Grade thresholds
It's important to remember that the exact grade thresholds for your exams will change every series. Cambridge sets them after each exam, based on how difficult the paper was and how the whole cohort performed.
You can check Cambridge's official grade threshold tables to see how past series have landed. Use these as a general guide only. Don't treat last year's threshold as a fixed target for your own exam.
What texts and topics will I study?
For Paper 1, you'll practise reading and responding to non-fiction and other text types, such as journalism, travel writing and personal accounts, since the exam always uses unseen texts rather than set texts you learn in advance.
For Paper 2 or Component 3, you'll practise directed writing (for example, letters, articles or speeches based on a given text) alongside descriptive and narrative writing, so you can write confidently in whichever form comes up.
Your teacher will confirm exactly which texts and practice materials your school is using, since these can vary between schools and years.
5 top revision tips
1. Practise reading unseen texts against the clock.
Every text in this exam is unseen, so the skill you're building is reading quickly and accurately under pressure, not memorising set texts.
Top tip: give yourself no more than 15 minutes to read all three texts before you look at a single question, just like in the real exam. This is exactly the kind of skill Atom's practice questions are built to sharpen, with a constant stream of fresh, unseen texts so you always have new material to practise reading at speed.
2. Keep your summary answers tight and in your own words.
The summary task rewards you for selecting the right information and rewording it yourself, not for copying chunks of the original text.
Top tip: write your summary, then check every sentence for words lifted straight from the text and swap them out. Atom's instant feedback flags it if your summary lifts wording straight from the text, so you can catch this habit early rather than losing marks for it in the real exam.
3. Match your writing style to the text type you're asked for.
A speech, a letter and a report all need a different tone and structure, even if the content is similar.
Top tip: before you start writing, jot down three features specific to that text type (for example, a greeting and sign-off for a letter) so you don't forget them under time pressure. It's worth practising this on Atom too, since the feedback checks whether your writing matches the conventions of that specific text type, so you know straight away if a letter reads like a letter or a report reads like a report.
4. Plan your composition before you write a word.
For narrative and descriptive writing, a few minutes of planning stops you running out of ideas halfway through.
Top tip: sketch out a beginning, middle and end in one line each before you start your full answer. With so many practice questions to work through on Atom, you can turn this into a genuine habit rather than something you only remember to do once or twice before the real exam. Plan first, answer, then see immediately if your structure held up or your ending felt rushed, so the habit is second nature by exam day.
5. Practise timed past papers under real exam conditions.
Understanding the format on paper is one thing. Writing at exam speed and pace is a different skill, and it only comes from practice.
Top tip: Atom's GCSE past papers are a good way to build up this timed practice alongside your school's resources. Atom's predicted papers mirror the real exam format and timing, so you can sit a full paper under proper conditions, then see straight after exactly where your pace or detail dropped off, ready to fix before the real thing.
Past papers and resources
Your school's Cambridge School Support Hub account is the best place to find official past papers and mark schemes for Cambridge IGCSE First Language English, since these aren't published openly online. Ask your teacher for access if you haven't used it before.
Alongside these, Atom gives you practice papers with instant, examiner-style feedback, so you can see exactly where you're gaining and losing marks as you go. Take a look at our guide on how to get the most out of GCSE past papers for a simple way to build this into your revision.
Once you know how the reading and writing components fit together, and which route your school has chosen, you can focus your revision on the skills that actually count. That clarity alone takes a lot of the guesswork out of exam preparation.
