Grade 10 End of Term 3 Exams 2026: What to Revise, Subject by Subject

Term 3 closes on Friday 23 October, and most schools set their end of year exams in the final two weeks. For Grade 10 that means the first full year of CBC senior school ends with a set of papers nobody has sat before.

That is the real difficulty. Grade 10 in 2026 is the pioneer cohort. There is no year group above them, no shelf of past papers, and no older cousin who can say "they always ask this". The learner has to revise from the syllabus itself.

This guide sets out what to focus on in each subject, and how to revise when there is nothing to copy. If you are new to how senior school works, start with Grade 9 to Grade 10: what actually changes.

Why this exam is different

In older systems a learner could study ten years of papers and spot the patterns. Grade 10 cannot. Teachers are setting these papers from the curriculum design and their own judgement, which means questions will come from what was taught this year, across all three terms.

Two practical consequences follow:

• Term 1 and Term 2 content is fair game. An end of year exam is not just a Term 3 test. Learners who only revise recent work get caught out.
• The exercise book is the best guide you have. What the teacher spent time on is what the teacher is likely to test.

Subject by subject

Every learner takes the core subjects. The rest depends on the pathway and the electives chosen. Use the rows that apply to your child.

The core subjects in more detail

English. Practise one comprehension and one composition each week, timed. The composition is where marks are most uneven. A five minute plan before writing usually lifts the score more than any amount of new vocabulary.

Kiswahili. The same pattern applies. Short daily sarufi practice, ten minutes, is better than one long session. Insha should be written in full at least twice before the exam.

Mathematics. Go topic by topic through the exercise book and redo the questions the learner got wrong the first time. Show every step. In senior school, method marks matter, and a correct final answer without working can earn less than a wrong answer with a clear method.

Pathway subjects

Senior school organises around pathways: STEM, Social Sciences, and Arts and Sports Science. Each learner also takes electives within or across them. Our Grade 10 notes by pathway set out the content subject by subject.

For the sciences, draw and label the main diagrams from memory, then check. For humanities subjects, practise "explain" answers where each point has a reason attached. For practical subjects, do not neglect the written theory. A learner who is talented on the field or in the workshop can still lose marks on terminology.

How to revise with no past papers

• Turn the exercise book into questions. For every page of notes, write two questions a teacher could ask. Answer them a day later without looking.
• Use the teacher's own tests. Topic tests and CATs from this year are the closest thing to past papers the cohort has. Keep them and redo them.
• Practise with format-accurate papers. Prediction papers written to the Grade 10 format fill the gap. See our Grade 10 prediction papers by subject.
• Mark honestly. Use the answer key, not a guess. Write the corrections in a different colour so the learner can see what changed.

A simple two-week shape

In the first week, cover each subject once, starting with the weakest. In the second week, sit timed papers and correct them. The final two days before the exams should be light: reviewing corrections, not learning new content.

Keep sleep normal. A Grade 10 learner revising until midnight before a Mathematics paper will perform worse than one who stopped at nine.

A useful rule for the second week: every paper sat at home gets marked the same day, and every mistake gets written up as a short correction. A paper sat but never marked teaches the learner very little. The correction is where the learning happens, and a pile of corrections is the best last minute revision sheet a Grade 10 learner can have.

What parents can actually do

You do not need to know the subject content. You can ask to see the exercise books, check that every subject is getting time, and make sure the learner sits at least one paper per subject under timed conditions at home. That alone puts a learner ahead of most of the cohort.

Also keep this year's report and test scores. Because the cohort is building the record as it goes, your own file is the most complete history your child has.

Frequently asked questions

Are there any Grade 10 past papers at all?

Almost none. Grade 10 in 2026 is the first CBC senior school cohort, so the only real practice material is teacher tests and papers written to the new format.

Will the end of year exam cover the whole year?

Usually yes, though schools differ. Ask the class teacher. If unsure, revise all three terms.

Which subjects should get the most time?

English, Kiswahili and Mathematics are taken by everyone and carry on regardless of pathway, so they are the safest place to spend extra time. Then the weakest pathway subject.

Do these results affect anything later?

Ask the school how it uses end of year results. Either way, the habits built now carry into Grade 11 and 12.

For full practice across every subject, the Grade 10 Complete Revision and Exam Kit gives format-accurate papers with answers, and the Grade 10 hub lists everything else for the year.