GCSE revision

misterthrifty

Has anybody any suggestions for encouraging my son to revise for his GCSE exams?

He's a bright lad and goes to a decent school, his class work is very good but he has always let himself down in exams because he doesn't prepare. I have tried begging, bribery, bullying etc but, being 15 years old means that he knows everything and it's all very tiresome!

Any suggestions appreciated as I don't want to see him throwing his chances away.

Mr T

andycarmi

Motivation??? Find something he wants???

clairey_em

Hello,

When my older sister was at GCSE age, my parents said that if she passed all her exams, she could have my mum's car, which was a fairly new fiesta at the time, thinking that she wouldn't have a hope in hell of passing them all. Then of course, with that incentive she passed with flying colours, and they had to buy her a car, they bought her a mini in the end, as the fiesta wasn't really intended to be given away!!

They very generously did the same for me and I passed all my GCSEs and A levels.

Other friends of mine were offered money for their results, like £50 for an A, £30 for a B, £10 for a C and then nothing for anything else. Bribery seemed to be a common tactic!!

hope that helps?

clairey em x

Bennifred

misterthrifty wrote:

Has anybody any suggestions for encouraging my son to revise for his GCSE exams?

He's a bright lad and goes to a decent school, his class work is very good but he has always let himself down in exams because he doesn't prepare. I have tried begging, bribery, bullying etc but, being 15 years old means that he knows everything and it's all very tiresome!

Any suggestions appreciated as I don't want to see him throwing his chances away.

Mr T

Much sympathy, misterthrifty - it's the same in this house at the moment:wall: :wall: :wall: :wall: We're doing the bribery thing too but after an initial burst of enthusiasm DS has reverted to usual ennui. Agree that it's very tiresome and more than a little frustrating! Our school is saying they don't know what's up with this year's Yr 11s - they all seem to be living in a parallel universe

purplepurple

Hi misterthrifty... does your son know what he wants to do when he leaves school? Often the kids at my school can't comprehend that one of the main reasons for passing exams is to enable them to go onto the next stage in their education or employment..... maybe if he has a think about where he'd like to be next year... in 5 years.... in 10 years etc (I know teenagers live very much for the "now") then it might motivate him. Let him find out which qualifications he'll need to go onto 6th form... or go onto the job he wants.

Another motivating thing that my pupils respond to is looking at how much they'll earn doing various jobs, and what they can afford with it. Most of them don't know how much council tax is, how much a mortgage is, how much it costs to run a car etc etc and how much they'd have left over after these costs every month. By having this discussion, the pupils start thinking of themselves away from school, responsible for themselves and the consequences of their actions (ie: no gcse's no flash car etc etc).

Let him realise that eventually he won't be your responsibility, he'll be out in the big wide world on his own and he needs to give himself the best possible start..... at school we try to do this without preaching at the pupils... I usually do a quiz for them to work out how much they think it costs to live and then how much it actually costs. So even if he thinks he's not going to need a certain subject or gcse in it to do the job he wants to do, he'll still need it as a "pass" to go onto the next stage in his life...... At this age pupils do think they "know it all" but there's nothing more heartbreaking then seeing them a few years later and them saying "I wish I'd listened.... I wish I'd worked harder etc".

Add to that, if you fail a gcse first time round, you're twice as likely to fail at re-takes........

Blimey.. having a rant here.. sorry! :rolleyes:

silvercar

Needing to get certain grades to stay on in the sixth form seems to be motivating my son.

Gingham_Ribbon

I think you and he need to write a timetable that he has to stick to if he wants to go out, have friends round or get pocket money etc. The timetable should be managable with breaks and time to do other things as well as enough time scheduled to get all his work done.

Let him know you'll check his work and ask him questions etc so you know he's not drifting off staring out of the window etc the whole time he's at his desk.

He needs somewhere reasonably quiet and organised to do it too.

Finally, he can make notes in different colours, make charts and diagrams to help him remember. He can put key words and definitions etc on cards and stick them round the house. You can ask him random questions when he's least expecting.

He should pick things up without even realising it.

Good luck.

elaine373

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=156739


Here is an earlier thread where i basically asked the same thing, except my son does have concentration problems. Maybe there are some tips here that would help your son. My son is still faffing around but as some-one once told me, you can lead a horse to water but not make them drink it. How true this is.

lara1983

Great deal of sympathy. My sister's the same and it's driving my mum up the wall! Saying that, I'm revising for finals and look where I am!
Here are my tips:
1) A room with no distractions for him - i.e. no internet, no mobile phone etc, just paper, pens and his work. This also means not letting other members of the family stroll in and out of where he works - I always found this very distracting.
2) Don't ask him to get 'x' work done for a certain time. Revision always takes longer than you think. However, DO ask him how many subjects he has and how many weeks left until exams. This should help him to realsie that time is short.
3) Allow him an hour or two in the evening without any nagging about work at all. He is human after all.
4) I assume he's on study leave. It's a problem if no one's around to make sure he's doing it. One way of making sure he does something is by doing a mini-quiz of the day's work. If he hasn't learnt anything, at least that quiz will help him remember the few things you go through with him!!
5) Revision is boring, so it needs to involve variety. e.g. morning = maths, afternoon = something more fun like history(!), and break subjects up with short timed essays/essay plans/looking at past papers.
6) Revision guides are a godsend. I had some really good ones for science which had cute jokey notes at the bottom which summarized the page. These are a lot more succinct/accurate than your own exercise books. There were bits in those books I hadn't covered well in class and they were brill. All I did was read and read those books and got my mum to test me on parts at random every evening. I got 9A*s and 3As so I must have done something right!lol.
7) Tell him he needs to make notes to keep his concentration, otherwise he'll just nod off! Also, the best way to revise even from revision books is to make notes, then notes from those notes, reducing them further and further until they fit on revision cards you can look at outside the exam room or on the loo!
8) I don't believe in incentives like money because I don't think there's enough money in the world to make revising worth doing without an underlying motivation, but it's a personal thing. I desperately wanted to go to Oxford and knew I needed to have the grades.
However, a lot of it is down to your own disposition - whenever I have exams I can't sleep at night unless I revise all day!
In the end, my OH got VERY average grades at gcse despite being bright, then showed his true colours at a-level when he was doing subjects he enjoyed, so it really isn't the end of the world if he just scrapes through (But don't tell him that!lol)

misty

If bribery doesn't work or you can't afford it - I can't think of much that will!! What about certain people you know as an example such a body who worked hard and is reaping the rewards and someone who could have done so much better with a bit of effort.

I can clearly remember being as I saw it then nagged to revise and thinking yeah/yeah. It went in one ear and out the other. I teach in FE now and it's the same for the younger ones re-sitting, they feel they have so many more interesting things to do. However, the adults who are juggling jobs, kids etc work really hard and do very well. It's never too late to start again but it is harder. Try to remember it's not the end of the world if he doesn't pass - just bl**dy annoying. Also does he know how to revise effectively? rather than just re-reading his notes. The BBC bitesize is good for looking at certain topics. Good luck to him and all the others currently prepaing for exams.

purplepurple

Tesco are doing 30% off revision guides with free p&p if you spend over £20 on books.....

also, a brilliant book to help with revising is mind maps for kids which will help loads with remembering stuff and concentration in exams..... WHSmiths sell a good variety of mind mapping books too....really worth a look