Dreaming Spires Revision

Students wanted a longer holiday, so we've compromised: we're now starting the crammer on the 4th of September and will run it for just four days, from 2-4 pm daily. I blame it on CIE for scheduling the exam so early this Autumn, but it is the last one of the current spec, so probably safest exam to take in the foreseeable future in terms of track record of past papers and examiners knowing how to mark it. Let me show you the way to go! (PS This isn't me in the photo, but it is my son and my dog)

We're just two days away from the Autumn sittings for the CIE English Language IGCSE exam, and I'm already looking ahead to Spring by opening up registrations for the LIVE AND ONLINE weekly January course as well as the daily Easter crammer to help students prepare for their exams for the summer of 2018. Dreaming Spires Revision time??? I'm so excited!!!! We'll be looking at the summer exams from last year, and taking advantage of my years of experience with this exam and what examiners are looking for.  So why slog through reinventing the wheel when I can point your teens to exactly the way to focus on each question, AND mark a mock for them to help them see where they can revise more efficiently? This course is delivered live and online, and is open to students from all over the world. We regularly have people attend from New Zealand, India, Singapore, and throughout Europe. If the weekly course doesn't suit your time zone, then let me know that...

Come enter the Rafflecopter giveaway of a FREE paperback copy of my exam revision guide for the CIE 0500 English Language IGCSE exam. This guide will walk your student through each question on the higher-tier papers, giving tips, tricks, short-cuts, and advice, while also warning of pitfalls to avoid. Enter as often as you like - no string attached! Use this link:  http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/85f3ef824/?

Do you feel stressed about the CIE 0500 English Language exam that's coming up this Autumn? Come along to our daily crammer and get all the strategies to make you feel more prepared, focused, and confident. After taking Dr P's crammer course, "Wilfred" felt in control. Now taking student registrations for the daily course that's starting 2nd of October,  meeting at 8 am because nobody has anything planned then but a few extra zzzzzzs!!! What: Dreaming Spires Revision crammer course for CIE 0500 IGCSE in English Language (higher tier) Where: On your computer - it's live and online When: 2nd-6th, and 9th and 10th October, 8 am daily. Cost: £80 including mocking a mark exam (2 papers) How: Register here to receive details of sending payment Who: Only 20 of you, so don't miss the chance to get live tuition from Dr P, author of "How to Ace the English Language IGCSE" , available on ebook and paperback from Amazon.

When I mark exams, I have to be honest that I like to start with the last question and work my way back to Question 1, whether it's the reading or the writing paper. I'm not sure why I like to do this. I think it's because all the other questions are more cut-and-dried or enjoyable, while the Question 1s sometimes feel like nails on a chalkboard to me. For the exam candidate, there are some good reasons for freeing yourself from the normal conventions. In the reading paper, for example, that Question 3 listing is something you can do in a fairly short time frame, and the subsequent summary should be churned out just as fast as you can write. Free yourself from convention Both these parts of Question 3 get easier and faster the more you practise them, so I just keeping thinking: why not grab some quick points in a short time frame, and leave yourself to ponder the more laborious Question 1 with some points already in the bag? There are more complex and detailed ...

Welcome to Dreaming Spires Revision and the new series of exam tips I'm running for this year. If you're not sure who I am, my name is Dr Kat Patrick, a home-educator for more than a decade who is also a former secondary school teacher in English and examiner for the Cambridge International Board's 0500 English Language iGCSE exam. I run online crammer courses about three times a year to help coach students do their best on this exam, and have also written a revision guide that you can buy from Amazon at the link below: http://tinyurl.com/hr8bmyl On a recent Facebook discussion about UK exams, someone challenged me about why I often mention that my revision courses give tips and tricks that only a current examiner can know. The answer is simple: no matter how many past papers you download, how many mark schemes or examiner's reports you read, you'll never know the ins and outs of the way examining works unless you've been in those standardisation meet...

This may be an unnecessary post. You may know exactly where to get Past Papers for the CIE iGCSE English Language exam, but just in case, my go-to links for old papers are: http://papers.xtremepapers.com/CIE/Cambridge%20IGCSE/English%20-%20First%20Language%20(0500)/ https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0BzumkDfi9230MEF4T3FSemtmNWM Pointing you the right way Here are three things you need to know about past papers: 1) The Cambridge Board changed its "spec" or its style of questions back in June of 2015. This means any paper before that is not in the current style. 2) That being said, there are still sections of the old papers that are useful for practice. Particularly, the Question 2 on Paper 2 -- that's the one about analysing the language of a passage. That's still there in the new spec, unchanged. In Paper 3, the descriptive and narrative tasks are unchanged as well, and you can get a huge range of practice questions that would be helpful. 3) ...

Hey, everybody -- if you have a student who is doing the CIE iGCSE 0500 English Language exam in the near future (that's the higher tier option), then you'll want to get on board the raffle for a free copy of my revision guide. If you're not doing it, could you please share this giveaway on your social media?  The link below will take you to the giveaway site and tell you what you need to do, or go to our Facebook page to enter it from there:  https://www.facebook.com/dreamingspiresrevision/app/228910107186452/ a Rafflecopter giveaway

Returning for January 2017, the weekly crammer course is making an appearance again. Running on Mondays at 1 pm from the 16th of January, it spreads the 8 sessions over a longer period of time. We're also running the Easter crammer as usual -- eight straight days starting the 10th of April, at 7:30 pm. Either one is £80 to get tutored in person by the author who wrote the book "How to Ace the CIE iGCSE English Language exam." The basis for both it and the Easter crammer will be last summer's exam, so if you're revising on your own already, you might want to avoid doing that one so you come to it fresh.

STOP PRESS! STOP PRESS! Due to overwhelming requests, the August crammer that starts the 22nd is meeting at 2 pm instead of 7 pm. Remember that this is 8 days in a row, starting the 22nd and finishing the 31st. If you or someone you know is sitting the CIE English Language iGCSE 0500 (Higher Tier), please register ASAP for the last few places.

Today is the annual rite of GCSE results, and I've felt such a part of it after receiving all the lovely emails from students who took the Dreaming Spires crammer course earlier in the year. Below is just a small sample of their effusive reports, but remember that I'm teaching my online crammer again from 22nd of August (7 pm). As always, I'll be sharing all the tips and tricks from being a current examiner. If you can't make the live course, then you can get the next-best thing by buying my course book here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/English-Language-iGCSE-version-Higher-ebook/dp/B01E42XQK0/ref=sr_1_fkmr2_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1460534833&sr=8-2-fkmr2&keywords=how+to+ace+the+gcse+english+language+exam *************** “E” did your English revision course at Easter, just letting you know she got an A*. (Much to her surprise:-) ) *************** Dear Dr P, I got my results for my English language GCSE today and was overjoyed to see that I h...

THREE to give away! Follow the Rafflecopter link below to enter your chance to win a FREE copy of the new 0500 revision guide. Everyone who enters receives  a free pdf file about the importance of copywork for improving a student's writing abilities. Starting 18 April ... a Rafflecopter giveaway