Over my years of tuition, I have come across two types of students. The student that studies what they want, when they want, and the student that rewrites the textbook.
I've been in the shoes of both types of student, I'll give you an example. During year 10, my favourite topic was trigonometry. I spent so much time revising that topic, that I got full marks on the trigonometry section, but nothing on vectors. I also wrote out the entire science CGP book, so I've been there, done that!
This article will transform the way you view maths revision. You will learn how to make maths revision time efficient. You may even implement this strategy with your children.
You have probably heard this a million times, but past papers are key and maybe not for the reason you think. Past papers are a blessing, they provide you with the exact road map of what to study. Imagine you have just gone to your closet, and the back of your closet has an old shirt, its super creased but you have to wear it today for a wedding - you're the groom... who has to look the best on the day.
Now for you to look the best your shirt has to be the least creased shirt of them all. This analogy represents your understanding of the GCSE curriculum, the more creased it is, the less you understand. Doing past papers, is like finding the creases. After completing a past paper you realise there are questions you got wrong, these are the creases. This how to guide will provide you with the road map to ironing out those creases.
Now we've found where all the indents are, we can make an effort to iron them out. Firstly, we need to heat up the iron, this is the motivation. You've got to want to do well in your exams, to actually put the effort in. Once the iron is hot, then we can start attacking the crevasses. Here, you will study each individual topic that you got wrong in the exam. For example, let's say you got question 16 wrong and it was about factorising quadratics. Study the method using any of your resources, then do practice questions starting from easy and progressively getting harder. Once you feel confident that you know how to do this topic, attempt question 16 again. If your revision worked, you would get it right, if not, you may need to revisit some of your work. Continue these steps for all the questions you got wrong in the paper.
You know sometimes, when ironing shirts there are a few persistent creases that just wont go away. At this point you need to ask yourself whether you might need to ask someone for help, if thats a friend, tutor, or whoever. They can help you iron out the persistent crease with different methods that you might not have known. Having the courage to ask for help, is the difference between cuff links and buttons.
Its all good, ironing the front of the shirt, but what happens when someone looks at the back? You need to keep repeating past papers, and working on the questions you got wrong. Ironing your shirt again and again will ensure it is pristine.
However, don't do too much. Don't leave the iron on your shirt for too long, or you'll burn it - just like you'll burn yourself out if you revise too much. You don't want to leave the mark of a burnt iron on the back of your shirt, how would that look at your wedding? This method is actually here to make revision more effective and efficient, as it forces you to continuously target your creases, rather than the already ironed sections.
The earlier you start ironing your shirt, the better. You could always iron your shirts on the day, but with all your other responsibilities, you can probably imagine how that would turn out. Instead, why not slowly iron out your creases, week by week, months before your wedding. Imagine how crisp your shirt would be!
Hooray! You got married. Your shirt was crisp and you were complemented the whole day. Ironing your shirt was a breeze and all it took was the CleereLearn way.
In all seriousness, I do believe this is the best method to studying maths and science, with the added benefit of revision not taking over your life.
Overview: Past-paper - Revise the questions you got wrong - Retry questions from past paper - Repeat. Do this once a week and you will be sorted.
