The Chemistry Comeback Challenge: Get Ready for Year 13! (2026 Edition now launched)

This challenge is designed to give A Level Chemistry students moving from Year 12 to Year 13 a more structured approach to recapping their Year 12 knowledge.

From over 20 years working with A Level chemistry students in groups and 1 to 1 tuition, I’ve noticed that even the most aspirational students tend to let things slide over the summer.

In fact, if anything it’s the students who are aiming for top grades and competitive universities who might have ‘lost’ the most knowledge!

Do any of the following statements apply to you?

• You have a summer packed with extra-curriculars: work experience, preparation for entrance exams like UCAT, volunteering, DofE expeditions or independent projects like EPQ.
• You did okay in your most recent mocks or end of year exams, but you know you were cramming beforehand.
• When you went over the last exams you did, you can’t believe how many marks you lost through ‘silly mistakes’.
• When you go back to topics you thought you knew really well, you realise you’ve forgotten huge chunks – definitions, reaction conditions, group trends and key vocabulary.
• You know it’s a good idea to go back over past topics, but you are a bit of a perfectionist and often get overwhelmed and procrastinate because you don’t know where to start.

If so, you’re in good hands – this challenge is for you!

What is the Chemistry Comeback Challenge?

It’s a structured, online mini-course that you can tackle at your own pace. You covered a lot of information in Year 12, so to reduce overwhelm I’ve split it into 5 main topic modules:

• Inorganic Chemistry
• Physical Chemistry
• Calculations
• Organic Chemistry
• Practical & Synoptic

Each module includes:

• A revision activity designed to strengthen retrieval and active recall
• A recap quiz to check what you remember
• A video to cover a key topic
• An exam practice question to apply knowledge (including either a model answer or video walkthrough)
• A ‘spot the errors’ challenge — to sharpen your exam technique and avoid common mistakes

It’s not just a set of videos to watch passively — you’ll be actively engaging with the material, testing yourself, and identifying what you need to revisit before Year 13 begins.

Why take part?

• Consistency matters. By committing to a structured course, you’ll get back into good study habits before term even starts 📅
• Confidence boost. You’ll head into Year 13 with a stronger grasp of Year 12 material, ready to build on it. Even if you get things wrong, the important thing is you will KNOW what it is you don’t know 🙃
• Exam technique. Activities like “spot the errors” make you think like an examiner and avoid the mistakes that cost marks✅
• It’s free! All materials are online, with answers and video walkthroughs to guide you — plus a live session to tie it all together ▶️

Bonus free live session: Habits of A/A* students

This session will take place on Zoom at 6.30pm on Wednesday 26th August – you’ll need to be signed up to the challenge to access the meeting link. As an experienced chemistry teacher and examiner with over 20 years of experience, I’ll be sharing the most important habits I see consistently in high performing A Level chemistry students.

The good news? The habits I discuss will be practical changes you can make to the way you work in Year 13 – things that really work to reinforce learning and push you towards your target grade, without spending hours more on practice questions or expensive one to one tuition.

How to join

All you need to do is use the link to register. If you’ve used one of my courses before, just log in as usual — if not, you can register quickly and easily. I recommend bookmarking the site and saving your login details so you can check back each day. The link to the live session is within the course, so make sure you are signed up before 26th August if you want to attend (you’ll be able to access the course materials after this).