National 5 is where Chemistry stops being general science and starts being Chemistry. Small-group tuition with Lynsey Robinson, a qualified teacher with over 20 years in Scottish classrooms and an SQA marker.
National 5 is the first time Chemistry asks pupils to hold three different things at once: the chemical idea, the maths behind it, and the precise language the SQA wants back. Plenty of pupils understand the chemistry perfectly well and still lose marks because they wrote it the wrong way.
The other jump is calculation. Moles, concentration and mass calculations arrive quickly, and pupils who were comfortable in S3 can suddenly feel lost. It is almost never that they cannot do the maths — it is that nobody has slowed down and shown them how the calculation connects to what is physically happening.
That is what these classes are for. Small enough that gaps get spotted in the room rather than in the exam.
Classes follow the SQA course through the year, then shift to past papers and exam technique as the exam approaches.
Course content follows the current SQA specification. Ask about the current year's arrangements.
Never more than five. Everyone gets asked, everyone gets heard, and nobody sits quietly at the back not understanding.
Lynsey marks for the SQA. Pupils learn how marks are actually awarded, and the phrasing that quietly loses them.
Exam technique is taught explicitly — how to read the question, how to structure an answer, how to handle the open-ended ones.
This class suits pupils sitting National 5 Chemistry who want to go into the exam knowing what to expect rather than hoping for the best. It works just as well for pupils who are coping fine and want an A as for pupils who have lost confidence and need the foundations rebuilt.
If your child is heading for Higher next year, N5 is the year that decides how hard that jump feels. Getting it solid now is far easier than repairing it later.
The step most pupils find hardest — and the one that matters most for university.