How to Revise for Grade 9s
Dear Mr Salles,
I don't know if you'll see this but I couldn't let myself go into sixth form without thanking you.
Every video you've filmed, every book you've written, every substack post you've published and every email you've sent all enormously helped me in my GCSEs.
English was undoubtedly my worst subject, but also my least enjoyable. I just couldn't understand it. I could never understand how people did so well in it, yet I struggled so much whilst excelling in every other subject.
I just didn't understand what more I could do or what I was doing wrong. In my mocks I achieved sevens, yet I was relieved with that.
I read every one of your books on literature and language and subscribed to everything you had online. You were pretty much my only teacher outside of school.
You were the reason I got 9s in both literature and language, whilst also only dropping only one mark on literature paper 2.
All your content works amazingly and I just wanted you to know that all the work you put in for the exams was more helpful than you could imagine. Thank you so so much.
Best wishes,
Tina
What I Did
Literature
For my February mocks, I did get the Kindle Unlimited free trial, but this was only a short time before the exams so I couldn't get the full use out of them. I could see the amount of information in the books was at a really good level and the analysis was really deep, so paying the money for the next few months for Kindle Unlimited was definitely worth it, especially seeing how many books of yours I used.
I did Romeo and Juliet and this was the section I prepared most on and did best in, I think because of your book on it.
I started by making essay plans for each essay that could come up, using your suggestions as well.
First I made notes from each video, just to make sure I had everything you'd talked about.
Then I would use your book to pick similar quotations and place them together, also using the in-depth analysis you had, whilst adding my own from school.
For each paragraph, I also used the content section of your book. I don't remember what they were called, but you had topic sentences in your book, that were complex, so often I used this as my introduction, as well as some parts as my conclusion.
This meant that with the full body paragraphs, I soon had a full essay. I did this for every essay that could come up, using your book and videos for guidance.
For the essays I thought could most likely come up I wrote the essay out but for the other ones I just tried to write the plan out multiple times without looking until I could remember it fully.
This meant that not only did I have valuable amounts of information in my head, but also information that I knew how to expand on and structure with similar bits of information.
My other texts were prepared in the same way - I just remember how amazed I was by the complexity of the Romeo and Juliet book, therefore I could do the most work for it.
Unseen poetry was practically unprepared for in my school, so I watched every video you had on it and the five-point method really worked for me because I went up from around 50% in my mocks to either full marks or just losing one.
For me, looking at answers really helps me because I get to understand how to structure the answer and exactly what needs to go in the answer. That's why seeing you analyse poems in real time was very helpful.
Language
Question 5 Paper 1
English language I undoubtedly found hardest and I think what really saved me were the stories on your substack and the way you looked at the answer and improved it.
I wrote 2 stories, with inspiration from your substack, which helped me know what to include and how to structure my answer, as well as the type of language I should be using.
You had a post about a mermaid story, which really helped me, as I used the same kind of storyline but with a werewolf - it worked out perfectly because the question ended up being on animals.
I used the improvements you had for the person, so my story ended up well edited.
Both stories ended up matching the themes of each paper, so for one story I pretty much wrote it out word for word from my memory.
Question 5 Paper 2
However, for the persuasive writing, I just used language from my story as well as some of your ideas from your book which had answers to different questions.
I remember in one piece of writing the theme was the environment and you made a joke about Greta Thunberg in your Ultimate Guide to Persuasive Writing, which I ended up tweaking and using in my essay.
Reading Questions
For section 1 of Language, the most helpful was reading top-grade answers to understand the structure and everything that should be included in the answer, and then writing out an answer to a different question but by using the full-mark answer. This meant I could get into my memory exactly what to say each time.
I used the full-mark answers in your books, which were incredibly helpful.
When I properly started putting in the work and using your resources optimally, that's when it really paid off.
Best wishes,
Tina
My Thoughts
I used to write guides just for students like Tina. They teach you hundreds of things you don’t learn in class.
Some of you won’t want to learn the ‘complex’ ideas which so delighted her. Some of you might not like English.
So, for everyone else, I’ve started to write guides which are so simple, even someone who dislikes English and working hard can get a top grade.
It makes me so happy that there are still many Tinas in school, though. Thank you all.