When to Start Doing 0606 Past Papers

Timing past papers wrongly is a common, avoidable error. Start full papers too early, before the syllabus is covered, and a student meets question after question they cannot attempt, which teaches nothing except discouragement. Leave them all to the final fortnight and the papers reveal gaps with no time left to close them. The fix is to phase them in, in two distinct modes.

Phase one: topic questions, from early

You do not need the whole course to practise a topic you have just finished. As soon as calculus is taught, calculus past-paper questions consolidate it far better than re-reading notes. This is topic-filtered practice: pull questions on one topic from across many papers and drill them while the teaching is fresh.

Start this the moment each topic wraps up in class. It does three things at once: it confirms the topic is genuinely understood, it exposes the specific question types that come up, and it begins your error log early, when there is still a whole year to act on it. Pair each topic’s questions with the matching worked examples to see the full mark-scheme solution.

Phase two: full timed papers, from about two months out

Complete, timed papers test something topic drills cannot: stamina, timing, and topic-switching under pressure. A full 0606 paper asks you to move between unrelated topics with the clock running, and that is a separate skill from solving any single question. It only works once most of the syllabus is in place, otherwise too many questions are unattemptable, so full papers belong in roughly the final two months.

By then, phase-one practice means you meet few genuinely unfamiliar questions, and full papers become about assembly and timing rather than first contact. This is also where the non-calculator Paper 1 and calculator Paper 2 strategies matter most.

Fitting it to a plan

The 8-week revision plan builds this phasing in: topic consolidation first, full timed papers weighted toward the back. If your child is starting later than ideal, how to catch up in Add Math sets the recovery order, and the phasing still applies, just compressed.

The honest summary: topic questions early, full papers from two months out, error log throughout. A specialist can tell within an hour which phase your child should be in and what to drill first, that read is what the trial class provides. Message us on WhatsApp with your child’s exam session to book.