my teacher told us that we must try to complete all 10 question for F4 or else we might not get a pass mark.
She said that if we only did nine and scored high marks, we would only get a small past mark.
is this true?????

if it is, does that goes for F5 too???

If that is true for F5, i'm in big trouble. i spent way too much time on question 1 that i didn't attempt one question.

I don't think it is true.

F5 was mainly a numerical paper this time, so you still have a chance I think. Your teacher is not too wrong about F4. Its hard to score marks in that and answering 10 questions is really important. Although if you're reasonable sure about the 9 you have answered, you'll probably be okay. At the same time its useful to remember that what the examiner considers sufficient might not be what we thought.

I myself attempted these papers this time. I almost completed 10 questions, yet Im not sure about all of them, I keep thinking my answers were too short. F5 was even worse, I nearly left 20 marks, and Im quite uncertain about the rest. Im having sleepless nights over this exams session. I know I'll either pass or fail by a small margin, which is quite nerve wracking. Just praying all the time these days.

This is absolutely wrong.

Not sure how true this is in terms of failing, but I know that time management forms a key in ACCA exams as it is part of the skills you must develop (e.g. overall time management and being able to focus on what is important).

When I attended the Government Finance Profession Conference this year, ACCA did a presentation on time management in exams. They explained that you gain the most marks in the first 10 or so minutes of any question and that the rate at which you gain addition marks after that drops by each additional minute (downwards curve). Therefore they advised that you strictly adhere to the advised time allocation (1.8 minutes per available mark) and move on to the next question as soon as the time has lapsed (even if you are mid-sentence!). You can always come back to a question if you have any time left at the end of all questions, but are more likely to score higher that way, although this is not a guarantee you will pass of course!

I would say it is strongly recommended you at least attempt each question in F4 as you will loose a lot of marks by not doing so and will therefore have to score very highly in the other 9 to make up for this, so in that sense it is true. I am sitting F4 in December and that is my revision plan anyway.

I sat F5 in June as well and found some of the questions very confusing and time was short as always. I just hope that I have gained enough marks in the questions on variance analysis and ABC to make up for the others.

Good luck with your exams, hope you'll pass!