With the latest exam coming to a close, you might be asking what to do after exams? Here are some enticing alternatives to recycling any spare papers lying around…

What to do after exams (with the old exam papers)

Start a bonfire

Setting light to a pile of scripts goes against our eco-friendly principles but it has been an unseasonably damp June that could use a little warmth. And there aren’t many forms of catharsis you can toast marshmallows over (or performance management targets depending on how the exams went)!

Origami

Turn a source of stress into a beautiful swan with the ancient Japanese art of origami. Apparently, it’s a great zen activity that promotes mindfulness, although, as with the elegant swan paddling frantically beneath the surface, even teachers who are outwardly calm and composed become distinctly un-zen with exam papers in hand! If it makes you feel better to screw it into a ball, just do it. Paper aeroplanes are a form of origami too and would make an appropriate second life for those papers after students gave flight to so many of your carefully prepared revision resources.

Fans

It’s typically the case that if you selflessly create a class collection of folded paper fans, it will rain all of July as well so perhaps hold off until it’s hit 30˚C and pupils are complaining about the unbearable heat before gifting them a DIY air conditioner. If exam know-how gets from the paper into the atmosphere and then into their brains by some means of osmosis then all the better.

Practice papers

Yeah, I suppose they could always be kept for that…

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