Emily Hughes was a maths teacher and Head of Maths for 15 years, and now runs myrevisionplanner.com together with her husband Paul, who was a teacher for 16 years. She is the author of the GCSE Survival Guide For Parents. Here’s her advice for the final pre-exam stretch.
Advice for parents
Make home a sanctuary: Do anything you can to take the load off your teen. They are under huge pressure, so give them a few weeks off from unloading the dishwasher or other chores. And maintain normal life: if they normally play football with mates on a Thursday evening, stick to the routine. Hobbies offer a mindful reprieve from the academic pressure.
Prioritise sleep, nutrition and hydration: The night before an exam, the most important thing is to get a good night’s rest, so help to implement a sleep hygiene routine. If your teen is worried they won’t sleep, exercise can help to tire them out, or switching off with a silly TV show might be a good distraction. Make sure that you are feeding their brain the most nourishing food. The temptation when stressed can be to reach for the sugar, but slow-release foods like porridge, bananas, whole grain bread and eggs ensure stable blood sugar levels. The brain does run on fuel and a sugar crash halfway through an exam is not ideal. Encourage them to avoid sugary energy drinks and drink lots of water. If the brain is dehydrated, it really has an impact; it is akin to driving drunk.
Encourage active rather than passive revision: It is not about quantity, it is about quality. Instead of re-reading notes, suggest using flash cards and mind maps and ask them to teach you about the Cold War or Macbeth. The more actively the brain processes information, the more links it makes between topics, forming stronger memories to access when needed. There is also strong evidence for “spaced learning”: taking a break to do something completely different, then returning to the material, helps information stick more effectively. And activities that boost mood, such as playing sports, can improve motivation and wellbeing. Music can also help; a playlist can help create routine and support recall.
Work with their brain: For teens with a diagnosis of dyslexia or ADHD, there are lots of ways to revise that don’t involve having to read actively. If they are dyslexic, have them record videos or voice notes for themselves rather than writing a bunch of notes. If they have an autism diagnosis and you know they need a rigid structure to work with, help them by creating a rigid structure. With ADHD, finding ways to gamify revision helps because it is all about the dopamine.
Play the long game: The exams are a six-week slog. If your child is working solidly all the way through, they will be shattered. They need a recovery period in the middle to give them time to reset, reflect on the papers they have done, and work out what to focus on in each subject. Over the half-term break, encourage them to take a couple of days to just switch off and relax; maybe treat it as a work week, working 9-5 from Monday to Friday, then taking both weekends off to rest.
Praise the effort rather than the outcome: Keep reassuring them that you are proud of them, whatever happens. Say: “I know how hard you have worked today; I am so proud of you.” Try not to compare with siblings, and ask them directly if there is anything you can do that will help, and anything not to do because it stresses them out, for example, asking how the exam went. If you both feel that you are nagging, ask how you can better support them.
Be as positive and encouraging as possible: Remind them that grades do not define them. If it does not work out, they can retake exams, choose different A levels, or open doors to other things they might not have thought about doing before: a different qualification, a foundation year at university, or a degree apprenticeship rather than university. There are so many different pathways for young people now.
Advice for teenagers
Focus on past papers: Exam technique matters as much as cramming knowledge. It is not just what you know; it is whether you can show it. At this point, the absolute best way to revise is past papers. Use the mark schemes to mark your own work, so you become familiar with what the examiner wants and what easy marks you may have missed out on. The more familiar you are with exactly what is wanted, the better. It’s not like a pub quiz where there is a one-word answer: you have to be able to explain and show what you know. I use the analogy of a driving test in which the instructor needs to visibly see that you are obviously looking around you, checking for other vehicles, in order to pass. And the mark scheme really helps you understand what they want you to say.
It’s never too late: Even close to exam day, there are still things you can do; there always is. Identify topics you are less sure of using past papers, then make a cheat sheet: an A4 paper with notes on the topics that just won’t stick. Keep distilling and reducing it and use that to focus revision in the immediate run-up. You can do the same with formulae or quotes you have to memorise. Last-minute reminders do help, so take it with you on the day and re-read it when standing in the queue for the exam. Then you can do a quick brain dump on rough paper when you are allowed to start writing.
Focus on exam-day strategy and mindset: Your state of mind when you go into the exam has a massive impact. If you are stressed out, it is not going to help you. Breathing is key. Pause for a moment on your way in and take a couple of deep breaths, which will do a lot to slow things down and soothe adrenaline. Be time-aware. If it’s an hour-long paper for 60 marks, that is a mark a minute, so a five-mark question should take about five minutes. Have a fair idea of how long you have got.
Don’t forget the golden rule: As a teacher, I used to write RTFQ on the board, meaning Read The Full Question. Then read it again. It is easy to misinterpret the question if you skim read and make assumptions. And some exams ask you to answer two out of three questions, so knowing which bits you are supposed to answer is important because you don’t get bonus points for answering all three. If you finish early, go back and check that you have answered what they are looking for.
Ask: Can I add anything? Have I done anything daft? Have I shown my working out in the case of maths? There is always something more you can do. You are stuck there till the end, so make the most of every minute.