Revision techniques: The secret to exam revision success But what Cooke is talking about, he explains, is known in cognitive science as the difference between massed learning – when you learn and consolidate material in a short space of time – and spaced learning. “People who do massed learning will guess that they’ve learnt better than they have – it’s over-confidence,” he says. “If you drill a load of new vocabulary and then test yourself straight away, you’ll have the impression the memory is going to be there for ever.” This makes it dangerous for exam revision. Although packing in all your physics revision before Pancake Day might make you feel smug, it’s probably not a good idea. “I can memorise a shuffled pack of cards, but if I don’t test myself on them a few days later, I’ll have forgotten them entirely,” says Cooke. Of course, testing is little use if you can’t learn the facts in the first place – an accomplishment often easier said than done, particularly if you were never taught to in a meaningful way.
Academic writing: why no 'me' in PhD? | Higher Education Network | Guardian Professional The PhD is a lonely pursuit. Ask anyone who has ever done one and they will tell you that there is a lot of "me time" during your years of research. It requires a lot of reading and writing, critical thinking, coming up with ideas, then throwing those ideas into the trash and coming up with new, and hopefully, better ones. There's no way around it, the process requires isolation. This was one of the first things our programme director told us during our induction seminar: to be able to do a PhD, you need to not only to be okay with being alone, you have to love it. You would imagine that with all this me time, all these academics living inside their brilliantly chaotic heads, having conversations with themselves (not in a crazy kind of way … or maybe just a little bit), academia would be more open to the expression of ideas and thoughts in the first person. Changing the way I write was not an easy task. What's my issue with this (aside from the irony)?
Five secrets to revising that can boost your grades How do you get the most out of your revision time, and end up with the best grades you can? Or, if you're a different sort of student, how can you get the same grades you're getting now, but spend less time revising? Either way, you need to know how to learn better. And fortunately, decades of research carried out by psychologists about learning and memory has produced some clear advice on doing just that. As an experimental psychologist, I am especially interested in learning. Wouldn't it be better, I thought, if we could study learning by looking at a skill people are practising anyway? Computer games provide a great way to study learning: they are something people spend many hours practising, and they automatically record every action people take as they practise. Using data from a simple online game, my colleague Mike Dewar and I could analyse how more than 850,000 people learned to play. So here are my five evidence-based tips on how to learn: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
How not to write a PhD thesis In this guide, Tara Brabazon gives her top ten tips for doctoral failure My teaching break between Christmas and the university’s snowy reopening in January followed in the footsteps of Goldilocks and the three bears. I examined three PhDs: one was too big; one was too small; one was just right. Put another way, one was as close to a fail as I have ever examined; one passed but required rewriting to strengthen the argument; and the last reminded me why it is such a pleasure to be an academic. Concurrently, I have been shepherding three of my PhD students through the final two months to submission. There is a reason why supervisors are pedantic. Being a PhD supervisor is stressful. Another examiner enjoyed a thesis on “cult” but wondered why there were no references to Madonna, grading it as requiring major corrections so that Madonna references could be inserted throughout the script. Then there are the “let’s talk about something important – let’s talk about me” examiners. 1. 2. 3. 4.
BBC Radio 1 - BBC Advice - Revision Basics Innovating Pedagogy 2013 | Open University Innovations Report #2 This series of help sheets is designed for people who are trying out distance and online education for the first time, and for teachers who have already taught at a distance and want to try something new. Each help sheet outlines one approach to learning at a distance and provides guidance on how to put this into practice. All the help sheets are based on approaches covered in past Innovating Pedagogy reports and take into account that students may have only limited access to technology and the Internet. The latest report in our annual series explores new forms of teaching, learning and assessment for an interactive world, to guide teachers and policy makers in productive innovation. Download Innovating Pedagogy 2020 This eighth report, produced in collaboration with the National Institute for Digital Learning (NIDL), Dublin City University, Ireland, proposes ten innovations that are already in currency but have not yet had a profound influence on education in their current form.
The science of revision: nine ways pupils can revise for exams more effectively | Teacher Network The weeks and months leading up to exams can be challenging for students (and parents and teachers alike). Now more than ever, young people seem to be feeling the pressure. So how can students revise better? Which techniques really work, and which don’t? What can students do to improve their memory, mood and concentration? Before you do any revision 1. 2. During revision sessions 3. 4. Leading researchers in the field of memory consider testing yourself as one of the most effective ways to improve your ability to recall information (pdf). 5. 6. 8. 9. As research into psychology continues to develop, we learn more and more about how best to help students learn.
JOLT - Journal of Online Learning and Teaching Volume 10, No. 1 (March 2014) Incoporating a special section on "Massive Open Online Courses" Volume 9, No. 4 (December 2013) Volume 9, No. 3 (September 2013) Volume 9, No. 2 (June 2013) Special issue on "Massive Open Online Courses" Volume 9, No. 1 (March 2013) Volume 8, No. 4 (December 2012) Volume 8, No. 3 (September 2012) Volume 8, No. 2 (June 2012) Volume 8, No. 1 (March 2012) Volume 7, No. 4 (December 2011) Volume 7, No. 3 (September 2011) Volume 7, No. 2 (June 2011) Volume 7, No. 1 (March 2011) Volume 6, No. 4 (December 2010) Volume 6, No. 3 (September 2010) Volume 6, No. 2 (June 2010) Volume 6, No. 1 (March 2010) Volume 5, No. 4 (December 2009) Volume 5, No. 3 (September 2009) Volume 5, No. 2 (June 2009) Incoporating a special section on "Integrity and Identity Authentication in Online Education" Volume 5, No. 1 (March 2009) Volume 4, No. 4 (December 2008) Volume 4, No. 3 (September 2008) Volume 4, No. 2 (June 2008) Special Issue on "Next Generation Learning/Course Management Systems"
Managing exam stress | Current Students | University of St Andrews You are here: University » Current Students » Advice and support » Personal matters » Managing exam stress Quicklinks:General exam stress-busting tipsTips for the revision periodTips for the exam itselfAfter the examA few anxiety reduction techniques Exam Stress Exam anxiety is: excessive worry about upcoming examsfear of being evaluatedapprehension about the consequencesexperienced by many normal studentsnot mysterious or difficult to understandmanageable by following a plan of helpful suggestions Four main areas which can contribute to your exam anxiety are: Lifestyle issues:- inadequate restpoor nutritiontoo many stimulantsinsufficient exercisenot scheduling available timenot prioritising commitments Information needs:- strategies for exam-takingacademic information such as course requirements, lecturers' expectations, exam dates and exam locationknowledge of how to apply anxiety reduction techniques while studying before any exam Poor Studying Styles:- Psychological Factors:- Plan. Smile!
SMIRK jQuery Mobile Web App Start page SMIRK by Imperial College, Loughborough University and the University of Worcester, modified by Marion Kelt Glasgow Caledonian University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Based on a work at Advice to revise 7 hours a day for GCSEs over Easter 'unbelievable' | Education An expert recommendation that GCSE and A-level students should study for seven hours a day throughout the Easter holidays has been greeted with a variety of scepticism, concern and mild horror by psychologists, teachers and pupils. Barnaby Lenon, a former headteacher of Harrow, the prestigious independent boarding school that educated the likes of Winston Churchill, Benedict Cumberbatch, the singer James Blunt and the rugby player Billy Vunipola, suggests in a much discussed list of revision tips, a total of 100 hours study over the fortnight long holiday. All topics should be revised at least three times before the exam; studies should start at 9am and finish by 6pm with regular 30-minute breaks and a good night’s sleep at the end. “Good exam results are made in the Easter holidays,” he writes in a blog for the Independent Schools Council, which he chairs. “Public exam results are important. “It’s just nonsensical. Lenon, however, has an impressive track record. Since you’re here …
Recomposing Scholarship: The critical ingredients for a more inclusive scholarly communication system. Scholarship is not just about publication, but about interaction, interpretation, exchange, deliberation, discourse, debate, and controversy. Below is the transcript from Jonathan Gray‘s talk at yesterday’s conference which outlined how at odds the current system of academic publishing, commodification and reward is with the nature of scholarship. I’d like to start off by raising the question: what is research? Perhaps we might be tempted to talk about “increasing the stock of human knowledge” as an influential OECD manual on research statistics puts it. But perhaps all of these metaphors of quests for knowledge and scholarly republics sound a bit too grand when it comes to characterising what researchers actually do, what we are actually engaged in on a day to day basis. Image credit: Seth Anderson (CC-BY) The day to day reality of research is often much messier, more complex and more mundane. If sheer quantity is a measure of success then things aren’t going too badly. About the Author
Journal of Pedagogic Development The Journal of Pedagogic Development (JPD) is developed in the Centre for Learning Excellence at the University of Bedfordshire, England. It was launched at the University of Bedfordshire Conference in July 2011 and its focus is on teaching, learning and assessment. Journal of Pedagogic Development (Print) ISSN 2047-3257 Journal of Pedagogic Development (Online) ISSN 2047-3265 Call for Contributions Do you have an idea for a paper to disseminate your research or good practice? We publish papers up to 8,000 words long. Announcements Vol 5, No 1 (2015): JPD 5(1) Table of Contents Papers Articles Book Reviews Academic standards: back to the future - Wonkhe The Minister for Universities and Science, Jo Johnson, writing in The Times on 1 July made a number of observations about quality and standards as part of his introduction to the as yet rather vaguely defined Teaching Excellence Framework or TEF: We need to ensure all students receive excellent teaching that encourages original thinking and prepares them for the world of work.…Students rightly expect their degrees to hold their value over time. My judgment, as well as that of many in the sector, is that the UK’s traditional approach to degree classification is no longer enough to provide the recognition that hardworking students deserve — or the information that employers require.…Taken together, a sharper focus on teaching, an assessment system that demands consistent engagement from students and a degree classification system that maintains the value of hard-won qualifications will challenge all institutions and all students to reach their full potential. Assuring standards 80s style