‘Early mornings worked best. I was at my desk at 4.30am’: How I got 9H1s in the Leaving Cert

For me, exam preparation is centred on routine and time management. In study, always strive for quality over quantity.
By taking on nine subjects I needed to be extra vigilant with my time and how much I could apply to each subject over a given week. A weekly study timetable helped me when it came to preparing for exams.
I found that early mornings before school worked best for me. I would be at my desk at 4.30am and aimed to get at least three hours of study in. To be able to maintain this early morning routine, I had to be diligent with going to bed early. I also continued this routine at the weekend, finishing up after lunch.
This, of course, would not have been possible without making sacrifices. I was playing a lot of hockey, and had a part-time job as a barista. But the maths didn’t make sense – there simply was not enough time to study. I reduced my hours in the cafe, and stopped working fully at Christmas. I was unable to commit to school, club or provincial hockey training, and instead took up running which gave me the flexibility to take a break away from the books whenever there was a window to do so.
Irish
Listening to different dialects helped when it came to the aural. I also watched Irish TV shows, with subtitles on, and listened to popular Irish language podcasts too. With aural exam papers I started with ordinary level to get the basics, and then moved up to higher level after Christmas in fifth year.
For the oral, I planned out the answers to every possible question that could be asked in the conversation, and learned off all of the picture stories really well. Future and Modh Coinniollach verbs are extremely important in the oral, so I revised and prepared related questions thoroughly.
For the conversation, I first learned the basics and gathered up plenty of phrases that prepared me for the harder topics like technology, environment or current affairs. I also practised with my grandmother who is fluent in Irish.
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I recommend to make several pages of notes of key phrases that demonstrate your Irish “blas” that could be applied to any essay topic. Learning around 20-30 Seanfhocails that can be dropped into any essay will also help boost your grade. As opposed to entirely learning off essays, I chose to learn instead key sentences that related to various essay topics.
Chemistry
Chemistry is all about understanding, and unlike other subjects, if you do not understand the mechanisms, it is very hard to answer questions well as the exam papers draw on your understanding of the course.
I feel you have to be patient with chemistry as it can take a while for things to suddenly “click” – for me it felt like everything came together after Christmas of sixth year, so don’t panic.
Watching YouTube videos explaining the key concepts and breaking things down also really helped, and then, once the understanding is there, I would recommend to start exam papers for learning instead of just learning off the textbook or notes, as the questions are asked in a specific way, and exam technique is essential for this exam.
For the experiments, make a booklet of every experiment with key steps, apparatus, conclusions and unusual past questions that have come up.
Practise as much of the maths part of the titration question as possible as it is guaranteed every year. I would also recommend to really practise stoichiometry, pH and mole calculations as they come up time and time again.
German
A good foundation in grammar is so important, and from fifth year I had a grammar notebook filled with notes on conjunctions, word order and verbs. I also kept a vocabulary notebook on topical subjects such as the environment, sport and technology, as these regularly appear in comprehensions.
For the oral, I created a Google Doc covering every possible question that I could be asked – hobbies, German culture, future plans and then went about practising these regularly with my teacher.
Having a good oral piece prepared came in handy in the composition part of the exam too as I was able to take from what I had already learned.
The aural wasn’t my strong point, so I practised every aural available from previous years, and also listened to German podcasts to familiarise myself with accents.
I referred to various German learning websites for comprehensions, and practised reading and picking information out of paragraphs from sources such as the Goethe Institute practice exams.
Maths
Maths was definitely one of my favourite subjects. I repeatedly practised the questions at the end of each chapter, answering them one day, and then returning to them several weeks later to redo.
With the worked examples in the textbook, I learned these off to understand the mechanisms of how to answer each question.
I learned all proofs and theorems fully in fifth year and then revised them monthly in sixth year.
I looked at exam questions to determine if any patterns existed, and familiarised myself with how the questions were written.
If I couldn’t answer a question, or answered it incorrectly, I would write out the full solution (keeping these solutions as notes) and then reread over the answers as much as possible. I would then try to find similar questions to test if I had learned from my mistake. Purely doing questions worked for me: I made it fun while listening to music and treated each question like a puzzle.
English
By the time the Leaving Cert came around I had a notebook full of quotes for each poet, my comparatives and the play.
For the composition, I selected two styles I felt suited me – the personal essay and the short story. Again, as with maths, I went back 15 years or so in exam papers searching out my preferred styles – first writing a rough draft, then timing myself in writing a full piece until I found my rhythm.
My English teacher saw the benefits in planning. Her advice was to spend a minimum of 10 minutes planning each question fully, and for the composition, about 25 minutes. If I became stuck on a question I would refer back to my plan where each paragraph was broken down, quotes included, characters discussed and key points highlighted.
Economics
I found the course quite short and enjoyable, however the project took up a lot of my time. I concentrated on first researching, then compiling as much information, keeping ahead of schedule as best I could.
The written exam I feel is quite straightforward if you learn the course well. From the beginning of sixth year I made sure to check in on the news, especially with regard to the Irish economy as the exams can include what is topical.
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Physics
I found this subject quite challenging to study as there is a lot of material, formulae and experiments to learn off. I made concise notes and a recap of each chapter once I covered it in school, which meant there was far less pressure when revising.
Experiments in physics are really important as they make up a large portion of the exam, so I organised my experiments in a folder including all key information, past questions and wrote out the solutions for possible calculations.
For more difficult topics such as magnetism, mechanics and electricity, I focused on past exam questions, as they tend to repeat the same questions for these more challenging topics every few years or so.
YouTube channels such as “bitesizephysics” really helped me in understanding magnetism and electricity.
Applied maths
Similar to maths, practising and repeating of questions is the only way to do well in this exam.
Unfortunately, there were not many past papers available, so I bought the two textbooks for the course and worked my way through as many questions from each topic as possible, again trying to learn the solutions to each worked example.
I went through questions on the old courses’ exam papers that were still relevant to the new course, and I also subscribed to AM Online as a resource for more practice questions.
Applied maths now has a project to be completed during sixth year. I tried to find sample projects online, with no joy, however by learning the course well, I feel a good mark is achievable in the project.
Accounting
Practising of exam questions is by far the most effective way of learning this course, and similar to Maths, trends can be seen in past papers.
Templates are really important in accounting – without a template for each account, you will make mistakes. I practised repeatedly drawing out blank templates for each account until I knew all of them by heart. This also helped me with answering questions as the templates give hints on certain calculations.
I didn’t spend too much time on learning accounting theory until sixth year as understanding the accounts first is more important than rote learning.
Timing in accounting can be tricky so I broke down the exact amount of time I could spend on each question, and when studying, I would try to beat that time by a minute or two to give myself some breathing space.
Robin Caren (18) attended Scoil Mhuire school in Cork and is now studying medicine at UCC