A separate service · one paper, one subject
Mock Paper, Marked
A paper written for one student, sat at home under timed conditions, and marked by hand by Leah against the mark scheme the examiner will use. Then an hour, one to one, going through what the marks were actually given for.
It is bought once, on its own. It is not a block of teaching, it does not have to follow one, and nothing about it commits you to anything else.
£395
One subject, at GCSE or A-Level. The paper, the marking and the hour are all included in that figure — there is nothing further to pay.
What happens
Four things, in order.
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01
The paper is written for them
Not a past paper printed off. Leah writes the paper against the specification for their board and their subject, weighted towards the parts of it they are weakest on. If the last school report said the analysis is thin and the context is thinner, the paper will ask for analysis and context.
This is the part a past paper cannot do. A past paper tests whatever it happened to test in the year it was set. This one tests what this student is getting wrong.
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02
They sit it at home, to time
The paper arrives by email as a PDF, with the real duration on the front, and they sit it under the conditions of the exam: no notes, no text open beside them, no stopping the clock. A parent is welcome to invigilate and most do. It is written by hand on paper, as the exam is, and photographed or scanned when the time is up.
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03
Leah marks it by hand, digitally, against the real criteria
The script is sent back to Leah and marked the way the board marks it — by hand on an iPad, against the published assessment objectives, band by band, with the marks attributed to the places in the script that earned them. What comes back is the script itself, annotated throughout, and a written summary of where the marks were won and lost.
Marked by Leah personally, as everything here is. Nothing is farmed out and nothing is machine-marked.
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04
An hour going through it
A one-to-one hour on Google Meet, with the marked script on a shared screen. Not a reading-out of the summary they already have — an hour on the two or three things that actually cost them marks, and what a stronger answer to the same question would have done differently.
A parent may sit in on this hour, as on any session here, without asking and without giving a reason.
What it is not
A mark on one paper is not a prediction, and we will not pretend otherwise.
The script comes back with a mark and the band it falls in, because that is what marking against a mark scheme produces. It is a measurement of one paper, sat once, on one morning. It is not a predicted grade, it carries no weight with a school or a board, and anybody selling you a predicted grade is selling something they cannot deliver.
It is also not teaching. The hour is there to explain the marking, not to begin a course of study. If what a student needs is regular teaching, that is the blocks of sessions, and it is a different thing bought differently.
And it is not a coursework service. The paper is sat unaided, and no part of what comes back may be handed in anywhere as the student’s own work.
Who it is for
Usually a student who is working hard and cannot see where the marks are going.
Before mocks, or after them
Either as a rehearsal under real conditions, or to find out why a school mock came back lower than the work in the exercise book suggested it should.
A second opinion on a mark
Where a grade at school is disputed or simply unexplained, an independent script marked against the same published criteria is a straight answer.
A student who does not do timed conditions well
Some students know the material and lose it in the room. That shows up in a timed paper and nowhere else.
Not, generally, a student in difficulty
If the material has not been learned, a paper will say so at length and expensively. Teaching first and a paper later is the honest order, and a block of sessions is the better thing to buy.
Subjects and boards
English Language, English Literature, French and Spanish — the four subjects taught here, at GCSE or A-Level, on any of the major boards.
AQA, Pearson Edexcel, Eduqas, OCR and Cambridge IGCSE. The board matters: the assessment objectives differ between them, and a paper written to the wrong one measures the wrong thing. It is asked for at the point of booking for that reason.
One paper covers one subject at one level. English Language, English Literature, French and Spanish each have a page setting out what the specification asks for.
Who marks it
Mrs Leah Burgess, and nobody else.
Leah read French and Spanish at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, and has tutored one to one for seven years and more, under contract for schools and in schools across Europe. She writes the paper, she marks it, and she takes the hour. There is no pool of associates, nothing is farmed out, and nothing is machine-marked.
- ReadFrench and Spanish at St Edmund Hall, Oxford
- TutoringSeven years and more, one to one
- SchoolsPrivate contracted work for schools, and time in schools across Europe
- SafeguardingEnhanced DBS, and the designated safeguarding lead. Policy in full
On English: three years at Oxford spent describing how language works in two languages that were not her own, and arguing about literature in three rather than one. More about Leah.
Booking
One short form, and the paper follows by email.
One form, and it is short. The subject, the level, the exam board, and a few lines on what the paper should lean on — the topics they are shakiest on, or the question type that keeps costing them marks. That last part is what makes the paper theirs rather than generic, so it is worth two minutes.
Payment is taken by Stripe on the screen after this one, and the card details never touch this site. The paper is then written and sent to the email address you give, ready to print or to sit on screen. Cancellation is set out in our terms.