Students look up the WASSCE syllabus to see what to revise. This page lists the topics GLearn already practises for each WASSCE subject on the site. Open a subject for past questions, or open a topic for a short explanation, practice questions and a mark scheme. GLearn does not publish the official syllabus and does not quote one. WAEC sets the examination.
Integrated Science
Integrated Science past questions
The cell
The cell is the smallest unit of a living thing that can carry out life processes. Plants and animals build their bodies from cells that are alike in some parts and different in others.
Photosynthesis
Photosynthesis stores light energy as chemical energy in glucose. Animals depend on that glucose, and on the oxygen released with it.
Acids, bases and salts
An acid turns blue litmus red and has a pH below 7. Its reactions with metals, bases and carbonates are predictable, and each one names a salt.
Electricity
Voltage, current and resistance are linked. In a series circuit the resistances add. In a parallel circuit the currents add and the combined resistance falls.
Ecology
Ecology is the study of living things and their surroundings. Energy enters most communities as light and leaves as heat.
Core Mathematics
Core Mathematics past questions
Quadratic equations
A quadratic equation has the unknown squared, and no higher power. It can have two solutions, one solution, or none among the real numbers.
Mensuration
Mensuration is lengths, areas and volumes. Write the formula, substitute the numbers you were given, and keep the unit.
Trigonometry
In a right angled triangle, sine, cosine and tangent compare two sides. The right name depends on which sides the question gave you.
Statistics
A frequency table compresses a list. The mean uses every value, weighted by how often it appears.
Sets
A set is a collection of distinct objects. Union joins two sets. Intersection keeps only what they share.
Social Studies
The constitution
A constitution is the highest law of the state. Ghana is governed under the 1992 Constitution.
Socialisation
Socialisation is the process by which a person learns the values, skills and behaviour of a society. The family starts it. Other agents continue it.
The environment
Development uses the environment. If the environment is ruined, the development does not last.
Science and technology
Science explains how things work. Technology puts that knowledge to use. Both can raise the quality of life, and both can harm people if they are used carelessly.
Rights and responsibilities
A right is a freedom or an entitlement the constitution protects. A responsibility is a duty that comes with living in the state.
English Language
English Language past questions
Essay writing
The essay paper asks for a form: article, speech, letter, story or argument. The form decides the voice. The paragraphs decide whether a marker can follow you.
Comprehension
The answers are in the passage. Your own words show that you understood them. A copied line shows only that you found them.
Summary
A summary answers the question that was set, in continuous prose, using only ideas from the passage. It is not a shorter essay of your own.
Lexis and structure
Lexis is the word that fits the meaning and the company it keeps. Structure is agreement, tense and the shape of the sentence.
Letter writing
Layout is a set of marks you can plan. Yours faithfully follows Dear Sir. Yours sincerely follows a name.
Biology
Photosynthesis
Photosynthesis has a stage that needs light and a stage that uses the products of that light. The second stage does not need darkness. It needs what the first stage made.
The cell
Organelles divide the work of the cell. The nucleus holds the instructions. Mitochondria release energy. Ribosomes build proteins.
Genetics
A gene is a length of inherited material that helps determine a characteristic. Alleles are different forms of the same gene.
Ecology
An ecosystem is a community of organisms together with the non living factors around them. Energy enters from light and thins out at each feeding step.
Transport in plants
Xylem carries water and mineral salts up the plant. Phloem carries sugars from where they are made to where they are used or stored.
Chemistry
The mole
The mole is the amount of substance that contains 6.02 × 10²³ particles. Mass divided by molar mass gives the amount.
Atomic structure
The atomic number is the number of protons. The mass number is protons plus neutrons. In a neutral atom the number of electrons equals the number of protons.
Chemical bonding
Ionic bonding is the transfer of electrons. Covalent bonding is the sharing of electrons. The type of bond helps explain melting point and conductivity.
Acids, bases and salts
A strong acid ionises completely in water. A weak acid ionises only partly. A titration finds an unknown concentration from a known one.
Organic chemistry
Alkanes are saturated hydrocarbons. Alkenes contain a carbon to carbon double bond and are unsaturated. Bromine water tells them apart.
Physics
Motion
When acceleration is constant, the equations of motion connect speed, time and distance. A start from rest means the initial speed is zero.
Current electricity
Current is a flow of charge. Potential difference drives it. Resistance opposes it. Power is the rate at which the circuit transfers energy.
Waves
Wave speed equals frequency times wavelength. Frequency is how many waves pass a point each second. Wavelength is the distance from one crest to the next.
Heat energy
Specific heat capacity is the energy needed to raise the temperature of 1 kg of a substance by 1 degree Celsius. Water's value is high, which is why a large mass of water stores a lot of energy.
Magnetism
A wire carrying a current in a magnetic field can feel a force. That force is the motor effect. Fleming's left hand rule gives its direction.
Elective Mathematics
Elective Mathematics past questions
Differentiation
The derivative gives the gradient of a curve at a point. For a power of x, multiply by the power and reduce the power by one.
Integration
Integration reverses differentiation. A definite integral between two limits is a number. An indefinite integral needs a constant.
Coordinate geometry
The gradient of a line through two points is the change in y divided by the change in x. One point and the gradient fix the line.
Vectors
A vector has magnitude and direction. In component form you add the matching components. The magnitude is the square root of the sum of the squares of the components.
Probability
A probability is a fraction from 0 to 1. Without replacement, the second draw sees a smaller total than the first.
Economics
Demand and supply
Demand is the quantity buyers will take at a price in a given time. Supply is the quantity sellers will offer. A movement along a curve is not the same as a shift of the curve.
National income
National income is the value of the goods and services produced by a country's factors of production over a period, usually a year.
Money and inflation
Money is anything generally accepted in payment. Inflation is a persistent rise in the general price level, not a rise in one price.
International trade
Countries trade because they can obtain goods more cheaply than they can make them, or goods they cannot make at all. The accounts of that trade are not one number.
Market structures
Market structure is about how many firms there are, how easy it is to enter, and whether the product is identical. Those facts shape the firm's power over price.
Geography
Map reading
A map is a scaled drawing of the land. Scale, direction and contours are the three tools that turn the drawing back into distances, bearings and slopes.
Climate
Climate is the average weather of a place over many years. In West Africa the rainy season and the dry season follow the movement of the rain belt.
Settlement
A settlement is a place where people live. Its site is the land it stands on. Its situation is its position relative to routes, resources and other settlements.
Population
Population geography asks how many people there are, how fast the number changes, and how the number is spread across ages and across places.
Rivers
A river erodes, transports and deposits. The work it does, and the valley it leaves, change from the uplands to the mouth.
Government
The constitution
A constitution is the body of rules by which a state is governed. It states who may exercise power, and the limits on that power.
Arms of government
The legislature makes law. The executive applies it. The judiciary interprets it and settles disputes. Separation of powers is the attempt to stop one person or one body doing all three.
Elections
An election chooses who will hold office. It is free when voters can choose without fear. It is fair when the rules and the count treat candidates alike.
Colonialism
Colonialism is rule by a foreign power that takes political control of another territory. In West Africa it gave way to independence movements in the middle of the twentieth century.
International organizations
An international organization is a body set up by states to do together what they cannot do as well alone. Membership, aims and headquarters are the facts to keep straight.
Literature in English
Literature in English past questions
Poetic devices
A device is a way of saying. The mark comes from naming it, showing the line, and saying what the line does. The name alone is not an answer.
Prose
Prose questions ask how a story is told, not only what happens. Point of view, a character's choice, and the narrator's distance are the usual doors in.
Drama
A play is written to be seen and heard. Dialogue, silence, and the occasional stage direction do the work that a novel would do in narration.
Character and theme
A theme is an idea the work keeps returning to. A character is one of the ways the work tests that idea. The essay joins them with evidence.
Writing the essay
The literature essay is an argument about a text. The introduction answers the question in a sentence. Each paragraph proves one piece of that answer.
Financial Accounting
Financial Accounting past questions
Double entry
Every transaction is entered twice. One account receives value. Another account gives value. The books stay in balance because both sides are recorded.
Final accounts
The trading account finds gross profit. The profit and loss account deducts expenses to find net profit. Closing stock is not a guess. It is given, and it is deducted in the cost of goods sold.
Bank reconciliation
The cash book and the bank statement disagree for known reasons. Some items are in one record and not yet in the other. A reconciliation explains the difference. It does not hide it.
Control accounts
A control account is a total account. The sales ledger control account stands for all the trade debtors. Its closing balance should equal the list of balances in the sales ledger.
Depreciation
Depreciation spreads the cost of a long term asset over the years that use it. The straight line method charges the same amount each year.
Plan the sitting around this map
Anna is the coach on WASSCE practice. Kevin is the coach on BECE practice. Both explain the answer. The first questions need no account.
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Practise with Kevin and Anna