Any retake advice for a mother of 3 toddlers?

Muneera

Hi All! 

First of all, congratulations to all who have passed Dec’15 level 1 exam! Well done!

Now coming to my subject, being a mother of 3 toddlers (age: 3.7, 2.3 and 7 mths old) and not working at the moment, I had appeared for Dec’15 level 1 exam thinking I could pass the exam as I’ve got bachelor’s degree in finance and accounting. Well I guess I was in for a shock as I could hardly study with 2 toddlers and a newborn without any external help! I somehow could manage to touch the books (Schweser not CFAI books but would’ve loved to) in the last 2 mths before the exam. And no I couldn’t give in 5-6 hrs per day like many but barely 2-3 hrs per day only after the kids would fall asleep. I guess you can do the math! I could barely finish all the topics and CFAI EOC questions, didn’t get to do any review or what soever, and merely did 1 practice paper. So you can calculate my pass rate!?!

After I received my result (band 4) last month, I’ve been rethinking again and again if I should retake the exam? If yes, then should it be June or December exam? What should be my study strategies considering i’ve kids all under 4? Being in my 30s will it be the worth the time and effort? Though I still feel if I could’ve given my 100% then I would’ve passed.

Please feel free to advice/suggest (positive/negative) as I really need to think through it. And yes I plan to get back to work, perferrably  in a consultancy job if I get lucky!

Thanks in advance.

rsparks

I have a friend who received a  band  4 after only studying ethics and alternative investments. They passed level  1 the second time, but had to put in a significant amount of time. I'm not trying to discourage you, but it will be tough if you are aiming for June. I'm not sure if you're a single mother or the support network around you at the moment. I could  have never studied 5-6hours a day, so if people are saying that, then they may be out of university or a career break. This would be the exception and not the norm. Most of us have jobs, family commitments, etc. The best piece of advice is to have a plan. If you are taking care of the kids, then have someone there each night or day to put in an hour or two. Otherwise, leave it to the weekend where family can help out to look after the kids if possible. I would recommend trying to get out of the house to study because if you are constantly thinking about them at home, you will be less productive.

One way to get  around a time constraint is to watch videos. rather than re-reading material, i went to youtube and watched a video. concise and to the point. CFAI will waffle on, but I used their material except  for eon. After watching a video focus on they main concept or  formula. I would watch the videos  on the train into and from work. You could do the same with a phone plus head phones throughout the day  and have Qbank for support.

I failed once after getting through all the material and only doing one or two practice exams. the second time I had Qbank, youtube vids and did 5 practice exams. I didn't study  except for on weekends.

You have  to be the judge of  balancing your time to get through the material plus reviewing by june. If not, you already have the text books, you could plan for Dec this year. This charter is a marathon and a sprint as well. However, You could try to keep to the June time scale: lvl 1 june, lvl  2 june and lvl 3 june. Dec exams may hamper  your progress.

Perhaps someone with children can provide further help as well.

-Ron

Muneera

Thank you so much Ron for all your feedback. I guess I need to really sit down and think it through. 
I'm hoping if some experienced mother could enlighten me more on this.