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A creative student used music to help her to overcome the anxieties the pandemic brought.

Lily Beecroft, 16, from Epping, was among a cohort of young people who missed a large period of in-school education due to Covid-19.

Despite being provided with online lessons, Lily found the return to class a struggle.

While also battling against learning with dyslexia, Lily found listening to music was a way for her to regulate and focus on her studies.

Today, she collected three Grade 7, one Grade 6, two Grade 5 and three Grade 4 in her GCSEs and is heading to Fashion Retail Academy, in London, to study fashion design.

Lily, who has ambitions of becoming a fashion designer or tattoo artist, said: “My parents realised when I was about seven that I was dyslexic as I did not want to read and my spelling was terrible.

“It takes a lot of effort for me to do subjects like English and science, but I did not let that affect me. I listen to music and it helps me to focus. The school let me wear my headphones when doing tasks on my own and I could take time out when I needed to.

“After lockdown, everything was chaotic. That affected our whole year group. I found it really hard to cope with the classes. We had missed so much of Year 7, 8 and 9 and so it felt a bit like going in at the deep end.

“I focused on the subjects I enjoyed and was good at; I focused on my strengths.

“I am very pleased with my results.”

 

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Exam techniques helped Oliver Stevenson to achieved Grade 9s in his GCSE exams.

The 16-year-old believes aspirations sessions gave him the knowledge he needed to turn potential Grade 7s into top Grade 9s.

He collected six Grade 9 and three Grade 8 today after the summer’s exams.

He said: “Not enough schools focus on exam technique as that is a big part of getting the top grades. You have got to know the terminology to include, to have a checklist of phrases, quotes and analysis. That makes the difference between someone getting a Grade 7 or a Grade 9. It helped me a lot to improve my grades from my mocks to today.

“The assemblies we were given at school showed us how to study for our mocks. They showed us a range of different methods to revise. They gave us sheets to revise from and showed us results from last year which was quite inspirational. Aspirations sessions after school helped quite a lot to solidify our learning.”

Of his bumper crop of results, Oliver said it is yet to sink in.

He said: “I feel really good. I expected much less that what I got. In fact, I did not think they were my results when I opened them! It was quite surreal. I was speechless, but very relieved. After all the hard work, it was nice to see it has all paid off.

“I am really relieved, but also feel like I am in a dream. It does not feel real.”

Oliver is going on to study computer science, maths, further maths and physics at A-level.