5 Top Tips to Prepare for Year 10
As we head towards the end of the summer term, Year 9s begin to feel the fear as they realise they are starting their GCSEs. As a parent, there is a lot you can do in advance to help your young person to start the year prepared, here are my 5 top tips:
1. Know your young person’s learning styles and what works best for them.
I’ve written quite a lot about learning styles, which you can read about here. Remember that all young people are different and they need different ways to study. For example, if your young person is a visual learner then you need to get them multi-coloured pens and get them mind-mapping!
You can get my free VARK questionnaire when you sign up to my mailing list here.
2. Know their weaknesses.
You’ve had the end of year assessments and you’ve been given the grades. Have you actually seen the papers? If not, ask for it! Then work out where their weaknesses are and work on it.
3. Make sure they have the correct equipment.
Do they have a scientific calculator and do they know how to use it? Over recent weeks I’ve been focussing on calculator use, you can see it all on my YouTube channel.
What about compasses? I’ve made a video about using compasses here:
4. Understand about the GCSE.
It’s so different from when we were at school. Do you know how many papers there are? What about grades? Get prepared by learning all about it and know what your young person will be sitting.
5. Use the 6 weeks summer break.
Rest and relaxation are extremely important and MUST be factored in. Learning happens when we rest and the brain gets to process. However, six weeks is too long and you run the risk of them forgetting important facts. Therefore they should do a bit of work each week, it’s a great way of improving their weaknesses I mentioned earlier.