What are effective ways of testing your knowledge when revising if you are sitting exams this summer? Revision consists of understanding, learning and applying the content of the subjects that you are studying. Part of that process is testing your learning to make sure that you can recall what you have learned. Testing should be a big part of your revision process.
Studies of Memory and research into how we remember information show that it takes three to six lots of testing for us to embed knowledge into our long term memory. Repeated testing is how we do this.
Try to test what you are learning regularly, so that it becomes a part of your revision routine. It is also a good way of letting parents or family members be part of your revision routine, maybe through flashcard testing or conversations about what you are revising each day. In this way revision can be interactive and sociable.
Effective ways of testing your knowledge when revising.
- Flashcards are brilliant for testing. There are several ways of testing flashcards. You can test them on your own by simply turning them over with question on one side and answer on the other side. Flashcards can be handed over to your family member or friend to test you. You can also spread them out in front of you and sort them out into three piles of cards…those that you know well, those that you sort of know and those that you need to learn further. You can then test them with different frequencies. The ones you know least well, everyday. The ones you know most well, every five days. This is the Leitner system.
- Digital flashcards using an app on your phone. There are lots of different testing apps based on flashcards. Anki, Quizlet and Gizmo are just a few of them. Some of them, like Anki have developed the Leitner system above, whereby they test you more frequently on the cards/information that you know least.
- Blurting This is when you remember content by recreating as much as you can remember using either paper, a whiteboard or saying it out loud. A good way is to focus on the information you want to remember for a certain time limit, cover the information and then see how much you remember by recreating it on a piece of paper or whiteboard. Then check it to see if there is anything you have left out and add it using a different colour. Mindmaps are very good for blurting.
- Cornell Notes are very effective for testing and have been designed especially for this purpose. The main section of them can be covered up for testing on your own or you can hand them over to someone to test you, because the questions are provided.
- Revision clocks are effective ways of condensing notes on a particular topic. Divide a large topic into twelve sub topics and see what knowledge and understanding you can retrieve on each one in a five minute time period. When they are complete, you also have a very useful poster with all the key information that you require. Templates can be found on the TES website
- Quizzes are excellent for quick testing. The multiple choice tests on BBC Bitesize are particularly good for testing what you are learning. They have them for just about every GCSE topic. A quick test is an effective method of testing that you have learned and understood what you have been revising.
- Talking for learning can take place in a car journey, on a walk or at the breakfast table. A conversation and asking questions about what you have been revising can help you to retrieve your learning as well as help with more deeper skills like analysis and evaluation. For example a conversation about History revision of the causes of World War One. What were the causes? Why were they the causes? What do you think was the most significant cause and why?
At www.studentnavigator.co.uk we offer academic mentoring and academic and revision coaching to help students prepare for exams and revise effectively. Please get in touch with us if you would like to find out more.