iGCSE and GCSE Revision Materials

It can be really tough finding GCSE revision materials that won’t cost you the earth but still at least try to keep things simple and interesting. Here’s my list for anyone that’s interested (in no particular order):

Seneca (www.senecalearning.com) – This site is amazing, practically every subject split up into interactive chapters that take 5-10 minutes each. I swear this website is the main reason I survived my GCSEs. The main site is free but if you’re willing to pay a bit their subscription services offer even more courses and specialist higher level stuff; and if you really want to shell out for it they do a guaranteed membership where they give you a refund if you don’t get above a 7.

 

BBC Bitesize – I’m sure you’ve come across this. It’s not great and tends not to go into nearly enough detail but it’s free and worth a look. It can be a bit confusing how everything is split by exam board though.

 

Grade Gorilla (www.gradegorilla.com) – Another great free site for Physics and Chemistry. Just a load of mini quizzes (mainly multiple choice) which are great for checking how well you understand something towards the end of a topic.

 

($$) Tassomai (www.tassomai.com) – I’m not the biggest fan of this site but I know a lot of people who swear by it. Lots of quick multiple choice questions but it can be rather expensive if your school doesn’t pay for it.

 

Sparknotes (www.sparknotes.com) – This is an American website covering loads of English literature in lots of detail. Their Shakespeare stuff is brilliant and includes side by side translations of whole plays. They also have loads of essay starters and commentaries, so if your set text is up there it’s well worth a look. The clickbait pop culture articles at the side can also be quite fun too (I’m sure you’ve always wondered which 20th century American author you are 😊)

 

Corbett Maths (www.corbettmaths.com) – This site has a load of resources I mostly skipped on but its best feature is the 5-a-day worksheets. 5 to 10 minutes of maths questions you can either print or copy from your computer, there’s one for every day of the year and each day has four difficulty levels and all the mark schemes up. Personally I started at the foundation level and worked my way up each day until I started getting lots wrong, but see what works for you.

 

Codecademy (www.codecademy.com) – If you study computing this is a pretty good site to learn coding and if you don’t but are still interested its surprisingly simple and mostly free, provided you can cope with the pestering to buy a premium account.

 

Quizlet (www.quizlet.com) – Flashcards, either create your own or use someone elses.

On a similar note Cram (www.cram.com) do something similar.

 

Grade Saver (www.gradesaver.com) – It’s not great but some of their poetry guides can be interesting for context. Just don’t take everything they say as gospel.

 

The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org) – Good for context but often lacking in depth. Useful for writing essays.

 

The Wilfred Owen Association (www.wilfredowen.org.uk) – If you’re doing GCSE English theres a good chance you’ll do a Wilfred Owen poem and this site offers some pretty good insight and commentaries to some of his poems, as well as some of that historical context examiners are apparently always on the lookout for.

 

Genius (www.genius.com) – Yes I know this is a pop music lyrics website but.. they actually have some half decent analysis of poems and speeches up there too.

 

Shakespeare Online (www.shakespeare-online.com) – It’s very academic in tone but these anotated Shakespeare pages are actually very helpful.

 

British Library (www.bl.uk/shakespeare) – I used British Library articles to help with my Shakespeare essays but I’m sure there’s a lot more on their site if you’re interested in reading around the subject at a high level.

 

Witches of the West End (www.witchesofthewestend.wordpress.com) – This is a really specific site but if you want ludicrously in depth blog posts proposing very radical ideas about Shakespeare plays it’s the place to go. Lots of interesting conversation starters that might give you some ideas for essays.

 

CliffsNotes (www.cliffsnotes.com) – I haven’t used it much personally but I know a lot of people like it.

 

Khan Academy (www.khanacademy.org) – I haven’t used this one either but I know people who love it and they’re maths videos on YouTube are pretty handy.

 

Duolingo – I used this outside of school to learn languages but I don’t know how effective it will be if you’re studying at school (perhaps just for practice)

 

$$ Vocab Express (www.vocabexpress.com) – We used to use this at school but I don’t know whether it’s something that will be particularly helpful?

 

The Student Room (www.thestudentroom.co.uk) – This site houses a lot of people with serious attitude problems but it also has a few gems of exam advice hidden in the forums.

 

Times Educational Supplement (www.tes.com/teaching-resource) – These resources are aimed at teachers but there are some useful worksheets up there.

 

On YouTube:

A lot of amateur dramatics groups put their performances up on YouTube and it can be helpful to see a play to understand it properly.

DoodleScience – Does what it says on the tin. Science explained in simple five minute videos with nice graphics. The GCSE specific stuff is particularly good.

FreeScienceLessons – No doubt you’ve seen him on the memes but some of this stuff is actually quite useful.. even if the constant ads for his book get irritating.

SpokenVerse – Poems read out loud. Surprising what a difference this makes.

tecmath – Some alrightish maths videos.

Techquickie – If you do computing you might find some of this interesting, and in amongst the hobbyist stuff there’s some useful explanation of computing concepts.

CrashCourse – Not specific to GCSE but very good at giving you the basics of a subject

 

You’re never going to need it but this periodic table song is quite fun: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgVQKCcfwnU&list=PLN9hbxpvgViN_MqUKHRq9PaFxoB7fyjWF&index=4&t=0s

And this truly cringeworthy equations song for physics is actually quite catchy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPm00CINCTo

 

Books:

Graphic novel adaptations of Shakespeare (with the full original text) make it easy to see the staging and keep track of what’s going on while following what is being said.

I’m sure you’ve already got them but the CGP guides are amazing, I don’t think the country would survive without them – they’re short sharp and to the point (and occasionally mildly amusing)

Again I’m sure you’ve been told it before, but printing off your specifications and working out what you’re hazy on is a really good place to start (and drawing a massively overcomplicated spider diagram of it all is a great way of procrastinating 😉)

 

Anyway I hope that’s enough to be going on with, and that you can extract something useful from all this. Best of luck with the exams! The key thing is, no matter what, try not to let it stress you out too much – it’ll all be over soon!