18 Nov 2019

 

Find out what type of learner you are

 

There are lots of online quizzes you can take to find out what type of learner you are, take a look at this one.

Once you know what type of learner you are you can optimise your revision time, and make sure it is effective.

 

Get organised

 

 

Make a plan & stick to it. Divide up the topics and subjects that you need to learn, and allocate time to do it. Work in small, manageable chunks and set realistic targets.

 

Know when you work at your best

 

Are you a night owl? Or an early bird? Or are you at your best at 3pm? If you aren’t sure track your energy levels through the day for a week and you should get a better idea of when you are at your best. Aim to do your most difficult revision at this time.

 

Know when to stop

 

 

You can’t pour from an empty cup, if you are exhausted you need to just stop. You will be wasting your time by trying to continue revising. Take a break, when you get back to the work you will do a lot better.

 

If you are more of a creative person, bring this into your revision

 

Draw pictures, write songs or jingles, make a video. Transform the information from a somewhat boring age of notes to something exciting and interesting.

 

Make mnemonics for information

 

Mnemonics are a great way to remember things, and can stay with you for years. How many people still know the colours of the rainbow because of Richard of York? (He gave battle in vain!). Make your own, the stranger the better.

 

Condense and expand

 

This is a really good revision technique and can be done in a few steps.

Firstly you need to really simplify the information, and condense it onto one page. After this, condense the information even more, reduce it into key headings. This will make it easier to remember. You can use mnemonics to do this (such as My Very Easy Method Just Speeds Up Naming Planets as a way of remembering the order of the different planets in our solar system).

Next see how much of the information you can write out yourself, without using the prompts. Once you have everything you can remember expand on everything that you have with your notes, and any other details you have from books and revision guides.

 

If you are competitive, test yourself and challenge yourself to do better

 

 

Do flash cards, or write down as much as you know about a topic in ten minutes. Challenge yourself to learn more and remember more. Set goals such as being able to recall five facts about a chosen topic in three minutes.

 

Teach others

 

With a group of friends pick a topic each and prepare a short ‘lesson’ to teach each other – no more than ten minutes each! Peer to peer learning can be really effective, and make things more interesting.

 

Sleep

 

 

Even if you are a night owl you still need your sleep. Make sure you aren’t staying awake until the early hours, or scrolling through Instagram feeds. Put the phone down and sleep!