Revising and studying can be a drag for any student if they don’t know how to use their time and environment properly. I’m going to go through the top 3 proven most effective ways to revise which can be applied by all students to ensure better grades.
The first method is known as the Pomodoro technique.
The pomodoro technique is a time management method developed in the 1980s, its where, in our case, a student will do 20-25 minutes of studying followed by a 5-minute break. This method, repeated again and again, ensures students don’t lose focus when studying and it also essentially recharges the brain during the periodic breaks to that students can revise with high levels of productivity over a prolonged period of time.
The second method is active recall. This is a very popular method which involves students continuously testing themselves on the same part of a topic.
This works by embedding information into a student’s long-term memory by repeated testing and re-capping.
Active recall is one of the most widely used revision methods as it’s easy to set up and takes little effort to recap a certain section of a topic with flashcards for example.
The third most effective revision method for students it past papers. This is self-explanatory, where a student does a previous year’s paper for the chosen subject and marks his/her own work to identify mistakes and improve from them.
Past papers are a very effective revision technique as is brings together and builds up a range of skills which will be used in their exams. These skills include time management, calculator work, answer structures, and more which can all help towards a smoother exam week and potentially better grades.
As for methods that don’t work well, these include reading notes, highlighting, and making mind maps. These are largely ineffective as they are one time actions which don’t embed information in a student’s long-term memory and so should be avoided.
So, there you go, the top 3 most effective ways for students to revise for their upcoming exams.