How to score good grades in exams?Share your secrets here

zaadee

How to score good grades in exams?Share your secrets here.
What is the most efficient way to do revision besides taking down notes?
Group study?
Time management?
Burn the midnight oil?
And how many hours do u spend daily on doing revision(not including doing homework)?Usually in the afternoon or at night?

Limerick Dude

Consistency.

Dont be doing bits and pieces all over the place, do a certain amount every night, it doesnt even have to be a long period every night!

nuada

Past papers, start with the really old sample papers and work your way up to last years paper. Should be about 12-15 papers for subjects like Maths and English.

As far as I remember the older papers are harder so you really need to work hard to get them done but by the time you get to last years paper you should be able to do all the questions fairly easily.

Alanstrainor

well first of all the group study thing is a no no, you get nothing done, It varies from person to person. Some people find note taking helpful as it condenses your, often gigantic book, into your own words. Plain and simple the best way of studying is to start early in the year and keep it up throughout, the time you spend is up to you, and usually increases as the year progresses. I'd recommend starting on 1 hour study apart from homework a night for starters and increase this as you see fit. Note taking and mindmaps were my main methods of study, but flash cards and other methods work, it's all dependent on the person in question.
I'd never let myself go on too late as it generally doesn't help as you wont learn anything when you're tired, and plus, it'll ruin you for your next day at school/study. Hope this helps,

sd123

learn the absoloutly essential stuff first, and make sure you know it inside out. Try to have a good idea of everything early in the year and by all means leave the less important things out, there are choices on the papers for a reason, remember. kinda the opposite of what everyone else said But thats what worked for me

Enemy Of Fate

Well the only thing i've ever needed to do to get good results is just read the material.....again and again and again and again and again, until you know basically everything in the book.Its not a popular method, but its never failed me.

doria gray

Here is a little tip for business studies, i started doing it of my own accord but i really think it got me my A in the mocks at least! What i did was i got those photo albums you get when you get a film developed and i emptied them and got a pile of flashcards and summarised an entire chapter in each flashcard then put them in the album in order and learned them off and it was easy to locate info whenever , it made business so much easier because its so wordy. I think it would work for certain subjects at least, I did the same with my bio papers, i wrote the answers to each question on a flashcard and stuck it over the question and read the question and flipped the card over to see the answers, as questions are quite repetitve i think this is a great way to memorise which is what the lc is really about, read remember, regurgitate. hey presto

Naikon

Cheat......in a discrete manner;)

eZe^

Listen in class. If you listen and understand a topic as your teacher is teaching it then you severely cut your workload when revising. Nobody wants to encounter an alien topic in the weeks leading up to the exams!

gaeilgegrinds

As a teacher- Listen to your teacher, do not waste class time (you have 7 hours a day there...more than study time!) Flashcards are great, also a study-timetable is needed. From March on...past papers done under exam conditions. One can NOT go from reading materical to producing it in an exam, one must practice doing that.

As a student- Ask your teacher questions & question their answers if you do not understand, sometimes their answers are confusing! If they do not know the answer do not dismiss them as being a mediocre teacher, the best teachers often had to come back to me with answers. Regular breaks & treats as motivation! Lots of fun to make the Leaving Cert year seem bearable! Rely on friends & be there for them! Be organised.

Hope these help. Not blowing my own trumpet but as both a student & teacher I seemed/seem to get exceptional results without killing myself (or my students). There is a skill involved.

JC 2K3

zaadee wrote:

What is the most efficient way to do revision besides taking down notes?

If you're too lazy to take down notes, then your attention span is probably too short to learn efficiently through just reading.

Notes don't have to be beautifully organised, neatly written and impeccible. They should be quite the opposite really - written fast, messy(only you need to be able to read them). Basically just scribble down important points. The only reason you do this is to make sure you're actually paying attention while studying something.

zaadee wrote:

Group study?

No, no, no.

zaadee wrote:

Time management?

Yeah, it's not rocket science, just be aware of all the small amounts of time you waste during the day. You finish school at 3/4, you go to bed at 11/12. That's 7/8 hours per weekday of free time. On Saturday, you'll have 12 hours plus of free time if you get up early. There should be no need to quit any extra curricular activities and you should be able to take a day off on Sunday. Study timetables work for some people, but I didn't bother personally. I wrote down goals for a week/weekend sometimes. I think this is very important. Don't make mental notes to study things, write down a list.

zaadee wrote:

Burn the midnight oil?

No. See above.

zaadee wrote:

And how many hours do u spend daily on doing revision(not including doing homework)?Usually in the afternoon or at night?

At the start of the year? 0-1 hours. Homework IS revision.
From about just before Xmas until the Easter holidays - 3 hours after school study(inc. homework) and the ocassional extra hour or two at home if necessary(depends what's going on in school).
2 weeks before the mocks - round 4-6 hours per day(was on Easter hols).
2 weeks before the leaving - same.

Corruptedmorals

....Cram. BUT a bit of consistent study as well.

Rozabeez

Do your homework and assignments.

Find a good place to study such as a library.

Enemy Of Fate

zaadee wrote:

Burn the midnight oil?

Well that depends.If you've already studied 5 hours that day....probably not.But if not then I find that after midnight is a great time to just do random short questions and stuff.Hell I remember in the month before the LC, after having srudied 6-8 hours of other subjects that day, i'd ''reward'' myself with some economics short questions around 1 in the morning before I went to bed, and I think it actually helped a bit (would probably help others more though, as Economics was the only subject I truly excelled at, and didn't need much study for).

Edit:Oh yeah and if you're cramming, drink lots of coffee and prop up a fan so that it blows air right into your face (I used my poetry book to prop mine up!!).This combination of caffeine and cold air will keep you alert during your long hours of study!!

Extreme-LoopZ

Flashcards, as mentioned, are excellent. If you're like me and have sort of a photographic memory (well not photographic, but if I can remember what a page looks like, then I can remember what info is on it) then red pen or pink highlighters and so on, really work wonders.

Also, it helps to once or twice a week take a step back and analyse what you've already covered, where you are and what you would like to have covered by this time next week.:)

Rozabeez

Say NO to group study.

JC 2K3

Down with flashcards and highlighters.

There is little else which annoys me as much as them....

treefingers

JC 2K3 wrote:

Down with flashcards and highlighters.

There is little else which annoys me as much as them....

i credit my highlighter as playing a major role in me getting through college

impossible to study documents dozens of pages long without having the relevant stuff highlighted.

maybe less relevant for LC...

JC 2K3

I find most people use them highly inefficiently.

Much better just to make notes anyway.

Rozabeez

I agree, I recall sitting there highlighting many un-important things blindly for hours on end.

nedward

Make a study timetable, tailor it to your hardest and most important subjects, ie make out a list of hardest, then most important, and assign hours based on combined position on the lists. Remodel this every once in a while, and plan out what you're going to study in that time block, e.g. TQM in business. 45 minute blocks are best, I reckon. And STICK to it

ninebeanrows

Its simple if you stick to it rigedly

Do all your homework perfectly up until Christmas, do revision for your small exams etc but no general study.

Before the Mocks do 1/2 hours of study as well as your lesseing homework load.

From late April step up and do 3 hours of study a day, by now you will have little if any homework.

Through May continue with your 3 hours a day.

But most important thing is to do your Homework and perform well in class tests.

I didn't follow this, but in hindsight, doing your homework etc is by far the most important thing, extra study can be left till closer to the exams.

nick23

Doin well in the exams is quite simple. You dont have to be amazingly clever. Just determined. If you want to do well you will.

Just start studying early (as in before christmas). By studying i mean proper nose to the grindstone i.e. at least 2 hours a night. If you do that you should have no problem. Dont start your past papers until about 2/3 months before the exams. But before you sit your exams make sure you've done every single question in those past papers unaided!

The only way to truly do well in the LC is to work hard. There's no avoiding it. The day you get into 6th year just get ready to work hard!