How to Study for the IGCSE 101

I have a tendency of writing down all my thoughts in the blogs, and sometimes it can be disorganized and overwhelming to read. For a change, I want to condense everything I know about how to study for each IGCSE subject (that I have taken) into very simple steps that one can take to at the very minimum improve on one’s current grade. It must be said that my guide shouldn’t be anyone’s be-all and end-all way of study, given that I’ve not received my exam results yet. But these methods have helped me succeed in the past and should be a starting point for anyone wondering “How do you even study for *insert subject*?”. Feel free to skip to the toughest subject for you!

English Language & English Literature

The core subjects become tricky due to differences in everyone’s curriculum: whether coursework is involved, the papers one is sitting, which books are taught etc. However, I’ll try to approach this having sat the Edexcel IGCSE, studying the anthology (three sections), Of Mice and Men, Macbeth, and An Inspector Calls.

Before anything, please check the content breakdown that I’ve made because I know I was extremely overwhelmed at first too.

Language Paper 1: Time management is everything. Since you are essentially required to write semi-essays for Q4 & 5, be sure to keep an eye on the clock. Also, since the texts are standardized, make sure you take good notes of annotations and analysis of every text since the beginning, which will save you SO much time when reminding yourself what the text was about later on.

P.S. This is certainly not recommended as the only studying method, but I did list out all the past paper questions asked in previous years and narrowed down to a few texts (which hadn’t been asked for a while) and focused on studying them. In times like these, it’s nearly impossible to recall every text by heart.

As for the transactional writing, I focus more on accuracy rather than dishing out every fancy word I knew. Of course, it adds a level of jazz to your writing, but humor is a fantastic way to demonstrate your personality to the examiner, just make sure it’s not overly informal!

Language Paper 2: Essay plans! Understanding the core themes of each prose and poetry allows you to prepare or “predict” questions the examiner will ask. Another advantage of essay plans is that even if you don’t remember every point you’ve studied for a text, you’d be able to recall some bits and pieces, preventing you from forgetting the entire content. As for the imaginative piece, focus on spelling and grammatical errors to maximize accuracy.

Literature Paper 1: Arguably the most intense paper out of the four, given how you are required to complete three sections. There’s not much to prepare for unseen poetry since the text will, anyhow, be unseen. However, developing the ability to identify literary techniques will often guide you to understanding the poem (this is something that’ll develop naturally if you pay attention whilst annotating for texts in class!).

Literature Paper 2: Plays have specific characters and themes, so get started on preparing for those that haven’t come up before! Something you can consider doing, especially since the past one to two years, is preparing for questions about the interactions/relationship between characters.

Key takeaway: ESSAY PLANS! Soon, you’ll learn to live and breathe essay plans as the essential way to prepare for English. It may seem overwhelming to start, but unfortunately it is the best way to remember quotes, their meanings and techniques certain quotes use. This way, you’re also able to revise a wide range of content quickly. (Don’t procrastinate because you might end up spending an hour just doing one question)

Math & Further Math

Practice, practice, practice! At IGCSE level, you will never encounter something you’ve never seen before. Edexcel especially likes to repeat questions, testing the same concepts but changing the numbers. Yes, the last 3–4 questions will be harder but guaranteeing a grade eight or nine shouldn’t be a problem when you’ve mastered the previous questions.

It isn’t easy to tackle the problem of making careless mistakes, nor have I overcome this problem either, but I’ve realized that staying focused goes a long way to help prevent writing the wrong number or reading the question wrong. Don’t get distracted by your environment, and don’t let your thoughts drift as you write.

Personally, to prepare for further math, I repeatedly do past paper questions and if you have an idea of what the initial questions are like, skip to the last five questions of each paper to familiarize dealing with tougher questions.

Physics

I tackle physics very similarly to how I tackle math: memorize the concepts (because there’s only so much content in GCSE) and do lots of practice. Often times, the more practice you do, the more you realize how similar questions are in different papers. Calculations are usually very straightforward, so just don’t overthink! There are 3–5 markers in papers where answers are often standardized, and you can memorize them to secure you easy marks (e.g. describing how a loudspeaker works in terms of electromagnetism).

Chemistry

Arguably the easiest science out of all 3. Again, there are lots of standardized questions in each topic, so memorizing those will help significantly to boost your score. A few that come to mind immediately are: Describe how crude oil is separated into fractions, how acid rain is formed, explain the differences in melting/boiling points in ionic structures and giant covalent structures. If you do want a comprehensive list of questions, email me and I’ll organize one!

Some people may struggle with calculations involving moles, so I would recommend doing more practices and focusing on what information is provided, giving you a direction to work towards (look at the numbers’ units!)

Biology

Unfortunately, my Biology grades stick out like a sore thumb in my reports and hence is my least confident subject. It is the one requiring the greatest amount of application rather than memorizing and re-organizing of data, which is exactly why sometimes it is difficult to identify what a question is asking for. Questions are wordy and with lots of graphs to read, so keeping track of time is crucial.

Tip: Read the questions carefully!! You should understand all the command words properly before answering a question. The subtle differences between explain, discuss, describe, evaluate etc. will be significant in Biology papers.

AQA PE

Like many of my other subjects, I was good at the theoretical part of the exam, where recalling of concepts mattered most. The same goes for the theory papers in AQA PE, which is divided between paper 1 (more on physiology & movement) and paper 2 (more on social-cultural & wellbeing).

Paper 1: It’s all about memorizing. From definitions of movements (e.g. concentric vs eccentric muscle contractions, rotation vs circumduction etc.) to the principles of training (SPORT FITT), you must dedicate time to remember them. Also, it is essential that you remember sport-specific examples to a given movement, lever system or training method - this will essentially make or break your paper!

Paper 2: It is less straightforward but still involves quite a bit of memorization. The difference between this paper and paper 1 is that this paper offers you greater freedom in your answers for longer questions like the 9 or 16-markers (e.g. there are many answers to a question asking about reasons for sedentary behavior which causes obesity). Something you’ll learn to accept (despite lots of complaining) is that AQA PE mark schemes are rather ambiguous, where some marks could be treated like an AO2 in a past paper and the same point is treated like an AO3 in another. Therefore, I think it helped me significantly to look at past mark schemes and identify which points come up repeatedly for the same type of questions, so I guarantee myself a few marks if the question is asked again. For example, speaking about factors like lack of education and availability of time will almost always be a valid point in a question on sedentary lifestyle.

Practicals: Most likely my weakest aspect, given the high demand for consistent participation in all three sports and the need for you to show success in all three. Duh. However, a key tip I wish someone had told me before was to record all your games in all your sports! Having the greatest volume of video evidence (at its full length and preferably with the score shown) will maximize the chances of you scoring high because there are going to be lots of skills demonstrated in games. Don’t procrastinate because appealing for practical scores is going to be much, much more difficult than starting earlier!

AQA Religious Studies

Regardless of which paper or religion you are starting for, I believe that success in RS stems from key understanding of quotes. Make sure you go over every single specification point and practice answering about each concept in the format of your question 4’s, 5’s and 12’s so you ensure that you’re prepared for anything they throw at you. For instance, make sure you know how to answer (and prepare a quote) for a question on Jesus’ resurrection in terms of Christians’ beliefs and its influence on believers.

Tip: Could be considered cheeky, but what I did was noted down if a concept had been asked before and practice any which haven’t come up yet. Caution: This is only to get you started! It is absolutely possible that they repeat past questions but worded differently!

Spanish

Languages are always difficult to improve, and I totally relate. Something I’ve struggled with the moment I stepped foot into my new school was Spanish because, frankly, I hate listening and not understanding, conjugating and get it wrong, and not being able to convey my thoughts freely. It felt like I was at a loss of control. Regardless, if you chose Spanish and/or French as a subject, you still have to regain that control even if it’s hard.

The moment when I decided to do so was when I saw, in bold and red markings, that I had received a 52% on my Spanish assessment. To say it was a reality check was an understatement because I’d never scored so low in any test. From then on, I tried any method I could lay my hands on to deepen my connection with the subject: I signed up for Duolingo to practice listening and speaking; went on multiple websites such as language gym to practice conjugations; participated in class etc. For full transparency, I also asked my parents for a Spanish tutor because two to three Spanish lessons a week in school was not enough for me to fully consolidate the knowledge. But the accumulation of both added interactions with my Spanish tutor and participation outside of school classes allowed me to gain a significant volume of vocabulary and verbs in a short amount of time. From receiving the lowest score I’ve had in any subject to receiving the Spanish prize at the end of the academic year, I’ve learned that improving is absolutely possible if you put your mind to it! Key thing with foreign languages is exposure, exposure and more exposure! Stay in touch with the language by visiting the foreign countries’ cuisine in your city, or watching Youtube/Netflix shows on introducing their culture… Anything!

History

Good old History, arguably my favourite subject that I’ve studied thus far! I’m so grateful to have studied the topics that I had and had the sweetest History teacher ever (shoutout to Mrs Samtani!), so along the way I have accumulated some tricks to hopefully help you all too. Fortunately, History sort of follows a 60/40 rule, where 60% of your success stems from clear writing structures and 40% stems from memorising and evaluating. Let me explain.

Writing structures for most papers differ but your History teacher will give you instructions on how to answer each of them so make sure you understand every structure for every question on every paper to the very last bit of detail. Structure is essential because it determines what and how much of a specific event or a factor you should evaluate. Pro tip: For almost all evaluation questions, try to give a mini conclusion at the end of each of your three to four main body paragraphs to evaluate how significant was this certain factor/event to the lead-up of something else. When discussing the significance of the Bay of Pigs incident to the Cuban Missile Crisis, give a mini-conclusion at the end of your Bay of Pigs paragraph to evaluate: Therefore, the Bay of Pigs incident was not the most significant factor despite (state Bay of Pigs incident’s significant), YYY (another event/factor) was more important.

The cold, hard truth for History is that memorising dates, statistics and names are all crucial for your success and you have to get started early or consolidate the numbers often to remember as much as you can in all the topics. I would list out key stats to constantly revise on and make timelines to map out a visual representation of what events looked like, this in turn significantly helped me when evaluating the importance of events as one causes the other. Unlike other application-based subjects, dedication and discipline get you very far in History! So what are you waiting for? Get working!

Final thoughts

Obviously, I have a lot more to say for every single subject because it’s impossible to list out all the experience and knowledge I’ve retained from the past two years. That would be the length of a research paper in and of itself! With that being said, I’ve listed essential tips and tricks that I used on a weekly basis to hopefully give some of you a direction to start working towards. Especially for subjects like English and Hisotry, lots of my friends and myself struggled to memorise and study for them so this condensed list was definitely something I wish I’d seen before starting revision. If there are any points which you are cofnused about or would like to understand further, please do not hesitate to comment or email me as I would happily help. Future blogs will deviate further away from GCSE things as I progress through new stages of my life so please let me know if there’s anything else you all would like me to address about GCSE!

Thanks for reading, and see you all in a bit.

-Winnie 07/08/2024