The Official 'A Levels' Thread

AbbY

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ADMIN
Nov 20, 2008
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Ankara
Hello everyone i am interested in doing alevels private & im from rwp. I dont know procedure i check british council site & registerations are closed idk how to do this if anyone can guide me kindly inbox or drop your number. Thanks
I'd say, insted of PM, help the guy out here. It helps others queries be answered, too.
 

Ovais909

Proficient
Sep 4, 2012
566
0
21
29
Karachi
Hello everyone i am interested in doing alevels private & im from rwp. I dont know procedure i check british council site & registerations are closed idk how to do this if anyone can guide me kindly inbox or drop your number. Thanks
Registration will open in Jan/feb for may/june exams

anything else you want to know?
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
Just dropped by after a long while for a quick question:

Regardless of one's educational background, which is the easiest (and preferably the shortest in terms of syllabus length) subject in CIE A-Level to sit the composite exam? When I say short in easy and short, I'm talking about the kind of subject that can be covered sufficiently for an A/A* grade in no more than 2/3 months.

PS: I hear things about Sociology and Business Studies from some in this regard, but would like to know from people here since many seem to have had the A-Level experience.
 

murtaza12

Global Moderator
Global Mod
Oct 27, 2011
10,721
121
69
Just dropped by after a long while for a quick question:

Regardless of one's educational background, which is the easiest (and preferably the shortest in terms of syllabus length) subject in CIE A-Level to sit the composite exam? When I say short in easy and short, I'm talking about the kind of subject that can be covered sufficiently for an A/A* grade in no more than 2/3 months.

PS: I hear things about Sociology and Business Studies from some in this regard, but would like to know from people here since many seem to have had the A-Level experience.
Business studies may seem easy but it requires effort.
You have to write long answers and the answers require proper knowledge to be applied and the examiners are really stingy when it comes to giving marks.

If you've done either Business or Economics in IGCSE then you can do it, if you haven't. I wouldnt recommend it.


No idea about sociology, my school doesn't offer it and the only kids who take it are giving it privately.
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
Business studies may seem easy but it requires effort.
You have to write long answers and the answers require proper knowledge to be applied and the examiners are really stingy when it comes to giving marks.

If you've done either Business or Economics in IGCSE then you can do it, if you haven't. I wouldnt recommend it.


No idea about sociology, my school doesn't offer it and the only kids who take it are giving it privately.
Accounting?
 

moizadil

Intermediate
Jul 13, 2015
233
0
11
Just dropped by after a long while for a quick question:

Regardless of one's educational background, which is the easiest (and preferably the shortest in terms of syllabus length) subject in CIE A-Level to sit the composite exam? When I say short in easy and short, I'm talking about the kind of subject that can be covered sufficiently for an A/A* grade in no more than 2/3 months.

PS: I hear things about Sociology and Business Studies from some in this regard, but would like to know from people here since many seem to have had the A-Level experience.
Information about yourself would be really helpful.

I could personally crush a levels maths in 3 months but getting an A in economics was annoying even after studying it for 2 years. A levels maths for many is the most difficult subjects is A levels so you see how it can vary from person to person.

From my experience computer studies, accounting, business studies are the mainstream subjects one should take if you are short on time but then again that too depends on the person. I'm currently majoring in accounting and I think it's quite an easy subject if you quickly grab the basic concept (double entry).

Sent from my 0PJA2 using Tapatalk
 

Sajawal391

New member
Nov 7, 2016
1
0
0
Can anyone Help me ?

Right Now Im Studying Here In American Lyceum International Based In Model Town LHR.
They Are Offering O And A Levels
But People In My Social Circle Are Suggesting Me To Change My School.
What Are The Best Option For O And A Level ?
Tell Me The Decision I Will Not Regret.
Should I Continue Here In American Lyceum Or Should I Change My School?
What Kind Of Entry Test Im Going To Face ?
What Is There Merit For Admission And Fee ?
And Last But Not The Least I Also Have Choice To Do O Level In American Lyceum And Change My School In A Levels.
Your Valuable Input Mean Alot.
Thanks
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
Any idea what the expected date for Cambridge A-Level May/June registrations is? Kindly also share the approximate fee for an A-Level composite exam (A1 AND A2).
 

moizadil

Intermediate
Jul 13, 2015
233
0
11
Any idea what the expected date for Cambridge A-Level May/June registrations is? Kindly also share the approximate fee for an A-Level composite exam (A1 AND A2).
Registrations must be open since I remember 10 Jan being our last date to submit the CIE fee. As for the fee amount, Idr correctly.

Sent from my 0PJA2 using Tapatalk
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
moizadil;[URL="tel:2800623" said:
2800623[/URL]]Registrations must be open since I remember 10 Jan being our last date to submit the CIE fee. As for the fee amount, Idr correctly.

Sent from my 0PJA2 using Tapatalk
@moizadil
Really? Thats weird. The CIE website only mentions that registrations for Oct/Nov 2016 have closed. No mention of anything related to 2017 session.
 
Last edited:

NarutimateTaha

Only on PlayStation
Supervisor
Dec 14, 2009
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Any idea what the expected date for Cambridge A-Level May/June registrations is? Kindly also share the approximate fee for an A-Level composite exam (A1 AND A2).
The registrations info will probably be up on the website soon, because the result date for the November 2016 session is 11th or 12th January. You can follow British Council Pakistan's Facebook page; they usually post the link to the registration form when it goes up on the website. The deadline will probably be 20th January or after that this time around.

The fees is approximately 19k-22k for one subject, A1 & A2.

EDIT: Reached out to the British Council, here's what they had to say:

Please be informed that we may not be able to guide you about the registration procedure and respective fee at the moment as the registration for May/June 2017 session has not been announced yet. However, the registration will be announced tentatively in January 2017 and all information regarding your stated concern will be updated at that time. You are requested to keep visiting our website British Council | Pakistan for further updates.

Thanks,
British Council.
 
Last edited:

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
Thanks so much for the response, Taha.

You are right; I reached out to the British Council myself and got the same response via email.

The registrations info will probably be up on the website soon, because the result date for the November 2016 session is 11th or 12th January. You can follow British Council Pakistan's Facebook page; they usually post the link to the registration form when it goes up on the website. The deadline will probably be 20th January or after that this time around.

The fees is approximately 19k-22k for one subject, A1 & A2.

EDIT: Reached out to the British Council, here's what they had to say:
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
Has anyone here attempted this year (since the syllabus changes) or is planning to sit this upcoming May/June session the A-Level Accounting exam?
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
What do you want to know? I gave it in May this year and got a B. :p
Oh cool.

MoizAdil was extremely helpful in helping me finalize the subject with his assistance in the earlier posts. Since you have recently attempted the exam, you may well be able to guide me in regards to the approach to the exam and any other helpful tips to prepare for the composite exam.

I have been told that it should not be too tough for me to score an A grade given that I am an ACCA Member. Someone who attempted the exam a year back mentioned that many basic and IT related topics have been made redundant in the new syllabus since 2016 May/June session.
Rather than going through a book to cover the topics in detail, I was told that I should go through the past papers as the paper pattern is predictable in that there are certain topics that are tested 99% of the times eg. There’s always a question on Marginal/Absorption costing and one on the balance sheet/SOPL stuff which accounted for 60-70% of the marks.

Now that the syllabus has changed over the course of a year, I would ask you to comment on these suggestions given to me. Has your experience been the same and what resources/practices did you use during the preparation? I was rather too proactive and bought a book by Harold Randall and 3 books containing past papers for 3 separate papers by someone named Muhammad Nauman Malik.

I’m afraid that these past papers don’t cover the questions that were part of the October/November session. Perhaps I should have waited till February and purchased the set that contained the new set of papers from this recently concluded attempt. Please do share your views on the matter.
 

NarutimateTaha

Only on PlayStation
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Dec 14, 2009
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[MENTION=25861]Hassan Aftab[/MENTION]

A-level Accounting is regarded as one of the easier subjects offered by the British Council and considering you're an ACCA member, I have to agree that it'll be easier for you to get an A or even an A* in the exam.

There's a small chapter, Computerised Accounting, that's been included in the syllabus. The topic is entirely theory-based and just reading it once should be enough for you to understand it well enough to answer the questions that come in the exam.

While the paper patterns are very predictable, there's always a risk of your prediction not coming true. As much as all the students want to study only the topics that have a higher chance of being tested in the exam, it really is a big risk to do that. But since you've probably done a lot of the topics that can be tested in the exam, you should just look at the Accounting CIE syllabus and see which ones need a little revising.

The AS MCQs paper is the easiest, you should have no problem with that. Again, look for the topics you think you need to study a little more because the MCQs can sometimes be a little tricky. The AS Theory paper has 4 questions. The first three will be on financial accounting (one question will be of 30 marks, the other two will be 15 marks each). The last one (30 marks) will always be based on Cost Accounting: Marginal, Absorption, Job, Unit & Batch. The most tested topics in the AS paper are Partnership Accounting, Incomplete Records. Consider yourself lucky if you get a simple balance sheet and a simple income statement.

The A2 paper has six questions (there is no A2 MCQ paper anymore). The paper's duration is of 3 looong hours. Six questions of which 2 will always be based on Cost and Management Accounting: Activity Based, Budgeting, Standard Costing and Capital Investment Appraisal. The thing with this paper is that they can test pretty much every topic since they have 6 questions to give us.

Here's the book that I used. I only used it for revision purposes, because it makes a clear distinction between the A1 and A2 topics. If you go the list of contents, you'll get a great idea of what is tested in the A1 papers and what is tested in the A2 paper. Oh, anything that's tested at the AS Level can be tested at the A2 level as well. You can use this book to study the Computerised Accounting topic as well. It has the latest syllabus, so it's really helpful.

So what you can do is take a look at all the topics that are tested in the CIE from the book I've linked to above, and see if there's anything you haven't heard of (which I doubt). When that's done and you're confident you've covered every topic then attempt a 2016 past paper and see how well you do. Here's a link to the 2016 past papers. Open the 'June' folder, and then select either the MCQ paper (qp_12), the AS Theory paper (qp_22) or the A2 paper (qp_32). You can use these papers to understand the paper pattern too.

Note that with the syllabus change in 2016, there's A LOT more focus on explanation and a little less on worked questions. They will ask you why instead of asking you to just prepare a financial statement so your concepts must be really fresh to answer those questions.

If you feel you don't need to study anything and you know everything that's tested in the exam, then you can just do one past paper every day until the exam date. Doesn't matter if the papers you attempt follow the old pattern, the questions are practically the same.

I know it's not the best explanation but if there's something else you want to know, let me know. Hope I helped! :)
 

Hassan Aftab

Among The Last of Us
Nov 13, 2010
2,200
3
43
Rawalpindi
My friend, you are an angel (not the Taher Shah kind).

Seriously, I appreciate you taking out the time and addressing this in such great detail.

This will surely suffice. Thank you very much. :)

@Hassan Aftab

A-level Accounting is regarded as one of the easier subjects offered by the British Council and considering you're an ACCA member, I have to agree that it'll be easier for you to get an A or even an A* in the exam.

There's a small chapter, Computerised Accounting, that's been included in the syllabus. The topic is entirely theory-based and just reading it once should be enough for you to understand it well enough to answer the questions that come in the exam.

While the paper patterns are very predictable, there's always a risk of your prediction not coming true. As much as all the students want to study only the topics that have a higher chance of being tested in the exam, it really is a big risk to do that. But since you've probably done a lot of the topics that can be tested in the exam, you should just look at the Accounting CIE syllabus and see which ones need a little revising.

The AS MCQs paper is the easiest, you should have no problem with that. Again, look for the topics you think you need to study a little more because the MCQs can sometimes be a little tricky. The AS Theory paper has 4 questions. The first three will be on financial accounting (one question will be of 30 marks, the other two will be 15 marks each). The last one (30 marks) will always be based on Cost Accounting: Marginal, Absorption, Job, Unit & Batch. The most tested topics in the AS paper are Partnership Accounting, Incomplete Records. Consider yourself lucky if you get a simple balance sheet and a simple income statement.

The A2 paper has six questions (there is no A2 MCQ paper anymore). The paper's duration is of 3 looong hours. Six questions of which 2 will always be based on Cost and Management Accounting: Activity Based, Budgeting, Standard Costing and Capital Investment Appraisal. The thing with this paper is that they can test pretty much every topic since they have 6 questions to give us.

Here's the book that I used. I only used it for revision purposes, because it makes a clear distinction between the A1 and A2 topics. If you go the list of contents, you'll get a great idea of what is tested in the A1 papers and what is tested in the A2 paper. Oh, anything that's tested at the AS Level can be tested at the A2 level as well. You can use this book to study the Computerised Accounting topic as well. It has the latest syllabus, so it's really helpful.

So what you can do is take a look at all the topics that are tested in the CIE from the book I've linked to above, and see if there's anything you haven't heard of (which I doubt). When that's done and you're confident you've covered every topic then attempt a 2016 past paper and see how well you do. Here's a link to the 2016 past papers. Open the 'June' folder, and then select either the MCQ paper (qp_12), the AS Theory paper (qp_22) or the A2 paper (qp_32). You can use these papers to understand the paper pattern too.

Note that with the syllabus change in 2016, there's A LOT more focus on explanation and a little less on worked questions. They will ask you why instead of asking you to just prepare a financial statement so your concepts must be really fresh to answer those questions.

If you feel you don't need to study anything and you know everything that's tested in the exam, then you can just do one past paper every day until the exam date. Doesn't matter if the papers you attempt follow the old pattern, the questions are practically the same.

I know it's not the best explanation but if there's something else you want to know, let me know. Hope I helped! :)
 

beastmode259855

Talented
Jul 28, 2016
69
0
1
Guys i need help just got my as result today
I got an E in as chemistry and i took a retake in oct/nob 2016 and the paper went really well
And i got the result today and it was a D.
I am really disappointed as the paper went really well and i am a bright student.
I am really confused
Should i get a recheck
Please tell me if they work and tell me if you have any such experiences with rechecks.
I cant give a retake as very little time is left and i am really depressed.
Thank you.

Sent from my XT1097 using Tapatalk
 

ahmed123004

Proficient
Mar 27, 2013
552
0
21
islamabad
Guys i need help just got my as result today
I got an E in as chemistry and i took a retake in oct/nob 2016 and the paper went really well
And i got the result today and it was a D.
I am really disappointed as the paper went really well and i am a bright student.
I am really confused
Should i get a recheck
Please tell me if they work and tell me if you have any such experiences with rechecks.
I cant give a retake as very little time is left and i am really depressed.
Thank you.

Sent from my XT1097 using Tapatalk
Was it AS or A2 ? If it was AS definetly go for recheck if you know your practical went great, if you have doubts about p1 and p2 aswell then dont go for recheck. Try to regain some composure and I hate to say this but you will have to retake again. I gave AS retake this oct nov aswell got no improvements, but im not going for recheck because i know my practical was bad.
 
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