IGCSE English as a Second Language: Listening, Writing, and Speaking
Preparing for your IGCSE English as a Second Language (ESL) exam can feel daunting. You are not just learning grammar
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We have received enormous amount of stress rescue requests from candidates. Especially when the exam is approaching.
We do hope parents and educators are paying kind attention to this post.
All of the candidates are pouring their hearts out to us, crying for help, because there is really no one listening to them or helping them.
Here are some of their cry out:
… and many many more.
Therefore, in this article, we will discuss how to “handle” your stress. Hope this would help you not only in your exam, you probably will carry this throughout your life. 🙂
Contrary to popular belief, we CAN NOT “handle” stress.
Stress does not exist. It is NOT a thing that you can hold nor eat 😉
Stress is a feeling resulting from your thought.
From your ‘negative’ thought to be precise.
When your mind constantly thinking on negative thoughts, for example: you are scared to fail, or not getting an A*, or not good enough comparing to your older brothers or sisters, etc…; you create a bad feeling inside your body from all the negative thoughts.
The bad feeling that you feel, is what you call ‘stress’.
The more you want to “handle” your stress, the more you think there is something wrong about you. Then, you put more pressure and create more unwanted negative thoughts about yourself.
Why would you do that then?
Shall we agree from now on you don’t try to “handle” your stress anymore?
We only take “YES” as the answer 😉
So what should you do then? Keep reading…
There is really no big deal to admit we have negative thoughts. Everyone has them.
Just the courage to admit we have them, we have already eliminated most of the bad feelings.
Aren’t you feel lighter now?
Know that you can’t fight darkness with darkness. You can only fight darkness with light. By admitting the existence of negativity, you have inserted the light of positivity.
That is the most important starting point, and it is essential for you to continue to the next step.
Now that you know stress is the bad feelings you created from all your negative thoughts.
All you need to do now is – Change Your Thoughts.
Here are some steps for you to start doing that:
When you are making your list, you will notice that you have a shift in your feeling.
You will feel must lighter, your mind is clearer, you have so much energy that you want to jump into the exam hall right now, and most importantly, you will notice a big smile on your face because now you are a much happier person!
The final step is, you must train yourself to keep this happy feeling and not let yourself slide backwards again to the negative thoughts.
Step 3 will show you exactly how to do that.
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The best way to keep your mind on positive thoughts is gratitude.
If you make a search, you will discover many great minds had always said the same thing about gratitude, and what kind of miracle it would bring to you.
Here are some of them:
“When you are grateful, fear disappears and abundance appears.” ~ Tony Robbins
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” ~ Albert Einstein
“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity. It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events.” ~ Melodie Beatty
Make gratitude your daily dose in your daily life.
You could be grateful for the chance to study, the ability to read and write, to be able to attend your exam at your comfort, to have a comfortable bed to sleep on each night, the luxury of clean running water and electricity, the money that have been given to you so you could continue your education, the fresh air, all your favourite food that is always available at your reach, etc etc etc …
The list is so vast that we simply couldn’t put everything here. But you get the idea of where to start 🙂
Pay attention to how you feel. If you are not feeling good, that means your mind is currently broadcasting negative thoughts.
Immediately find anything you could be grateful for to shift to positive thought.
***
Last but not least, please know that you are a worthy human being. Everyone is.
We are all here to do something important. We are all equipped with a special talent that only we have, no one else.
And we are meant to find out what we are good at, so we could contribute this talent to mankind. When you are contributing your best talent for the benefit of mankind, you will be rewarded handsomely (a.k.a earning a lot of money). 🙂
So now, go out there and score A*!
Join 62,169 (and counting) IGCSE & AS/A Level subscribers who’ve taken our insanely valuable FREE email courses. Learn exam tips & score A* in your exam!
Nawal Amir
Saudi Arabia
Reinard Swart
South Africa
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325 responses
It’s a great thing you’re doing for all those students, ofcourse including me. I’ve read the post and it actually relaxes your head a bit and takes some of your stress away indeed, i just hope i have it in me to be able to achieve my goal and make my parents proud, my parents have worked so hard especially these 2 years to make sure i can do whatever and achieve whatever i wish to achieve, that just makes me loath myself sometimes thinking i don’t have a conscience for even stressing out and not studying enough.. i just wish i could put my head straight and concentrate on my studies in this little time i’ve got maybe, just maybe a miracle would happen and i would be able to follow my dream after all.
Hello NoorBanat,
Just go for it! You can achieve anything. Fix your mind on your goal, and know that you CAN achieve it. 🙂
where can we get feb-march 2015 past papers……..pls can u let me know
This made me feel so loved and as if I’m capable of getting those top grades. Thankyou so much
Yes! Definitely you are capable of getting those top grades! 🙂
It is no surprised to see many students who are always at the top grades suddenly gotten a Grade C, because they suddenly lost the confidence and get nervous before the exam. Whereas those who are considered “gone case” suddenly achieved Grade A or Grade A*. This is all because of CONFIDENCE!
We have seen this, because we had student who achieved Grade A and A* after building up her confidence just a month before the exam. The most interesting fact was, she was below passing mark and all her teachers classified her as “gone case” 😉
If she can, so can you! 🙂
Oki that was a good piece of advise. But still there are 3 problem.
1st Right now i am giving 4 subjects in May/June 2015
1) MATH
2) English
3) ICT
4) BIOLOGY
MY TEACHERS AND PARENTS, they think I can easily get an A* in all subjects.
but its really hard i just have 20 days to go. And I don’t no what to do right now.
I think I am not ready yet. I am REALLY REALLY scared. 🙁 🙁
i can’t get myself to study. There is a chance that I might FAIL. 🙁 🙁
The 2nd problem is that,
MY school starts “O levels” in 8th grade so I almost forgot all the things I learned in 8th. And I don’t have much time to revise all the Subjects.
The 3rd problem is that,
English paper is changing and my school has already finished so i don’t no what to do about English also 🙁 🙁 🙁
PLEASE REPLY AS FAST AS YOU CAN. MY EXAMS REST IN YOUR REPLY.
yours kindly
hishaam
Hello Hishaam,
Please read our article again, and relax 🙂
If you keep thinking you will fail, you will ! So, stop thinking that and change your thought to you will SUCCEED!
Oki I will try
BUT what about ENGLISH.
The paper changed so tell me what to do ???? 🙁 :X 🙁
You can practice with the specimen paper. Don’t worry about that. Just work on it, and you will understand.
Oki I will try
BUT what about ENGLISH.
The paper is different now so tell me what to do ???? 🙁 :X 🙁
Just do your practice according to the specimen paper. You can download the 2015 specimens paper here:
https://igcsecentre.com/cambridge-igcse-past-exam-papers/
You could also get some external help, such as hire private tutor or join some revision classes.
you Say that i should not be stressed but my teachers say that stress is sometimes good especially during exams!
My parent really expect a lot from me but sometimes i feel i will disappoint them on the results day
I’m so scared 🙁
Hello Dany,
Just know that, YOU are responsible for your life, nobody else 🙂
Whenever you took an advice from someone, you build a belief system in you. This belief system will stay inside you for a long long time until one day you realise it is not serving you good at all. But this belief system had already created the reality in your life as the circumstances that you see.
If you see some circumstances in your current life that you don’t like, that is merely the result from your belief system. So, if you wish to see “different” circumstances, just change your belief system 🙂
All the best!
I am an 8 ‘O’ level student its hard for me cuz i’ll give exams for the first time that’s why i’m afraid 🙁
I don’t know, I just don’t feel worthy enough to fullfill up my parent’s dream.. They have so much expectation but there is me : DUMB! Even my biology teacher told me, If i get A* by MISTAKE, which is not ever possible but even IF get, she will resign from my school 🙁 How do u still want me to motivated ? I just can’t continue studying and everything is going worse with me.. 🙁 I have board exams just after 1 and half months..
Hello Kafeya,
First of all, we want to let you know that, whatever others said about you will NOT affect you at all.
What others said, are merely their own opinion. Their opinion are based on their life experience, their thinking, their behaviour, and their quality. Whatever quality inside them, that is what they will “show” towards other people in their lives.
So, as you can see, nothing of these are actually your concern. It is their lives – NOT yours 🙂
Please know this, you CAN do anything if you want. If you want to score A*, YES – you get it! 🙂
Shut your mind off from all the negative energy around you. Imagine you are being protected by a light positive bubble, and you are staying inside to concentrate on your study. This is your ultimate and most important goal right now.
You MUST and you CAN do it – because we know you can do it! Now, go get that A* ! 🙂
yes go do it
you can dont let anyone tell you u cant
because they simply dont know the future
dont listen to what ur biology teacher says
surprise her and everyone!
surprise her then tell her… “come on..resign”
you know what i do?
i have a bored
i write the name and date of the person that put me down
and the moment his or her name is written down
i cheer up
like i forgot it
do the same
let all the stupid people go away
dont listen to them
this is ur future not theres
raise your parents head up high
and i am sure they will be proud no matter what
good luck and cheer up 🙂