topicsare you struggling with or what are you struggling with is thecorrect question. A lot of times I see people say what do you want to go over?Yeah. in in in a session and that’s depends on the student how they answerthat because if it’s but we’re talking about the student that you’ve just spoken about that that that type of studentor regardless I think the question should be what are you struggling with the mostwhen you go into a classroom or whatever rather than what do you want to go overbecause what they want to go over is things that they’re already good at. Yeah. And that’s just again back to the wholeego thing. you you want to be going over the thing you’re weakest at, not the thing you already know how to do.I have like a a slight caveat. Okay. Um when I if there is a student who’sfailing across the board Mhm. I like to find what they’re good atthat to build up the confidence. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think the confidence comes first.That’s true. Yes. So the confidence thing first, but when you feel when you already have that confidenceYeah. Yeah. You don’t want to continue to be going over stuff you already No. Yeah. Yeah. And it also depends on the time frame.Like if you’ve got 3 months left and you your confidence have been hitafter the mocks, you can do a few weeks of building up confidence. But you do need to target thoseYeah. weak areas because otherwise you’re going to end up getting the same mark you got in the mock. I think forcertain students they do need targeted help, tuition, whatever. They needguidance. They need guidance. Yeah. Yeah. They should also so it’s kind of linked track one improvementper subject like one target, one topic, usually the biggest one for eachsubject. And again, you can map this out into a, you know, a nice little wall map orwhatever you want to, however you want to do it. And you should be looking at exam questions weekly at this stage.And I think also the mark scheme to see what people what the examiner is looking for, how it’s how the two marks,four marks, five marks are broken down. Yeah. And basically reverse engineering youranswers to get the marks. Yeah. I’d say as well for

Retakes and why Maths and English matter most

specifically for students who are on the foundation track or they’re struggling abit more. Yeah. Um there’s a lot to be said actually forprioritizing maths and English because it feeds into everything else. So there’s that and so there’s thatelement. But I think the other thing is they’ve got limited time there. theremight be only so much they can do. Mhm. And if they hit all of the like seven,eight subjects, they might they might struggle with that workload to get it,you know, get it to the point where they’re actually excelling in all of them or whatever. Um, but they willdefinitely have to retake maths and English if they fail it. And in myexperience, I’ve never talked to a retake student and they’ve gone, “Oh, thank God I’m retaking this math inEnglish.” Like all of them hate retaking and so they regret the fact that I didn’tpass and um because it’s it’s actually immensely difficult to pass the retakes.If you failed once, it’s more and more difficult. But why is it is that is that again down to yourself-belief thing or is it something else? It’s partially a statistics quirk. So ifyou failed if you’ve passed it first time like the pass rate of the first setof exams is higher than the retake pass ratebecause if everyone’s failed it once they’re more likely to fail it againbecause you’ve got weaker candidates all taking it. Now you think is that because of the the way it’s graded or because it’sNo, it’s just it’s just you’ve got weaker candidates who are taking taking um foundation retakes or takingretakes. They’re they’re they’re weaker. So your part is obviously going to and also I think there’s not enough timebetween if you’re doing November retakes it doesn’t really give you that muchtime to like you receive your results say in August.It’s very short runway to do November retakes. That’s why I generally recommend if you’re doing retakes atall, unless you’re very very close and you can pull it out of the bag. Um, takethe summer ones because you know you got a bit more time. You’ve got a whole year to mature. You got a whole year to learnthe content. Although you probably again they want to do be doing other things. So like generally you want to avoidretaking. It’s It can be like I know students who they’ve retaken like twothree times. It’s not fun. No, it’s not.It’s not fun. No. All of them hate it. Yeah. Because you get again it’s a label. You get put into a into a box andyou’re labeled as someone who Yeah. didn’t pass or can’t pass or whatever it is. And that’s a it’s a spiral, isn’tit? Like it’s an incredible achievement when they re retake and they pass. like it’sit’s because they’ve failed it one time and it’s really really like I said it’sstatistics are against you generally if you but that’s just because of the thepeople going into it so it’s not really a fair it’s not everybody you’re the statistic is from the people thatdidn’t well you can’t you’re you can’t pick out the individual from amongst the numbersif you get what I mean like if you’ve failed your GCSE exams because I don’t know, youdidn’t have in some cases it was because the school didn’t prepare them very well. Mhm. Um literally that it was like the thechild had everything that they needed to pass, but it they weren’t prepared well enough. Yeah. And if they go into the retakes andthey’re confident and they pass, then you can’t unplug that person from the statistics. But the fact is is that ifyou are in line for a retake, you’re generally more likely to failaccording to the statistics. Now, that’s not saying anything about the individual and their levels and their potentialsand all of that. Yeah. But according that’s what I’m saying. According to the statistics, it’s because everyone in that second setYeah. are weaker in general. It should. So, you you can’t it’s not really a fair statistic. Youshould be taking everybody and then cuzbut you can’t because because you’ve taken like the bottom 10% of whatever it is and then that 10% is 100% of who’s taking the next one. Soit’s not really a fair comparison. Well, the failure rate of foundation maths forinstance is actually quite high and even in English well actually especiallyin English cuz English AQA English language isactually the I think it’s like the hardest GCSE in terms ofin terms of the the number of nines in terms of the number of eights and that kind of thing. like you’ve got fewerpeople achieving top grades in that and more people I think it’s slightly easier to pass an essay subjectssometimes if you know cuz there’s there’s some leeway in the answer and stuff like that as well I think if if you’re like getting a twoor one in English language that’s really I don’t know how it is quite like Icouldn’t say for certain and I’ve taught a long time if I had a student who wason a two yeah and in in the English language I don’t know just from knowing that thatI can get them to a grade four or five like it’s immensely difficult.

Outro

Yeah. So hopefully that was useful to everyone that’s just taken their mocks and thatthe information was useful to students and parents if you’re listening and watching. If you want help with math,English or science, we do run classes uh in person but also we can do it online. If you have any specific questions, youcan leave them in the comments down below. If you are watching us on Apple or Spotify, don’t forget to give us afollow and a rating. And we’ll see you back again next month.The Education Lounge podcast.