Possibly the most important academic milestone for any 18 year-old, we understand the pressure to succeed. The jump from secondary to JC/IB is indeed large and many students do initially falter. We see it as our job to help you get back on track as soon as feasible. As with everything we do, we take a highly tailored approach towards the way we teach. As individuals, each student is different and has different learning needs.We do not believe in putting our students in large lecture-style environments. Instead, our students are grouped based on their competency level and schools. This creates an efficient yet enjoyable classroom environment that aids in your learning process. The intimate classroom environment also allows our tutors to keep a watchful eye over the class and allows you to clarify any questions immediately. We find that the ability to clarify immediately aids greatly given the complex and in-depth nature of the tertiary syllabus.
a need to win
Our team is desperate to help you succeed. Besides providing complimentary 1-1 consultations, we take it upon ourselves to do all we can to help you break through your limits. Every quarter, your tutor will take some time to assess your academic weaknesses and come up with a game plan with you with our Academic Standing Report. This game plan consists of actionable steps and tailored revision worksheets to target your specific learning needs. Additionally, we aim to inspire by doing goal-setting with you. This helps create a sense of ownership and responsibility towards your grades and an inclination to strive harder towards your target.
ultimate preparation and ultimate assurance
Having been through the same system, our tutors are well-versed in the stress you face. We take it upon ourselves to come up with revision material that makes it easier for you to study. Our curated revision packages are designed to provoke efficient learning. By ensuring that questions are arranged based on difficulty and question type, we find this helps you do a comprehensive revision for the subject. Additionally, our tutors are on standby to answer your questions over text. We realise that many hardworking students fail to see significant improvements if their questions are not answered quickly. This is because by the time the answers come back, they have forgotten the question or forgot why they didn’t know it. By answering your questions in a timely manner, this greatly aids your learning. We aim to provide the ultimate preparation for you so you can be assured and confident before your final examinations.
Lessons for IB and A levels are held separately.
Given the diverse types of subjects and the advanced nature of each subject at the tertiary level, it is impossible to take a blanket approach towards all the subjects. Each subject takes a different approach but at its core, we reverse-engineer and break down the subjects to their fundamentals before training our students to apply the relevant concepts.
General Paper
75% A/B for 2018 A levels
77% A/B for 2019 A levels
80% A/B for 2020 A levels
81% A/B for 2021 A levels
Acquire
This is the first and most basic step when it comes to the General paper. As implied by the name of the subject, a wide breadth and depth of general knowledge is necessary for students to do well at the A levels.
Apply
However, knowledge is simply not enough. Here at Crucible, students are thought how to tackle both SAQ and essay questions in a scientific manner. Using formats that are tried and tested, we have achieved at least 80% A/B at the 2020 A Levels.
Adapt
Critical thinking is the last and final step. Sometimes, curveballs will be thrown at students during the exam and it is the student’s ability to adapt to these changes that ultimately separate the strong from the week. By going through different variations of the same questions, students are better prepared to answer any question that the A Level poses.
JC / IB Mathematics
76% A/B for 2018 A levels
88% A/B for 2019 A levels
86% A/B for 2020 A levels
90% A/B for 2021 A levels
92% 7/6 for 2020 IBDP
95% 7/6 for 2021 IBDP
Mastering Motherhood Principles
In every topic tested, the key to achieving A / grade 7 is to master the fundamental principles of each topic. You will notice that simply memorizing the formula is inadequate to attain the ideal grade. Understanding these fundamentals is the first step to success.
Identifying Question Types
Increasing the efficiency during revision is vital to every student. At Crucible, we have prepared a list of solutions to essential question types tied to each motherhood principle. Students can refer to this question bank to familiarise themselves with the thought process behind the solution.
Apply and Adapt
This is the most critical step. Memorising the formulas and remembering the motherhood principles is not enough. We expect uncertainty and we embrace it. With plenty of curated application questions, we teach students the key skill to link the application questions back to the motherhood principles.
JC / IB Chemistry
75% A/B for 2018 A levels
79% A/B for 2019 A levels
84% A/B for 2020 A levels
85% A/B for 2021 A levels
93% 7/6 for 2020 IBDP
96% 7/6 for 2021 IBDP
Reverse Engineering: Learning through Application
By reverse engineering the past 10 years’ worth of questions from A-levels / IB and school prelim papers, we identify the crucial content that is frequently tested and essential for the students to understand. This allow us to scope down the syllabus to more bite size information that is easy for the students to pick up and apply for each chapter. Further practice of the basic question types during class will strengthen the student’s fundamentals to allow them to perform and excel in school exams and A-levels / IB exams.
Our Chemistry lessons are structured around the key concepts to be taught in Physical, Organic and Inorganic Chemistry. Each lesson is designed to cover a few key concepts. After which, our questions are segmented into difficulty level and question types. By immediately letting students try out relevant questions after the key concept is taught, students are able to better identify the type of question in the exam. As students begin to realise how to identify the key question types, we proceed to go through harder questions and application questions. This allows our students to gain a mastery of the key concepts and to approach examination questions with a clear framework.
An emphasis on First Principles
As the examination questions have increasingly become more application based, we now focus a lot on application questions. By designing our syllabus to be based on key, fundamental concepts, our students will be able to learn on first principles and be prepared for any curveball that is thrown at them during their examinations.
JC / IB Physics
80% A/B for 2018 A levels
85% A/B for 2019 A levels
82% A/B for 2020 A levels
87% A/B for 2021 A levels
100% 7/6 for 2020 IBDP
100% 7/6 for 2021 IBDP
simplifying complicated concepts
Physics is an extremely demanding subject: students need to not only internalise fundamental concepts but also know how to apply them to questions readily. Many of our students find their grades below expectations and not reflective of the amount of effort put into the subject. At Crucible, we simplify complicated concepts using easy to understand analogies into bite size ideas.
honing skills
Practice questions are sorted into different levels of difficulty: first, students are expected to be competent in stating Physics laws and definitions and manipulation of equations. Next, students are trained to apply the laws to application questions. Finally, we ensure our students are able to link the different topics together, such as Gravitation and Electric Field, to solve integrated questions.
With sufficient illustrations and practices for students to hone their skills, our students gain a crucial added advantage over their peers.
JC / IB Economics
82% A/B for 2018 A levels
88% A/B for 2019 A levels
85% A/B for 2020 A levels
89% A/B for 2021 A levels
97% 7/6 2020 IBDP
100% 7/6 2021 IBDP
Content mastery
The mastery of Economics content is made easy with our comprehensive notes. Our notes comprise of structured content which targets questions that have been tested for the past 10 years. Motherhood framework for description of graphs and explaining of fundamental concepts are provided to give the students a clear method to study for Economics.
Question Analysis
Common misconception of Economics is that as an Arts subject, memorising of content would be enough to get an A / grade 7. However, it can be seen that the papers have been testing on the application of the prerequisite knowledge where it is no longer as straightforward as regurgitation of content. In our lessons, we focus on learning content through practice questions, picking up the skill to conduct question analysis and learn to form answer structures that fulfil the requirements of the question.
Answering Technique - Giving the examiner what they want
The last step of mastering economics would be to fine tune your answers to contain all the necessary economics analysis rigour under the strict time constraints without over writing or under writing. This would require experience and practice of questions under our guidance to prepare for your exams. In exam conditions, it is imperative that students have a clear framework and know the adequate amount to give in order to obtain the highest banding. We train our students to give the examiner the necessary information to score without overwriting; time is of major essence in economics.
*Results represent our students’ grades from the A level / IB November session and are collated from students who have attended our lessons for at least 4 months prior to the final examination.