Revision Tips!

I just want to start with a small disclaimer to say that everyone works and revises in their own way - some of these tips may be absolutely useless for you! But personally, these have all worked well for me and they're the methods that I still continue to use in my last year of A Levels! I've got mock week the first week back so I've had to sacrifice my Christmas Break to lots of school work sadly, but hopefully it will pay off!

Just in case any of you were wondering, I'm taking Psychology, English Literature and Maths (Statistics) and these pictures come work from a variety of the subjects! It's important to remember that not only is every person different in how they revise, but every subject is different too!

1: Colour is your friend!

I'm a strong believer that the more time you spend making notes and the more attractive they look, the more you'll be able to recall them. I like to colour code what I'm doing to help link ideas together and also to make me look a little bit more organised! You don't have to spend silly amounts of money on stationery supplies (although I have definitely been guilty of doing that before!) - all of these pens are WHSmith's own brand, but I know you can get supplies like this from all over!

2: Mindmaps Mindmaps Mindmaps!

I've always found that the way I work best is through making and looking at mindmaps on A3 paper as they're such a simple idea to link ideas together and to expand upon what you've written without having to worry about them looking too neat! Unfortunately, English and Maths are a bit of a struggle to learn with through mindmaps but they're my holy grail for Psychology and were for my GCSEs too! I like to make a list of all of the mindmaps I want to make and do them section by section, so these are my Methodology ones!

3: If not mindmaps, what else? Note cards!

My favourite way to learn formulae for Maths is to write them down on notecards and then stick them up on the wall by my bed - I'll Instagram a picture when they're all done! I have a pack of white cards and a pack of coloured so again, it's easy to colour code what you're doing. Note cards are also really good if you want to revise by writing yourself questions and putting the answers on the back so a friend or relative can quiz you on them - makes revision a bit more interactive! I also found note cards particularly useful when I did French, as they were the perfect size to write out the conjugation of verbs on!

4: Don't be afraid to write on EVERYTHING!

I know that personally, when I was younger I used to be wary of writing on worksheets or textbooks that I had because I didn't want to make them messy but especially as an English student, you need to be making annotations on everything - provided that they are yours and you won't get into trouble for 'vandalising' them - I'm not paying any library fines for you if you follow this advice! Have a highlighter pen in your hand at all times and just make notes about anything that seems at all relevant! Plus, there's something really satisfying about seeing a poem, for example, that's been scribbled all over like these Christina Rossetti ones!

5: Keep all your work together!

There is nothing worse than doing a load of work and then it just disappearing into thin air! If you try to keep organised throughout the year, it means you have all your resources together when you come to revise towards the end of the year as well. I have a Psychology folder, an English folder for classwork and also a separate folder for my Reading Log, and for Maths I adore these notebooks from Paperchase because it means I can keep all my work ordered and together! I even bought an A5 size for when it comes to doing past papers at the end of the year. 

Oh wait, how have I not included that as a tip?!

6: PAST PAPERS

At the end of the day, it doesn't matter how much revision you do if you walk into the exam having no clue what the layout of the paper is going to be, or how they're expecting you to answer the questions! For subjects like Maths, you can do loads and loads at home and just mark them yourself - for my last exam last year, I did every past paper there ever has been for it! - but for subjects where the quality of writing is important, it's a good idea to write some sample essays and get your teachers to go through them with you.

So I think that's about it *sigh of relief* Revision is a lot of hard work and concentration but most of the time, it pays off! Do you have any tips for how to revise that I haven't picked up on here? I'd love to know how you guys have revised for different styles of exams!