So, the day came and went. How did it go? Here's my experience/observations/predictions:
This was the first time I had taken the exam whilst not living in London. As many of you know, I travelled back from Guernsey a week before the exam and spent the time at my parents revising hard. I was doing about 12 hours a day of revision, which towards the end was catching up with me. I know people say not to cram just before the test, but I have always revised right up until the final whistle (and even this time I'm glad I did that).
I travelled up to London on the Friday afternoon, which was a nightmare in itself because the coach took an hour longer than it should have done. I then had to get across from Victoria to the Excel Centre with a bag full of books on a Friday evening in London. Great. When you want to get somewhere quickly, people always seem to be getting in your way. I'm pretty sure they are always getting in your way, but you notice it more when you're in a hurry.
I arrived at the hotel around 9, planning to spend a couple of hours reading whilst getting some room service in for dinner. It was a brilliant plan, except the Ibis Hotel didn't do room service. I was told I could go and order from the restaurant and take it back to my room though. So down I headed, only to find an empty restaurant with not even a waitress in sight. So I ditched that plan and went across the road to the Nisa Local, where I managed to get an interesting combination of some salt & vinegar crisps, some Jacobs crackers, some babybel cheese and a banana (gotta have your 5-a-day!).
As was always going to happen, I didn't sleep very well the night before. In fact, even using the word 'sleep' to describe what I went through is probably being a bit colourful with the truth. For several hours I drifted in and out of a light daze, and when I was dozing all I was dreaming about was the exam itself. Horrible. So on E-day, the single day I had been working up to for several months, I felt like a zombie who had just been on a 36-hour bender.
Ok, so on to the exam. I had gone through multiple mock exams before the day, and generally done ok. I was actually looking forward to the AM paper as the previous papers hadn't been too bad, and didn't require as much detail as I had expected prior to doing them. Unfortunately, the one thing I omitted to do was a mock paper under exam conditions and within 3 hours. this was a mistake. It turns out 3 hours is actually quite short. I was trying to write full answers whilst keeping things neat, and this meant I struggled badly on time. I was only about half way through the paper with an hour to go. It was at this point I remembered @Sophie's article on how she felt in Level 3 with no time left to do 3 questions. I took some deep breaths, and waited for that moment of calming down and clarity. Unfortunately it never came. I therefore progressed on through the paper trying to scoop as many points as I could. The problem was, I had no time to actually read any of the text. I had to go straight to Part A, go with my first thoughts with a brief reference to the Vignette, and get something down that made some sense. I got through the paper but I don't think it bodes well.
The afternoon session was a bit better, although I do know I made some mistakes and there was some other bits I just didn't know.
Overall, I'm not confident I have passed. If I do, it will be a miracle, but having scrapped through Level 2 I just cannot see my luck continuing. A lot of other candidates felt the same time pressure in the morning paper so this may help my cause, but I doubt it. Time will undoubtedly tell.
It would be good to see how other Level 3 candidates felt it went?
This was the first time I had taken the exam whilst not living in London. As many of you know, I travelled back from Guernsey a week before the exam and spent the time at my parents revising hard. I was doing about 12 hours a day of revision, which towards the end was catching up with me. I know people say not to cram just before the test, but I have always revised right up until the final whistle (and even this time I'm glad I did that).
I travelled up to London on the Friday afternoon, which was a nightmare in itself because the coach took an hour longer than it should have done. I then had to get across from Victoria to the Excel Centre with a bag full of books on a Friday evening in London. Great. When you want to get somewhere quickly, people always seem to be getting in your way. I'm pretty sure they are always getting in your way, but you notice it more when you're in a hurry.
I arrived at the hotel around 9, planning to spend a couple of hours reading whilst getting some room service in for dinner. It was a brilliant plan, except the Ibis Hotel didn't do room service. I was told I could go and order from the restaurant and take it back to my room though. So down I headed, only to find an empty restaurant with not even a waitress in sight. So I ditched that plan and went across the road to the Nisa Local, where I managed to get an interesting combination of some salt & vinegar crisps, some Jacobs crackers, some babybel cheese and a banana (gotta have your 5-a-day!).
As was always going to happen, I didn't sleep very well the night before. In fact, even using the word 'sleep' to describe what I went through is probably being a bit colourful with the truth. For several hours I drifted in and out of a light daze, and when I was dozing all I was dreaming about was the exam itself. Horrible. So on E-day, the single day I had been working up to for several months, I felt like a zombie who had just been on a 36-hour bender.
Ok, so on to the exam. I had gone through multiple mock exams before the day, and generally done ok. I was actually looking forward to the AM paper as the previous papers hadn't been too bad, and didn't require as much detail as I had expected prior to doing them. Unfortunately, the one thing I omitted to do was a mock paper under exam conditions and within 3 hours. this was a mistake. It turns out 3 hours is actually quite short. I was trying to write full answers whilst keeping things neat, and this meant I struggled badly on time. I was only about half way through the paper with an hour to go. It was at this point I remembered @Sophie's article on how she felt in Level 3 with no time left to do 3 questions. I took some deep breaths, and waited for that moment of calming down and clarity. Unfortunately it never came. I therefore progressed on through the paper trying to scoop as many points as I could. The problem was, I had no time to actually read any of the text. I had to go straight to Part A, go with my first thoughts with a brief reference to the Vignette, and get something down that made some sense. I got through the paper but I don't think it bodes well.
The afternoon session was a bit better, although I do know I made some mistakes and there was some other bits I just didn't know.
Overall, I'm not confident I have passed. If I do, it will be a miracle, but having scrapped through Level 2 I just cannot see my luck continuing. A lot of other candidates felt the same time pressure in the morning paper so this may help my cause, but I doubt it. Time will undoubtedly tell.
It would be good to see how other Level 3 candidates felt it went?