How I Procrastinated Through O Levels… and Did Decently Well

Believe me when I say this, "FAILING O LEVELS IS A MYTH". Yes, you are hearing this from your former O-Level candidate. Let it be Cambridge boards, Edexcel boards, AQA or even OCR. Pardon me if you are from some other boards. I can only name these 4 and have genuine ideas on 2 of them. Cambridge and Edexcel. I pursued the Edexcel board. No specific reason at all, nor did I even go with the flow with other students, as most of them, including my friends, seniors, and juniors, chose Cambridge to continue. 

Currently, when I'm writing this, I am on the verge of ending my Advanced Levels. (Writing on Advanced Levels is also coming when I finish it and accomplish what I started with O Levels.) To talk about subjects, as a science student, I chose all 4 science subjects: Physics, Chemistry, Further Pure Mathematics and Biology. Along with these 4, I took English Language B, Bangla and Mathematics B. 

I was a typical school kid and performed more than decently in my class. I stood out among my classmates because they were not as academically inclined. However, I was in the time period when COVID-19 hit. So everything went into Lockdown, and online school started. My School was at its peak of the downfall era. I definitely cannot disagree with the fantastic things I achieved at my school. But the truth must be unleashed. 

I got to know that for O Levels, you do not need School. You just study, prepare, register with your Local British Council and give exams. Hence, I left School. I was in the eighth standard. My seniors suggested some teachers who tutor. So, I joined them. Yes, at first classes were online, but it was more than enough.

Even though I did classes, mostly what they did was teach the topics according to the syllabus and hand us past papers. Which can be easily done by yourself. Come on, it's the era of the Internet and power every information in the palm of my hand. Basically, what I want to speak directly is that you do not necessarily need tutoring. If you think you are lacking and still not understanding through online lectures and stuff, then I think you should join. Otherwise, it's a cake walk. 

One thing I really need to mention is the analysis with marking schemes. During my time, I procrastinated a lot. For O Levels, even if you procrastinate a lot of your time, you can do exceptionally well. Taking My biology for example. Even though I missed my A for 1 mark, my parents were decently happy as I scored with only few months of studying. I achieved that by mostly doing Past papers and marking scheme analysing. This is the board exams. According to what I think and have come to realise, apart from academic knowledge, they also test your adaptability. Because of the enormous students I have seen, they got marks deducted cause they were missing keywords from the marking schemes. Even though their answers were sensibly correct. It doesn't take a genius to figure that out. So, yes, matching your answers with your mark scheme is extremely necessary if you want your grades to shine. IT APPLIES TO ALL SUBJECTS. Not matching answers with the mark scheme, even though your answer is sensible, will boil your blood when you see your scripts. Trust me, I can relate, especially when you miss your A* for 2 marks in FPM. I was devastated.

Summary:  Study the topic you are studying. Let it be from a YouTube channel or your tutor. Then test yourself with the past papers. You can find an enormous amount of topical past papers pages on the internet (I'll drop them below.) For notes, I'd strongly suggest making your own notes. When you analyse with the marking schemes, you check where you did wrong and what you are missing. Make a different copy and write the points there, and write them as a structure according to comfort. If you face doubts, you can ask your tutor, or you can post it on Reddit. Trust me, you can not even imagine how helpful Reddit is.

All these are note-taking subjects, like Physics, Chemistry, Biology, etc. Talking about Mathematics and FPM, I strongly suggest practising, and nothing else. Study the math topics, practice the exercises, then get yourself familiar with exam-type questions, which is obviously done by doing past papers. The importance of past papers is undeniable. If you face problems, you are just one search away from your solutions. YouTube is where you will find it. Mention any subjects, let it be science, business, or anything. You will see any topic left off on YouTube. I can guarantee you that. For the English subject, what I mostly did was writing and reading. I read so many articles and fictional stories to get more and more ideas to improve my writing. And practice past papers ;). Past papers' role comes again!

Some pages I recommend: 

(Notes, Past papers, Topical Past Papers):https://www.physicsandmathstutor.com/, https://www.savemyexams.com/ (very limited free edition btw :(  

Reddit pages: https://www.reddit.com/r/alevel/, https://www.reddit.com/r/igcse/, https://www.reddit.com/r/Edexcel/