IHETC School
Natural sciences — Upper secondary
The subject requires holding together a large body of knowledge and an ability to analyse documents. Revising one without the other yields an average mark regardless of how much work was put in.
What is at stake in this subject
The subject requires holding together a large body of knowledge and an ability to analyse documents. Revising one without the other yields an average mark regardless of how much work was put in.
- Genetics and evolution
- Human physiology
- Geology and earth dynamics
- Ecology and environmental issues
- Analysis of scientific documents
What this page covers
- concepts covered
- 5
- subjects covered in upper secondary
- 4
- stages to validate one concept
- 4
Concepts, not a textbook contents page.
All included in the same subscription.
The last one is assessed work.
From knowing the lesson to working the documents
Faced with an analysis question, the pupil recites the lesson instead of extracting information from the document provided. The examiner wants the opposite: the document exploited, with the course illuminating it. This is a habit to unlearn, not knowledge to add.
What the tutor does with your child
The tutor systematically has information extracted from the document before allowing recourse to the course. The order of those two moves is precisely what is assessed.
- It changes angle the moment an explanation misses
- It leaves the answer to the pupil and stays alongside until they find it
- It has the result checked by a second route
- It goes back to the missing prerequisite, even one from an earlier year
- It keeps the concept open until the pupil restates it in their own words
Parents' questions
How do you revise such a large volume?
Not by rereading. Active recall — asking yourself the question and attempting the answer without looking — produces incomparably better results than rereading, for the same time spent. That is the method the tutor enforces, even when it is less comfortable.