Exam Week Experience

The past week was buzzing with life on campus, especially amongst us ninth graders as it was finally time for us to put on paper, all we had learnt from the past year.

All the teachers had told us not to worry, and to help us, had provided the students with resources and work to do at home to better understand the concepts they were struggling with.

However, there was still little stress from the teacher’s side too as expectations were generally high and workload outside exams were not very reduced. The parental unit was also building up the stress as there support mainly lied towards the academics they wanted me to do best in. They were a little oblivious to some of the other subjects, which were a little harder and expected me to study for Maths and Science continuously.

I tried to manage the workload and as advised by the teachers, had created a schedule for the subjects and topics I needed to study, when and for how long with what resources. I tried to be as specific as I could be on the schedule so I could apply it better with my actual studying schedule.

I had to adapt it here and there, adding a few more hours onto topics I was having a little problem in grasping, taking away a few hours in order to fit in family-related events or other unescapable formalities.

The exam week, in general, was more so an experience for me than a finalised event which would determine my grade, but it didn’t get my attention away from the final percentage I got on all the papers. The final results allowed me to reflect on my studying techniques and made me rethink, especially on the timing I should give to each of my subjects.

I think that personally, I really needed to give more time to prepare for Chinese as I feel I don’t learn much from my teacher and need to do more questions and writing exercises outside school time, in order to achieve a better outcome on my exams and tests. This result may also just influence my parents into getting me a tuition teacher for certain subjects I am struggling with.

I think that at the end of the day, the exam week was a way of preparation and a practice for what is to come in the future for all o us, and also helps us get less nervous about the actual IGCSE examination and the mocks as well.

Overall, I am somewhat satisfied with my grades and scores I got from the internals, however, I would like to put in more effort next time in understanding concepts or topics I am not comfortable with.