Here at Tutor in a Box, we are big supporters of using past papers. For revision, they’re like gold.
But for past papers to work, we need to make sure students are ready for them by ensuring a student has learnt the topic and mostly understands the material.
Past papers are a great way to support revision and we highly recommend using them to familiarise students with the type of questions that will come up in exams, and provide guidance on the way they should be answered. They are the equivalent of a ‘test drive’ for exams, and the good news is that you can do more than one!
With the lead up to exams, this is the perfect time of year for students to start practising with past papers, helping students discover what they already know and where there are gaps in their knowledge. It’s one of the reasons schools do mocks – they’re helpful at working out what level people are at and what they know/don’t know.
There are many different ways to implement this technique into a learning environment such as, getting students to complete a paper a week in a non-pressured environment and then asking them to mark it themselves, explaining answers as you go. Sitting past papers under exam conditions is another way to prepare students for what is to come. Alternatively, students can do this independently and test themselves at home.
You can find past papers online, by searching on Google for things such as ‘Edexcel Maths Past Papers’ but here are some helpful sites that do all the work for you linked below
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Exams in 2022 – everything you need to know – The Education Hub (blog.gov.uk)
