Mock Exams: Your Ultimate Guide to GCSE and A-Level (2023)

FAQs

How to prepare for GCSE mock exams? ›

They might set exams they think are the same level as official exams, but actually turn out to be much harder. You may find mock exams harder for some subjects, and the same level for others. It is difficult to predict what your real exam will look like – and to predict how hard mock exams are too!

If you are found to have cheated in your mock exams, or have broken the exam regulations in any other way, it will be dealt with internally by the school. However, it is important for you to understand that during your real exams, the school MUST report any instances of wrongdoing to the awarding body.

Rather than revising one subject for seven hours in one day, it's better to do one hour of revision for seven days. This is because the time in between allows you to forget and re-learn the information, which cements it in your long-term memory.

The main use of mock exams is to show you and your teachers what grade you are currently working at, and how you perform in exam conditions. If you fail, don't worry – your teachers will help you identify the main issues in your performance and what you can do to improve.

A practice of 10 to 12 mock tests per week will make their preparation thorough.

“Also, some students cheat on their mocks. For both reasons, mocks have very little validity.” Despite being an @AQAMaths exam marker, when marking as a teacher I mark more harshly; students take note of their incorrect work more than their correct work. Also, some students cheat on their mocks.

How many students cheat on tests? ›

One of the most thorough studies, carried out by Dr. Donald McCabe, reveals that about 95% of polled students (both undergraduates and graduates) admitted to having cheated in some form.

Mocks are an excellent opportunity to identify the areas you may need to work on before the exams proper. You may be thinking 'I already know what I'm struggling with - I don't need exams to show me' but you'd be surprised how frequently students fail to successfully self-diagnose without the help of exams.

Revise a topic, then revisit it the next day, after three days, and after seven days. This is thought to be the perfect amount of time to help your brain remember information.

Planning is the key to effective revision. Reports from WhatUni agree that four to five weeks (around a month before your first exam) is the minimum time you should set yourself to revise. So if your first exam is in the middle of May, you might want to start revising during or just after the Easter holidays.

Ideally, studying should start at least five days in advance of the exam to allow students an ample amount of time to go over course concepts and materials, and reach out to their instructor or peers if they find they have any questions.

Why use our Mock Exam Correction Service? The average turn-around time for the return of corrected scripts is three weeks.

According to The Student Room, students revise 15 to 20 hours per week for their exams, which might sound a lot until you break it down. You've probably worked it out for yourself, but the recommended time equates to three to five hours of revision per day with weekends off!

GCSEs are seen as evidence of work ethic - and you need a really strong one of those to cope with studying at Oxford or Cambridge. Our guesstimate is that the average successful applicant has around eight 8/9 grade GCSEs under their belt.

How rare is it to get all 9s in GCSE? ›

how did it go? It's also important to remember that it doesn't matter if you don't end up getting all 9s. 8s-6s are still great grades (and even if you just pass that's fine since that's all most employers will ask for anyway at GCSE Level). Only the top 5% will get all 9s.

It is never to late to start doing the work. But, it's much better to start doing the work today than it would be to put it off until tomorrow, next week or the day before your exams start.

Instead, aim for 30–45-minute sessions with short breaks in between and ideally no more than 4 hours of study time per day. This way, you'll have more productive bursts of revision, rather than trying to cram multiple subjects for hours on end and potentially create more stress for yourself.

The absolute minimum time you should start revising for your GCSE's is a month away. This is because you need time to safely learn all of the facts and figures for your exams, and you can't fit all of that information in your brain in a month!

Only use a mock (or test double) “when testing things that cross the dependency inversion boundaries of the system” (per Bob Martin). If I truly need a test double, I go to the highest level in the class hierarchy diagram above that will get the job done. In other words, don't use a mock if a spy will do.

In general, mock exams can be a good indicator of real exam results, and are much more important now that coursework is no longer counted towards final grades. But it's important to note that there is a lot of learning and revising to do between their mocks and sitting real exams.

Inaccurate mocks causing false-negatives

The confidence you have gained through this test is false confidence. In this case, using a mock to test the code is actually worse than not testing the code at all, because if you hadn't tested the code, at least you wouldn't have any false confidence in it.

3) Do not take 2 mock CATs in a day in order to increase your mock test count. It is meaningless to take mock CATs when you are tired. And you are definitely kidding yourself if you have taken a mock CAT, analyzed it and are not tired at the end of it. Mocks have the capability to make or break a year's CAT attempt.

The test results do not affect your actual grade however lots of emphasis and value are associated with the test.

Regular practice of mock tests makes one aware of one's strengths and weaknesses, the time one takes to solve the question, and mistakes committed. One can easily document the mistakes and abstain from repeating them. It also helps to keep a track of our performance and improve day by day.

How do you get through mocks? ›

Cheating includes, but is not limited to: lying; copying from another's test or examination; discussion at any time of questions or answers on an examination or test, unless such discussion is specifically authorized by the instructor; taking or receiving copies of an exam without the permission of the instructor; ...

Cheating on exams is lazy.

Success takes hard work, persistence, dedication, diligence, and willingness to sacrifice. Cheating and trying to find the easy way out just doesn't help you learn and develop these traits. If you persist in laziness (and cheating), you will continue to find it hard to attain your goals.

This work demonstrated that 64 percent of students admitted to cheating on a test, 58 percent admitted to plagiarism and 95 percent said they participated in some form of cheating, whether it was on a test, plagiarism or copying homework.

Most high schools will also put any cheating allegations on a student's record. Colleges will be able to see this and may not want to take a chance on a student that was caught cheating in high school. They may think that they will just continue to cheat their way through college.

Cheating on tests and copying on school papers can lead to serious repercussions, from failing grades or suspensions to college rejections and loss of scholarships.

GCSE Mock Exams

They cover the same topics as the actual GCSE exams and offer students a chance to familiarise themselves with the exam format, timing, and style of questions. Typically, they take place in Year 11 in December or January, a few months before the actual GCSE exams, which are taken in May or June.

Mock exams are often conducted using past papers, but you should also be able to get more papers from your school or the exam board to help you revise. This shows you the kinds of questions that are likely to come up and helps you to feel more prepared when exam day comes.

When choosing a test double, we need to consider what we want to test and how we want to test it. Fakes are generally used to improve performance by avoiding external calls. Mocks are used to verify the behavior of our code. Stubs are used to provide data that our code needs to run.

The 3 R's of Revision: Review, Reread, React/Reshape.

How to do revision with ADHD? ›

Avoid distractions

Alternatively, try the pomodoro technique. The pomodoro method helps to break your revision session down into manageable chunks. For example, if you have 2 hours to revise, break this into four 25-minute sessions with 5-minute breaks between each session.

The most common use of 3-2-1 I've seen is in response to a reading or lesson–usually 3 things you learned, 2 things that made you curious or confused, and 1 most important thing you learned or should do with what you've learned.

They might set exams they think are the same level as official exams, but actually turn out to be much harder. You may find mock exams harder for some subjects, and the same level for others. It is difficult to predict what your real exam will look like – and to predict how hard mock exams are too!

So, if you are scoring low in mocks, either your accuracy is not up to the mark or your attempts are lower. If your accuracy is low, then reduce the number of attempts! Go for only those questions in which you have full confidence.

GCSE students (year 10 or 11) = 1.5 hours per subject per week. E.g. if they're studying 10 subjects this will be 15 hours per week. A Level students (years 12 and 13) = 4-6 hours per subject per week. E.g. if they're studying 3 subjects in year 12, this might be 12 hours per week.

It's never too early to start thinking about revision, and the earlier you begin, the more time you'll have to make sure you're as prepared as possible for your GCSEs.

It normally takes around six months to prepare to pass your GCSEs, so it's a good idea to start the process at the beginning of Year 11. However, everyone is different and some people may need to spend more time studying than others.

You should begin revision at least six months in advance of your GCSE exams. The amount of time spent revising as well as the revision focus and dedication should increase at the three-month mark, then again at the one month mark and two-week mark.

Mocks are just a dress rehearsal.

– You can try out different revision techniques to see which work best for you. – You can see which bits you know pretty well already, and which you need to revise. – You can find knowledge gaps. You won't have covered everything yet, so don't panic about them!

What is the best way to study for GCSE exams? ›

Rather than revising one subject for seven hours in one day, it's better to do one hour of revision for seven days. This is because the time in between allows you to forget and re-learn the information, which cements it in your long-term memory.

Start planning 2-3 months before your exams so you can give yourself, at the very least, 5-6 weeks of solid study time. The more time you give yourself to your plan, the more you can easily break down the work and take it in manageable chunks.

Ofqual has warned against schools over-assessing their students to gather evidence in the event that exams do not go ahead in future.

Students take mock exams on screen in their chosen subject, and these are marked by Pearson Edexcel examiners; results are then made available online via the Pearson Revise platform with marks for each question to help identify gaps in knowledge and an overall indicative grade*. What subjects are available for GCSE?

They don't count towards your final grade and yet schools repeatedly impress upon students the importance of taking them (almost) as seriously as any other exam.

What's the Main Challenge of GCSE Exams? Students tend to find GCSE qualifications difficult, but why? For the GCSE exams around 9 subjects are studied, some take less, but there are students who take up to 12. The biggest challenge for students is to balance the workload they will face when taking their GCSEs.

GCSE Geography

The subject also includes creating and examining models as a part of the learning process. The pass rate for GCSE Geography in 2022 was 72.7%. This indicates that the subject is relatively easy and has a higher success rate than some other easier GCSEs.

Two months is plenty of time. Are these for your GCSEs? Make a plan, prioritise your weaker subjects and spend a decent amount of time revising each day (also remember you've got the long Easter break coming up where you can a lot of work) and you'll be fine.