This is a short term, and many of our students are now in the final furlong before the finish line of public exams at GCSE and A-level. Speaking tests and practical exams have already started, and Year 11 and Year 13 can now count the days until their first written exams. I thought this was the ideal opportunity to give some final advice and reminders for effective revision in the final stretch.

1. Break it up

Cramming doesn’t work. Revision is most effective when it is spaced out, with breaks in between. This allows the brain to consolidate what you have revised, and also helps keep a healthy balance between revision and relaxation. Take fifteen minutes off for every hour of revision completed – it’ll help you remember what you’ve learned, and stop you going stir-crazy.

2. Make your brain work hard

In order to remember something, you really have to think about it. Just reading through notes, watching a revision video on YouTube, or listening to a recording of the key information is not going to help you remember information, because your brain isn’t having to try very hard. Re-reading, watching or listening on their own are passive activities. For information to stick, you need to actively do something with it – so turn the information you’ve read, watched or listened to into something else. A mind-map, a spider-diagram, a practice answer, a poster, a set of flashcards…you choose! Taking information from a source, processing it, and turning it into something else will help you to recall it better. After a proper 45-minute revision session, you should feel tired – you will need that break! (see tip 1).

3. Practice makes perfect

At this stage of revision, in the final weeks, your best preparation will be to practice exactly what you will have to do in the real exam. Practice questions, completed from memory to the same timings as the exam, will not only sharpen up your exam technique but will also help you remember what you’ve learned because they are a form of retrieval practice. You can get past papers or practice questions from your teachers, the Academy’s VLE, and services such as MyMaths, but also from exam board websites, and revision sites such as Get Revising or Bitesize.

This excellent video from the BBC summarises these three strong approaches to revision:

Good luck?

If you’re well-prepared, you know your stuff, and you’ve practised your exam technique, you shouldn’t need luck – the exam is just an opportunity to show the examiner what you can do. But good luck to all our exam-takers anyway!