GCSE + A-level Regrets with

[@udokafintelmann6803]

Great video

[@isfakrahaman4140]

same

[@saifnielsen8210]

100% would agree on that

[@RAmjad]

Thanks man, couldn't have done it without you! You give some really solid advice

[@udokafintelmann6803]

@@RAmjad likewise

[@afraababirye]

stress relief ! thanks a lot guys

[@katana6088]

Didn't expect this collab , pleasantly surprised

[@Sam.Kramer]

11:55 so glad this was your first piece of advice, it is so true. But like you say: not just from people thinking they would never fit in, just as much people thinking they would never be strong enough to be accepted. There's only one way to find out and that is applying - you miss 100% of the shots you don't take!

[@dezlina.7813]

Collab we didn't know we needed!

[@dellonbamfo6281]

Just wanted to say thanks for saving my a levels bro🤝

[@RAmjad]

Awesome! I'm so glad that I was of some help :D

[@akhi6730]

This came on my recommended as i'm going into sixh form, bro I wrote this stuff down thanks for the info. Going to be very effective hopefully

[@KITZKP]

This really inspired me to to push myself and work more harder for the top grades. Thank you so much😁

[@valenciaflo3934]

U can either work harder a more hard, I’d go with the word harder. Dont say work “more harder” because it sounds so bad and it is wrong.

[@ImogenWhite]

New Subscriber here found from Udoka's channel. I am just going into my 2nd year at LSE. I agree about the points about friends, they are crucial to your success and happiness in so many aspects of life.

[@RAmjad]

Awesome! And yup, I learnt so much about the value of good friendships over the last few months and really want to make a video or two on it soon

[@mohammadg1851]

I feel inspired, I have just started the first week of year 11 and I’m planning how my revision will go and I found some tips in this video pretty useful thanks to you.

[@astudentstudying6199]

I genuinely didn't see this collab coming. Love watching both of your channels, great video! Can't wait to watch it. Been a bit busy so definitely need to catch up on a few videos aha

[@JadenYee]

Great advice! Collabs like this will go far 💯

[@mariyaxxrylee3304]

Love your videos already! 😄😄

[@mariyaxxrylee3304]

Very helpful thank you 🙌🙌

[@junaidur_rehman]

Great video man, even though I'm a medical student, the advice in this is very solid. Looking forward to more great content from you 😉

[@user-gi3yr1gl7j]

this was amazing, appreciate it

[@divine7168]

Yeah I pretty much just got 3-D's in science, B in english, and F in math. I pretty much haven't studied this month.

[@HasanTheNoob]

thx for this xD

[@efeoni9499]

@Udoka at least you got a 4 for English I got a U. Though like you I got all 9s and L2D*, except for a 7 in English language.

[@ghph8314]

Hi, I have just watched alot of your videos on revision and just wanted to know whether this would be good as I have just entered year 12. -Making notes in class -Transferring them to flash cards on anki and do active recall and spaced repetition -Doing practice paper questions Is this enough or should I be doing anything else. Thanks for all the great videos 👍 One of the best study youtubers I have watched 🤫😂

[@RAmjad]

Yup, that pretty much sums it up! I would suggest doing some extra work to improve your problem-solving skills if you're doing STEM-related subjects but I'll dive into that in a later video this week

[@ghph8314]

@@RAmjad Thank you very much.

[@Lebron01234]

how were your alevels results if u dont mind sharing

[@devonmck]

I'm your 4000th subscriber!

[@RAmjad]

Awesome! Thank you so much :D

[@isfakrahaman4140]

lol came hear 1 minute after uploaded

[@Saturnax]

Hi, Great video! Btw I have this thought going through my mind, what do you think about homeschooling? I’m a high school student and in the past year (first year of high school) I decided to try out homeschooling because of Covid. I really enjoyed this kind of education because you can plan the time all by yourself. Obviously the topics will become more and more complicated with the time, and I’m considering getting back to the public school. From my perspective it’s also a little bit easier to motivate to learn once you’re in the public school. What do you think? Should I come back to the public school? Like you said in the interview the school system is just intended to educate people at an average level. So should I take a risk, go for another year in homeschooling, and try being best at couple of subjects instead of many? What’s your opinion? Thanks, Max

[@RAmjad]

Hi Max! Great question but as a heads-up, take my advice with a large grain of salt because I haven't experienced homeschooling myself. Here are just a few points that come to mind, 1) I agree with you that it's easier to stay motivated in school - especially when friends around you are working or just generally the studious vibes or having a little bit of friendly competition. 2) You're right when referring to the school system and I would personally prefer getting really good at a few subjects that I know I'd be super interested in pursuing (for me it would have been maths b/c studying anything maths-related like maths, physics, engineering or computer science - doing extra maths would have set me up pretty well for that). But if you're in the US, I'm not sure what universities look for over there and it may be worth spending a little less time on maths to make a more well-rounded application. On the other hand, it can be better to do even better and get really great results in olympiads which may be more impressive to your application? I'm not sure. 3) From a social aspect, looking back, I was pretty socially awkward during secondary school but became increasingly less socially akward - especially at university b/c I made an active effort to push myself socially. I'm not sure whether homeschooling would have made a difference for me here (maybe I'd just have less experience speaking to pretty girls lmao). But my thoughts here are really ill-informed but I think it's also something worth considering. Sorry for not providing a direct answer but hopefully it's helped you take a few more things into consideration :)

[@Saturnax]

@@RAmjad Hello! Thank you for replying. I decided to begin the current school year in the public high school. Through the next year I'll see how better or worse the system will be in compare to the last's homeschooling one. I can totally agree with your opinion. 1) A little bit of friendly competition is what I needed in the homeschooling system. 2) A lot of time in the public school is simply wasted in activities such as checking the attendance list and arriving to the school each day (if you live couple of kilometers away from the school like I do) 3) In my case the socializing is not a huge problem in homeschooling because we have a special organization of high school students and because of that we meet each other every week. But of course you don't see your buddies everyday :). 4) I live in Poland where the Universities don't look at your grades but the scores of the last, final exam, at the end of highschool. That means it's probably better to stick to the couple of subjects that you're best at. I also need to consider where exactly I wanna go to the university, because In some other countries like Germany or UK it might look differently. Thank you for all the tips and hints. I became your new subscriber :) Good luck bro.

[@RAmjad]

@@Saturnax Awesome, good luck! And as for wasted time, in my school, we have 35 minutes of form time a day (15 in the morning, 20 in the afternoon) where we usually had attendance, morning announcements, etc. I just asked my form tutor whether I could just get on with work during that time and mostly ignore everything that was going on and they were fine with it. Same goes for some teachers letting me use their room to study when I was bored during break or dinner time. I hope it goes well and do keep me updated!

[@Saturnax]

@@RAmjad yea, sure there’s always a way for this haha. But the worst thing are morning arrivals to the school. My school is 10km from where I live. That means I have to wake up at 6:30 to get to the bus at 7:09. So it’s like 3 hours per day wasted for the arrivals. It’s 25 days in the scale of 10 months of school 😮. That’s a lot of wasted time. Sure we can also study in the bus and then it’s not that wasted. 😄

[@RAmjad]

@@Saturnax Oh damn! That is super long but for sure - studying on the bus works or if you're not feeling like studying then just doing some light reading about topics you're interested in with some pop books can be really fun (or just staring out the window and listening to some good podcasts). Sometimes I just didn't feel like going through flashcards during my commute so just put on a podcast (I used to listen to one about folklores called Lore quite a bit) was really fun

[@doyeonkim2068]

Hi Ray, I am a student going into L6 this year and I would like to know how you developed critical thinking skills. For example, was there a specific website or book you used?

[@RAmjad]

Ah I just released two videos on it - hopefully they're useful :)

[@tpiano1165]

Hi Rey, regarding your point on pushing yourself and the "average classroom", do you have any advice how I can push myself in maths? What are resources that you would find useful for pushing yourself? I'm currently doing GCSE's, but (I'm not bragging or anything like that) I find it quite easy. I know that I want to do a math/physics rich degree later on in life, because I love maths. Any advice/tips/resources would be greatly appreciated. Really great video.

[@quiquegamer5560]

Udoka's point of having good friends around you I completely agree because in year 8 I didn't have a good set of friends and usually bully a classmate then I get detention with the principal, and that changed my perspective on things, and now the boy that I used to bully in year 8 is now one of my best friends

[@RAmjad]

Aww that's fantastic! It's crazy how things change - one of my closest friends is someone who someone I really didn't get along with in Year 7 to 8 but we came to overlook our differences and have a bunch of fun together. Whilst we don't speak much, every time we catch up every few months, the conversations are easily over 3 hours long

[@kaladinium7337]

Hello, Ray

[@minecraftgoat158]

Hi l love ur work and am new sub what do u what when u grow up ur career

[@RAmjad]

I have no idea yet and am figuring that out but I'm super keen to make a video explaining my thought process and how I'm thinking about what to prioritize in careers 🤞

[@quiquegamer5560]

Just came from Udoka's channel great content btw nice collab

[@sebbydudie237]

Oh wow...you went to my secondary school....

[@katana6088]

Ray as someone who came from an unprivileged background , how do you believe oxbridge admissions should handle state school and private school or grammar school applications. It is clear that, those from private/grammar schools are afforded an abundance of opportunities and specialised support to give them the best possible chance to enter oxbridge, on the other hand as state schools have to cater to students of a variety of backgrounds and abilities, the more capable amongst them are not given that same guidance(An example of this could be , private/grammar schools having specialised problem solving or critical thinking classes for admissions tests).This coupled with other factors such as the plethora of contacts available to those with more privileged backgrounds , private tuition , etc... I'm sure you already know of the many other advantages they have. Now I have been thinking for a while about this topic , and it's clear its a complex issue. So what are your thoughts , should state school students be compared to other state school students and private school students to private school students?Should there be quotas for state school students?Should the best applicant at the time get in , or should it be based on potential? What's the solution to this you think?

[@RAmjad]

Hi, super interesting question and I don't have a solution here (otherwise I would have proposed it to the university long ago!) Oxbridge do use contextualised scores where they put a number on your GCSE results and prediced A-level results in context of your schools average results. I knew this to be the case and was conflicted between choosing between my local state school and Manchester Grammar (which is a private school despite the name) on a scholarship. I chose the former because I thought that if I could get predicted and achieve 4 A*'s anywhere, it'd look more impressive at my local state school. Also, for a lot of access programs and summar schools, one of the requirements is that you can't attend fee-paying school and they look at your school's performance in deciding so I chose my local state school to give me more opportunities when it came to these programs. So whilst I think good things are already being done - I haven't thought too much about the issue. One way I'm personally tackling is by trying to make all students take an active approach in improving their problem solving skills through more upcoming videos b/c talented students at state schools don't get pushed enough by their teachers to do this and fall behind their private school counterparts (who are being pushed to improve their problem-solving skills b/c their teachers see the value in it when it comes to applying a few years down the line). Hope that is a little interesting, would be interested to hear any thinking you've done around this area!

[@katana6088]

@@RAmjad I think the education system needs to put money into state schools having perhaps a designated staff member or members who are in charge of enrichment beyond the curriculum for motivated talented students.This needs to occur from as early an Age as possible , and then enter them into competitions regularly and organise training and specialised programs of study for problem solving , critical thinking and other skills or just Excellence in a subject of interest(English, biology...) , and take them on trips and other fun activities to encourage their passion.Because I think the main thing is to challenge and stretch young minds , and give them a passion to do this , because that's what makes the difference and gives the motivation to pour hours of work into your craft even when it get tough .And instill in them the confidence that they can accomplish great things if they put their mind to it.I think talented state school students lack confidence and don't realise how capable they are, I think a good analogy is a difficult problem , if you don't have confidence in yourself and believe you aren't smart enough you will give up easily , if you believe you can do it if your try hard enough(growth mindset) you will do much better.When you get them immersed in this from a young age they are able to compete with private school students.

[@RAmjad]

@@katana6088 Ah that sounds super good! Yup, most "gifted and talented" programs I've heard of at schools don't really do anything. It seems that all I can do right now is to tell those students to push themselves and stretch and challenge themselves rather than hoping that say their teachers or parents will do it for them. I will have a video coming up about why I think more people should get involved in competitions / olympiads

[@katana6088]

@@RAmjad You are a massive inspiration to me as someone from a Pakistani immigrant family aswell , trying to do the best I can to honor the sacrifices my parents have made for me , you are doing a great job 🙌

[@ummetalha8340]

Thank u guys this was pretty inspiring…. I got a 5 in English language and 7s and 8s in rest of the subjects .. want to do medicine in future.. should i retake english in the autumn?? we did not even cover both papers i feel i won’t have time while doing A levels .. 😟😨😨 plz help.. will i be penalised when applying to unis even though we had disruption in education due to pandemic??? awaiting ur response 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼

[@RAmjad]

Hi, I'm honestly not sure. I think it may be worth retaking it but I'm just a random dude on the internet, I would ask your teachers and get their opinion instead and tell them about your plans for the future and make whatever decision you feel is right

[@khojanelelala8117]

Udoka: 'E?!'

[@amnaamin6390]

can you do a video all in urdu, it would be interesting to listen and give us an insight into your South Asian side too! :)

[@RAmjad]

Ah, unfortunately my Urdu is pretty terrible so the video would be a huge embarrassment 😂

[@39.tranvantrong19]

VIETNAM HELLO