Im taking ESS SL as a filler subject and I don't understand what is expected in this subject. I dont get how my ESS can be lower than my math aa, bio, chem HL considering that ESS is like year 9 bio and my teacher only wrote not specific enough for the essay question

So my global politics teacher has just set us our first graded essay titled 'Evaluate the view that the UN security council is in need of urgent reform'. The word count is 1,200 words. I find politics really interesting and I understand the UN and how it works but I don't really know where to start with this essay. I need to do well in it as I have been given quite a low grade for maths in my first report so I need to use my politics grade to bump up my overall point count otherwise my mother will be very disappointed. My teacher has made it a requirement that we use referencing to our sources but I don't know what sources to use, if anyone could give me advice/point in the direction of sources I can read to help me answer this question I would be really thankful.

I'm a student at the end of my 10th grade (IGCSE) and I have two choices moving forward for 11th and 12th: IB Diploma or AS & A. I'm not 100% set on my field but I'm aiming for something that can teach me how to use design softwares such as Blender and Photoshop effectively whilst preparing me for uni.

I don't mind too much difficulty, but I have severe ADHD and I can't sit and memorize or study for more than an hour in one go, so I'd prefer a curriculum that prioritizes research, critical thinking and problem solving over high content.

I also do plan to go abroad as I'm working on my French and I'm a very fluent English speaker (it's my first language), so it's important to me that the board can provide an easy pathway out of India where I live.

P.S. I'm new to this sub, so I hope you'll forgive me if I formatted my post incorrectly or added the wrong flair.

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for some advice regarding one of my IB students.

She is currently taking Math AA SL, but her test scores have been hovering around a 3 out of 7. She aspires to major in Business / Business Management in college, but her school just reached out asking whether she should transfer to Math AI SL. She really has difficulties in math or analyzing complex things.

Her family is quite anxious and asking me for guidance. Here is the situation and what we are debating:

1. Current Math AA SL status: She finds the abstract proofs and algebra heavy lifting very challenging. If she stays in AA SL, her predicted grade (PG) will likely be a 3 or 4 at best.
2. The AI SL Alternative: From what I understand, AI SL relies much more heavily on the GDC (calculator) and statistics, which aligns better with business applications. However, the wordy problem contexts might be a factor, though her English reading is generally okay.
3. College Admissions Reality: Does taking Math AI SL and aiming for a 5–6 give her a significantly better chance at mid-to-top tier business programs (Top 50–100 global) compared to sticking with Math AA SL and ending up with a 3–4?

We know top-tier institutions (like LSE) prefer AA or HL math, but for general business/management majors, is an AI SL 6 universally preferred over an AA SL 3?

Would love to hear insights from IB teachers, counselors, or students who went through a similar transition. Any advice on how this swap impacts business school admissions would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance!

Hiii everyone!

I’m an M28 student, and I’m starting to get really worried about the upcoming IB offical exams. My grades haven’t been great so far, but I’m aiming for 43/45, and I really want to do everything I can to improve.

My subjects are:

- HL: Math AA, Physics, Business management.

- SL: English A LL, chemistry, french AB initio.

Business Management: I usually understand the case study and have ideas about how to answer the questions, but I struggle to express my thoughts clearly and structure my answers properly. I think my English skills are partly holding me back. How can I improve my exam technique and learn to write more effective answers?

English A: Language and Literature: In my home country, most of my English classes focused on answering reading comprehension questions rather than developing broader language skills. I only started learning English more seriously after moving to Belgium, so I sometimes struggle with vocabulary, writing, and expressing myself naturally. Since I’ve chosen English A Lang and Lit, I’m worried about keeping up with the course while also improving my English. Does anyone have any tips for improving my English and doing well in this subject at the same time?

After doing a lot of research, I’ve noticed that everyone talks about the Math and Physics HL combination as if it’s absolute hell.....So, I’d really appreciate any advice on how to prepare for these two subjects

Chemistry, French ab initio, CAS: I’d also appreciate any tips for these subjects, especially how to balance everything without getting overwhelmed.

Thank you so much in advance! Any advice would mean a lot to me!!!!!!!!!!

basically I need to choose whether to take the ib or not very soon.

my local education system (new zealand, ncea) is recognised by my dream university (LSE), and the grade requirements are MUCH more lenient towards ncea than ib, because of ncea's comparative easiness.

however, I still feel like I'm missing out on valuable learning if I don't take the ib. school has always been incredibly easy for me, i don't study and still get top marks in my assessments, and i think ib would be a rewarding challenge. especially because i'm already interested in the subjects offered at my school, as well as the TOK and EE component.

but I just have really bad time management skills -- on one hand, ib could probably help me lock in, but on the other hand, my grades might suffer for a bit. i also participate in a LOT of extracurriculars to a high-commitment level, as in 3 days after school aren't free for me.

ncea is literally so easy, you can get top marks without truly breaking a sweat. should i maxx out my grades w ncea or actually challenge my learning with ib???

My school assigned this project (which I had no idea about until a few days ago) and today wanted us to find research questions for tomorrow. Does anyone have any ideas for a biology research question on the theme of water? It should be experiment based rather than research based. Any ideas would help

Hi everyone,

I am an IB graduate (N25) and got five 7's. I'm building a website where people can get my notes. This is the link below, with the first product being an IB biology markscheme booklet (90 pages) for HL and SL that was super helpful for paper 2 practice! It's at a lower price now so get it soon! As well as all my business management notes!

https://linktr.ee/IB.resources

bio hl- 6

eng lang and lit hl- 5

math aa hl- 6

chem hl- 5

Econ sl- 5

french b sl - 6

okay so I got a high 6 for bio and was expecting a 7. same with math aa hl but I made really stupid mistakes in my exams so... in eng l&l I didn't do too bad but I was really bad at the start so my internals were low (I got 28/40 in P1) im pretty satisfied with french and econ was way harder than I expected (I srsly should have studied more than a day). our teacher gave literally no support for chem and I was already kinda bad

any advice, how do I do better?

I used to be so stressed and on top of things, because I cared but I kinda feel numb after the stress IB and its loads of work its put on me. It's like the continuous stress just resulted in complete numbness, and I have zero motivation or care about deadlines.

I still care about my grades deep down but I'm just numb to do anything about them.
I was the kind of person who would worry about an unfinished assignment and feel so so guilty about procrastinating, and push myself to get things done because my grades and impression mattered so much to me. I was always on top of things and everything, and always put my 100% into this program and its courses.

Nowadays, I know an assignment is unfinished and I know its important and I know I should be doing it and I know I will regret leaving it until later... but i just lost my urgency entirely. It just isn't there anymore. I miss the person who I was in this program, I'm definitely not the same anymore.

I feel like the IB has put irreversible damage on me and my work ethic, and becoming who I once was again just doesn't feel possible and it feels so tiring to become what I was before.

I’m an ib student and my EE is due in a couple of hrs. It’s really bad, I think I’m gonna get a C, I hope not, I really want a b but all the ai graders all say that it’s a C, idk what to do , I don’t wanna cheat and ask ai to rewrite it when I’m also so scared of getting plagiarized by turnitin, it’s on psych idk I’m sooo scared and nervous, I know I should have done it ages ago but now it’s like please help I’m so scared, but I know I might have to just suck it up and take the C and move on.

For those that have taken their exams and do chem SL, how did you prepare and what'd you get? Is it just grinding papers? And the same for math aa SL. I'll honestly be happy if I get a 5 in math but I'm aiming for a 6 in chem.

Also, if anyone got a 7 in bio HL and business HL, I'd love to know what you did in the last week before exams and the night before.

Hi everyone,

It would be appreciated if you could each fill out these 3 Google Forms, as they are important for my Economics EE, which is about the application of behavioural economics in online shopping.

It would be appreciated if the questions were answered honestly, as it would be very helpful for me to gather good data that I can analyse for my EE. Hoping for a minimum of 30 people per form😭😭)

(Also, if you're going to be using a different currency other than the indian rupee, kindly put the converted indian rupee value as well next to your answer)

Links to the Google Forms:

1) Utility Maximisation = https://forms.gle/WS4mfc72H41QSMX38

2) Anchoring Bias = https://forms.gle/iCm2oq2CuFMRHAY16

3) Framing Bias = https://forms.gle/JTqPr732mcRcSmuR9

Hi, IBDP November 2026 student here.

I am about to do my business exams in just over a week. does anyone have prediction papers for Business Management N26 Paper 1 with the Lemon Magic case study?

Because I got my final paper 1 exam very soon, if anyone has it please send it over to me asap 🙏

They've been commenting long passages under each post to advertise their services. While I know that these checks aren't accurate, I ran several of their responses through Turnitin and they all came out 60%ish AI (and it's pretty obvious from how they write too). Hence, we have a random bot account giving potentially inaccurate feedback just to advertise themselves, I don't see why they aren't banned yet. If I wanted chatgpt to tell me how many trials I need for an IA, I wouldved asked chatgpt -- people come here because they need human feedback, not some bot pretending to be authoritative.

This sub isn't the right place for them to market like this. If they're that desperate, pay for Reddit ads.

u/lanternaeducation, before you comment

"Our advice was written/checked by humans"

No it isn't. Its either checked by a very incompetent person who knows half to nothing about IB, or it's written with a bot with the syllabus guide uploaded and has no experience in teaching.

Does any one else have their EE topics chosen by their EE coordinators? In my school, we have to create 3 EE topics from the following subjects: history/language A, sciences/math, and arts/theater/language B (we only have French and Spanish for Lang. B). Then, instead of having us choose the one we like the best, two coordinators choose for you, then send them off to the supervisors. The thing is, the entire process for the EE has been pretty messy for the IB grade and many EE topics have been rejected for being "too complex to understand" or for some other unknown reason despite receiving high praise. Honestly, idk. I kinda just wanna know if this was common or if I'm cooked.

Hi Guys, I am in desperate need of finding the N20 listening track for Spanish B. I have access to the questions and the markscheme but cannot find the actual audio anywhere, someone please help! the exam is next week!

Thanks

I have my chem hl test in a bit more than 3 weeks.

I've already tried all the new syllabus past papers (2025 may to 2026 may) and am looking for some worthwhile old syllabus papers to practice before my exam.

What were the hardest past paper in Chem HL?

hey guys, anyone with revision dojo cheat sheets please dm me im in dire need of them😪

Feel like I got scammed when I bought bio SL for revision village, there's very few paper 2 questions . I found save my exams but that's also paid. any free resources?

RV History questionbank is decent but I'll probably need more since I've done a lot of them

Thanks!

Would anyone who got an A on their IB Psychology EE be willing to help review mine? My internal deadline is in 2 days, and I feel like mine is very shallow. Thanks!

It makes IA's horrendously hard to write for no good reason as far as I see it. It excludes valuable documents in analysis and limits a lot of what can be said and supported. Im not educated enough to understand why this is the case, can somebody please explain why the IB made it like this?

Hey everyone

Here is the topic I currently plan on doing for my Math AA HL IA (not the exact RQ, just the general idea): It's pretty much me recording myself running and tracking the movement of one ankle over several strides, then using piecewise, trigonometric and parametric functions to model its trajectory.

I would use differentiation to calculate velocity and acceleration, integration to calculate the distance my ankle travels, and then incorporate physics and some reasonable assumptions to investigate the optimal running cadence (steps per minute) that theoretically requires the least energy at a constant speed. I'm still figuring out the exact physics model for the optimization so ideas for that would also be nice.

Any thoughts on this topic? Is it feasible for a high-scoring Math AA HL IA? Thanks!

These are some random questions I have. If anyone could help, I'd appreciate it.

For context, I'm M27 and using title n.4 (To what extent do you agree with the claim that ‘any coincidence is worth noticing; you can throw it away later if it is only a coincidence’ (Agatha Christie). Answer with reference to mathematics and one other area of knowledge.)

1. Do I have to necessarily evaluate two perspectives (I agree/I disagree), or can I use

   a

2. third one like: "partially agree"?

3. How much do I have to involve a real life situation? Do I just discuss it a bit in the intro and then never mention it again? Do I tie back to it afterwards?

4. Should I focus on one discipline inside an area of knowledge or can I use multiple? Is there a "sweet spot"?

5. How do I use as evidence examples that are in both areas of knowledge? Can I do it however I want since the essay has no structure?

If I have any other questions while writing, I'll edit the post or comment.

Thank you in advance to anyone who can help me!!

I am writing my EE in English and I am thinking of using 2-3 short stories and analyse how author uses 1 literary device in them.

how does {Author} uses Imagery to potray the theme of Humanity in his {name of short stories}

This is not my real RQ but kinda what mine will look like. However, my question is whether using only 1 literary device enough or is it to simple?

I am analyzing how the authors uses it and what meaning and effect it creates, but not sure if this is good for Exttended essay or too simple?