'Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration'
Thomas Edison
Inventor of the Light Bulb and other tools

The following information is intended to help you to make the most of your learning. It explains something about each of the following topics.  

• Motivation
• Methods of Working
• Learning styles which suit your personality
• Memory and learning tips
• Reading techniques
• Mock examinations
• Extended Writing skills

Lots of people behave as though succeeding in school is a matter of luck; it is not. Of course, it helps if you find school work easy, but many people rarely use their whole mind to really think about work. You are probably a lot more intelligent than you think you are.

There are a number of techniques that you can use to make your learning more effective. We want you to work hard, but we also need to be certain that the work you do is useful to you and actually helps you to learn well.

Discipline

Subjects in college are called disciplines. This is because they are a special way of thinking and it takes self-discipline to learn to think in that special way. Usually you will find that you enjoy homework once you start.

The more effort you put into a subject the more enjoyment you get out of it. It is much easier to work at something you enjoy. It sometimes takes a lot of effort get started. There are so many things that are more fun than homework.

This page is designed to help you to get the most out of your work in school.

Confidence

Some people have no confidence. Whenever they are set a new challenge, they expect to fail. If you take this view of yourself, then you will fail, no matter how clever you are. It is hard to get out of a negative way of thinking. The challenge is to stop saying, 'this is too hard!' and start thinking 'this way of doing it is not working so I will try another way, my teacher will help!' Remember that your teacher is your friend, even when he or she is moaning at you to do more work.

When things that you have tried to do have gone wrong, maybe you failed an examination or test that you wanted to pass, think about what you said to yourself about what happened. Were you blaming yourself? Did you get depressed? Did you stop trying for other tests?

Try learning from bad events and turning them into learning experiences. Develop a positive attitude and think of what you could do to improve your performance.

Setting targets

These should be long term targets or goals. They could be medium term targets. They can be lists of things to do, or tasks.

Goals Think hard about what you want to do with your life and how you need to get there. Aim high. It is wise to have just two or three long term goals to work towards.

Targets These are shorter term aims for yourself. They could be simple things such as 'I am to pass in this subject with an excellent grade at GCSE'. These should be something that you can do, and feel good about yourself for doing.

Remember to be confident when you set your targets. When you have undertaken reviews of your own performance for each subject, you will have set yourself targets. Use these targets to help you improve your performance in each subject.

Tasks These are just the daily things that you need to do, and which you have written in your planner. Keep lists of all the things that you must do, and tick them off when they are done. This will make you feel happy and confident.

Putting off tasks just makes them bigger and more horrible. Revision is a hard task and so you need to plan revision with a timetable and to be very disciplined and stick to it. Remember to timetable some pleasure for yourself so that you can remember to relax a little too.

Work in the way that suits you best. You are advised however, to work as much as you can with other people to share ideas and to talk about the work.

1. Read their work and look at what they do.
2. Learn from the people in your class.
3. Work outside school.
4. Do not be ashamed to want to do well.
5. Work with your friends at home.
6. Share books.
7. Use the facilities in school.
8. Go to sociology revision lessons. Ask for them if you feel you need them.
9. The school has a good LRC and you can also use the Internet. Go to homework club; ask to borrow books. (Note: Anything that you borrow from school must be returned, because if it is not given back, you deprive other students of materials and that is both selfish and wrong.)
10. If you watch relevant programmes on television, make notes on your ideas so that you can remember them.
11. Be systematic and take advice.
12. Buy nice pens.
13. Learn your spellings.
14. Write carefully and plan your work properly.
15. Teachers know the tricks and you should take their advice!

Setting up a place to work

Do: Find somewhere quiet and comfortable. Do have all of your work neatly sorted and well organised in folders. Do make space to spread your things out. Use the LRC or the library if you do not have space at home. Listen to quiet music.

Do not: Work in front of a television. Listen to music with words. Put off doing the work. Allow other people to distract you.

What kind of mind do you have?

People have different ways of thinking and learning. See what kind of person you are and adapt your learning styles to suit what helps you to learn things best.

All the tips will help you to learn what you need!

Your personality affects your thinking style so decide which revision tips suit your needs and make those the focus of your style.

Are you artistic and creative? Do you tend to remember photographs? Do respond to colours and shapes? If the answers to these questions are 'Yes', then you are a visual thinker.

1. Design posters
2. Use mind maps
3. Colour code your revision notes
4. Draw cartoons and funny pictures near important facts.
5. Create diagrams of important information.

Are you musical? Do you remember songs and words easily? Are you good with names and word puzzles? Can you remember other people's words? If the answers to these questions are 'Yes', then you are an aural thinker

1. Read your work aloud onto tape and play it back.
2. Repeat facts you need under your breath as you do other jobs.
3. Create rhymes and poems for facts.
4. Explain your work to any willing listener.

Are you a dancer or active sports player? Do you wriggle and move a lot?Do you find sitting still difficult? Do you enjoy the process of movement? If the answers to these questions are 'Yes', then you are a kinaesthetic thinker

1. Walk around the room as you learn facts.
2. Move your arms as you say things aloud.
3. Make large posters so that you can remember the movements you made as you wrote the material
4. Write your learning out in big letters.
5. Play classical music as you learn facts.

How your memory works

One of the most important things that your mind does is to forget things. It acts as a form of selection barrier so that only important things pass into your long term memory.

How do you manage to show your mind that something is important enough to store in long term memory?

There are a number of things which help us to remember and also help us to retrieve information:
• Smells
• Sounds
• Funny things and jokes
• Repetition
• Actions and activities

As a guide, think of all of the techniques that advertisers use to grab your attention and see how many of those tricks you can apply to your own learning.

Creating Index Cards

It is useful to create a set of personal revision cards using boxes and index cards for each of your subjects. Any stationery shop will have some.

It is better if you manage to start early in your courses and to keep up the habit of looking at the cards and creating new ones. However, it is never too late to create index cards for your subjects.

Write down just the important ideas and use colours to make the work stand out.

Here is an example of the kind of information you could use

What is mass media?
Mass refers to a lot - a lot of people
Media refers to communication - so mass media means communication to a lot of people.
Examples: television, radio, post cards, computer games, internet.


Reading techniques

One of the best ways of learning material is to read and make notes. Follow the pattern set below and this may make the process easier.

1. Scan the work you are studying. Read the whole passage very quickly in order to get a rough overview. Jot down the main headings or the main points in a rough order.

2. Decide what you need to know. You will learn less if you read everything, because your mind cannot cope with too much learning in one go. Decide what it is you need to know and focus on that material.

3. Read carefully and precisely. Do not make notes, just read everything to make sure that you have looked at every word and that you have not missed any important points. This is part of examination technique. People sometimes do not read questions carefully enough in the rush to begin writing.

4. Memory and recall checking. Turn the book upside down and write down what you have remembered. Check that against your notes. You may need to scan your work again and restart the process.

5. Revise your work. Go back to your notes on a regular basis to check that you understand them and have learned the main facts. Try and write them down without having the book in front of you. Talk to people about the notes.

Reading graphs and stimulus materials

In subjects where it is necessary to look at graphs or stimulus materials the following tips may help.

1. Use a small clear ruler to look at the material. It will help you to focus on certain small parts.
2. Read or look at everything. Sometimes questions will focus on the legend, which is the writing which tells you about the stimulus materials. 3. Check your answers to graph and stimulus questions especially carefully as this is an area where it is very easy to make careless mistakes.

Learn from the Mock Examinations

It is tempting to push your mock examination paper in the bin if you did badly or to relax and forget about it all if you did well. Both of these strategies are an enormous mistake.

The whole point of the mock is to learn about examinations and to learn examination techniques.

Look at the following list and then at your examination paper and the teacher's comments on it. Can you honestly say 'yes' in answer to the following questions?

1. I followed all of the instructions carefully.
2. I had all of the correct equipment with me.
3. I answered all of the questions.
4. I answered the right questions for me.
5. I understood all of the questions because I read them carefully.
6. I spent a lot of time thinking and planning my answers.
7. I put all of the important points in my answers.
8. I wrote exactly the right amount for each question.
9. I had exactly the right amount of time and finished checking my answers as the clock stopped.
10. I made no mistakes because I checked all of my work carefully.
11. I revised thoroughly and so I knew the work.
12. I felt calm and cool and collected because I knew I was well prepared and happy about the paper.

If you said 'yes' in answer to all of the questions, then you are a super-human. If you said 'no' to more than about four questions, then you really need to look at your examination techniques, because no matter how good your revision, you may let yourself down through carelessness.
 

1. How long do you have for writing?
2. What will the structure of the paper look like?
3. How many questions will you answer?
4. What kinds of questions will there be?
5. How long should you spend on each question?
6. How many marks are there for each part of the examination?
7. What equipment will you need in the examination?

On the day, make sure you have plenty of time to discover the answer to this following question! When and where will the examination take place?

 
Extended writing and essay answers:

Checklist for the content of an essay

1. Does the introduction refer to the question?
2. Does the conclusion refer to the question
3. Have I stayed on the point and talked about the question?
4. Is there factual information in my writing?
5. Have I used evidence to back up the points that I have made? Is all of the information present in the essay?

Organisation of the essay

1. Does the introduction tell the reader what the essay is about?
2. Does the conclusion refer to the introduction?
3. Are the ideas presented in logical order with a clear plan?
4. Are a variety of points of view referred to?
5. Is each point of view properly developed and clearly explained?
6. Is the essay the correct length for the title?

Style of the essay

1. Is there some academic and specialist language used in the essay?
2. Are quotations and references to books properly acknowledged?
3. Did I check that the spelling is accurate?
4. Are my sentences the correct length?
5. Have I used paragraphs correctly?
6. Is my grammar accurate and careful?
7. Have I used a formal style of writing?