PPE's and Revision Strategies
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Study Skills, Revision Strategies & Useful videos
How to revise effectively & purposefully
Ensure you are revising (re-looking) every single week. This will help you build your vocabulary and recall! We all forget things, but do you know why we forget things?
The forgetting curve is a mathematical formula by Hermann Ebbinghaus that originated in 1885.
The curve demonstrated the rate at which information is forgotten over time if we don’t attempt to retain it. Learners will rapidly lose their memory of learnt knowledge in a matter of days or weeks unless the information is consciously reviewed. Some studies suggest that humans forget approx 50% of new information within an hour of learning it. That goes up to an average of 70% within 24 hours.
To succeed you must be revising – effectively!
During the year all your teachers will talking to you about revision, setting revision for homework and asking you to independently revise. Make sure your revision is effective!
Re-reading does work as a revision technique but it is massively inefficient! You don’t need to buy expensive flash cards, or get highlighters (also not very effective), or sticky notes- you just need to stick to what is effective and what works!
Here are a few effective techniques you may want to try:
So what does that look like practically?
- Spaced practice - Starting your revision early means you can spread it out and avoid last-minute panic. Memorising information takes time – you can’t cram it all in and expect it to stay there. Give yourself the best chance of success by staggering your revision – five hours of revision over five days is better than five hours in one day. Once you know what to revise for the exam, make a revision timetable to plan your sessions using a digital or paper diary.
Avoid the temptation to jump straight into your revision without one. Making a plan does take time, but it will save you hours of figuring out what to revise each day. Include lots of detail in your plan like relevant topics or lesson notes. Block out time for socialising, exercising and other breaks. Stick to your timetable as best as you can.
- Retrieval practice - Time spent testing yourself pays off, so come up with questions to test your knowledge. Make sure you understand what you're revising by thinking it through, rather than learning by mechanical repetition. Ask your friends and family to test you (this makes it less boring too).
Easy and fun way to do this is flashcards (remember to apply the Leitner system - here's how the Leitner System works):
- All flashcards start off in pile 1. Review each card and test yourself on the contents. Every time you get the facts or questions on the card correct you move the card to pile 2. You repeat the process on each card in pile 1 at frequent intervals, such as every day.
- You repeat the process on the cards in pile 2 less frequently, such as every two days. When you correctly recall the answers to the questions or facts on these cards you move them to pile 3.
- Cards in pile 3 can be reviewed less frequently again, such as every three days. Once you're confident you know the information on the cards you can move them to pile 4.
- Pile 4 contains information which you should feel you know well and could recall easily. These cards can be reviewed less frequently than any others, such as every four days.
- Interleaving – Break topics or even subjects into manageable chucks and revise them in different orders each week ( a revision timetable can help you do this!)
- Dual coding – Combine information with visuals. Perfect if you are more of a visual learner. For example:
- Diagrams
- Icons and symbols
- Diagrams
- Posters.
- Timelines
- Infographics
- Elaboration - Elaboration helps makes connections between new material and what you already know. Ask yourself to answer "Why?" questions. This will encourage you to think more deeply about the new concepts and explore the connections to related topics, thus increasing the quality of learning.
- Concrete examples - Concrete examples are specific, real-life examples used to illustrate an idea. They can be useful in helping participants grasp abstract concepts because they present the conceptual elements in a recognisable context. Concrete examples can be verbal descriptions, stories, actual objects and models.
The thought of hours of revision and sitting down to start worrying you?
The Pomodoro method follows a basic pattern of 25 minutes studying followed by a five minute break. If you do four of these in a row you can then have a longer break. It works because you learn better in short sessions, and you don't have to punish yourself with unbroken hours of revision. That could look something like this:
- 25 min revision session = 5 min break (enough for a toilet break or to make a drink/quick snack)
- 25 min revision session = 5 min break
- 25 min revision session 5 min break
- 25 min revision session = 15-30 min break (Lunch/longer snack break)
And that’s over 1 hour and a half of revision you would have completed! In 4 small sittings if you stick to those timings.
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