Three tips to consider when revising for a challenging test
three tips I share to revise for a (challenging) exam
Pupils may often struggle to find a learning strategy to increase their score for a test. The following is a list of 3 tips that can be considered when revising for an exam:
1. The myth of learning modality
There is no need to spend time searching for a learning modality that matches your revision style. If you’re someone who enjoys reading, that doesn’t necessarily mean that you can’t try studying through visual aids like diagrams that help you simplify the content from certain topic. Nor does it mean that you can’t listen to lectures while doing your daily chores. Recent evidence, such as that from where they did a small meta-analysis of 10 papers on learning modalities, suggests that there is no enhanced learning outcome when aligning preference to modality-specific learning styles.
Try either learning style. Source: https://www.businessedge.org.nz/jeanette-bremner-visual-thinking-strategies/
2. Distributed, consistent learning
Well, what works then? A common idea echoed by educational psychologists is that spaced learning, also known as distributed practice, has a significant positive effect on learning outcome as measured by retention interval. As shown by , students tend to have a higher recall of verbal stimuli when it’s presented over spaced episodes compared to when presented over a massed session. What we can extrapolate is that we shouldn’t learn a lot during a single session, but rather distribute learning across different smaller, but more frequent ones. Even more, has shown that spaced learning also works when students properly self-regulate their study during a massive open online course and correlated positively with quiz performance. These results are indeed relevant for the situation a lot of us pupils are subject to due to the pandemic.
Distribute it, instead of cramming it. Source: https://www.jcrsmed.org/articles/2018/4/1/images/JCurrResSciMed_2018_4_1_37_233198_f1.jpg
3. Self-test
Another tip worth considering is to constantly self-test yourself on what you learnt, instead of only restudying the same information. Reviews like that from has identified that the active, repeated retrieval of information from memory produces better retention of such compared to conventional ways of passive learning such as watching lectures, having study groups, or reading. For example, search in the internet for quizzes made by fellow peers or past papers that get released after a period of examination is over, and enjoy doing them. If there is feedback readily available, it’s recommended for you to delay the feedback as it has been shown by the same author that it may prove to yield better learning outcome than immediate feedback.
So, this may sound cliché, but… what were the three tips I just shared? Self-test yourself.
Also, this illustration is perhaps not “exactly” the self-testing you just had in mind, but it’s more or less the same principle of actively participating in a task[^1]. Source: https://lumiradxcaresolutions.com/2016/11/08/what-is-patient-self-care-dr-mark-sullivan/
Of course, fine-grain details such as how much time do you dedicate to self-testing, or duration in between your spaced sessions as well as which modalities to try may ultimately be up to you to decide. In the end, this depends on your individual context and available resources.
Finally, the three tips are complementary to one another. As such, when spacing your study, find some time you can dedicate to self-test. Or otherwise experiment with different learning modalities and test yourself in each of them.
All in all, I hope these tips come in handy when revising for any challenging test!
