Entrepreneurial Horsham teen hopes his English GCSE revision guides help students reach full potential

Josh Lea-Clayton, 18, was inspired to create and sell his 5to9 English guide after he defied the odds to achieve near-perfect marks in his English exam.

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The Tanbridge House School pupil had been expected to to achieve an average set of grades, predominantly grade 5 (Cs) based upon his Key Stage 2 data. But the teenager knuckled down, and studied mark schemes, memorised content, and practised past papers for hours on end.

Josh’s persistence, determination and work ethic was rewarded. He received an amazing grade 9 (A) and won the highest achiever award in his school for English.

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Josh, who first became interested in business when he was 14, said: “I settled on creating a GCSE English guide/tutoring programme firstly because it is an area in which I feel I have a great deal of expertise; I received the highest achiever award in my school for English with 99 results despite 55 targets.

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“I am also very passionate about helping other students to understand their true GCSE potential.

“As I proved, target grades can be extensively misleading. I believe anyone who is willing to devote themselves to working hard and smart on their studies, can exceed expectations and achieve great grades.”

Josh, who plans to study philosophy at Southampton University after his gap year, said that he struggled to grasp English because the subject wasn’t factually black and white, unlike maths and science. He also conceded that he was also dispassionate towards the subject.

But once he had formulated a revision plan, Josh’s motivation and drive was renewed.

He added: “English is one of the most challenging GCSE subjects as it is predominantly based upon knowledge application as opposed to knowledge recall.

“In science and maths knowing the necessary facts and methods is enough. In English, this isn't the case. Students must form essays about poems they have never before seen and write stories with titles that are dictated to them in the exam.

“Additionally, I struggled with English because I simply wasn't passionate about it. As skilful and perceptive as Shakespeare is, I found it difficult to identify with his play, Macbeth, which I studied. The use of old English, in particular, can be very off-putting.

“But once I started to take on the work head-on, viewing it as an intellectual challenge as opposed to a test on Shakespeare or poetry my lacking interest was replaced by drive and motivation.”

Josh revealed that creating cue cards helped him hugely during his revision process.

He said: “Across all of my subjects, cue cards were my go-to revision strategy. They allowed me to actively test myself in a quick and efficient manner, assisting my memorisation of content.

“Over several months I created crates full of them. In my English Guide, I direct students towards exactly what to make these cue-cards on.”

The 5to9 English guide has been a success for Josh and the 18-year-old has set his sights on growing the business further in the future.

Josh, who is also tutoring several students, added: “My English Guide has seen a lot of early success with orders from across the country, as afield as Manchester.

“I am looking to continue growing my business, taking on new tutees, and updating the guide for future year groups as the specification changes.

“I have boxes of other revision resources to share and so may well expand into other subjects such as science, geography, and business, should there prove to be demand for it.”

To purchase a revision, and to find out more information, please visit www.english5to9.squarespace.com.

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