The Science of revision – developing good habits early

1. The Science of revision – developing good habits early March 2019

2. Student Council update • What we’ve been discussing recently; • Confidentiality in school – are students aware that teachers are not able to keep information confidential? Students have asked for more clarity on the process of reporting information. Ms Smith will be providing this through Tutor Time next week. • Use of appropriate language – there have been issues raised recently around the discriminating language used by a minority of students. The use of positive language will be part of the Student Voice work for next week in Tutor Time. • If you have an issue you would like addressed, speak to your Tutor Rep or come along to your House Meeting during Tutor Time or the Student Council main meeting Week 1 Weds lunch.

3. As we can see from the learning pyramid, studies have proven that just sitting and listening in class or reading back through notes, are ineffective ways to remember information for most people. • The more we do with the information we learn, the more we remember it. • Discussing your learning with others and teaching others the content, is actually the best way to remember the information. • Don’t leave revision until Year 11 and 13. If you do this, you will be ‘relearning’ not ‘revising’ information. It’s never too soon to make a startand introduce healthy learning habits. • Discuss the next slides in your Tutor Groups – how easy would it be to follow these habits?

4. Breakfast- king of meals • It is estimated that around 27% of boys and 39% of girls skip breakfast some or all of the time. How many of you have skipped breakfast this morning? • Research has found that skipping this meal significantly reduces students’ attention and their ability to recall information. • Simply having a bowl of cereal will give you the concentration and memory boost you need to have a productive day of learning/revision. • Try foods such as yoghurt, low sugar cereals, fruits, poached/scrambled eggs.

5. Snapchat and Instagram can wait! • This should be an obvious one, but for many it isn’t. Phones can be distracting; they are linked to FOMO (fear of missing out). • Evidence shows that students who spend more time texting and using social media get lower grades. • In another fascinating study, researchers found that the mere sight of a phone was enough to reduce a person’s ability to focus. • Out of sight really is out of mind. How many of you put your phone away when completing homework or revision?

6. Start early and spread it out • To commit something to memory takes time. • Spreading out your revision sessions on a particular topic (e.g. 30 min sessions over 10 days) is more effective than spending the same amount of time in one go (i.e. 5 hours in one day). Short bursts of revision (30‑40 minutes) are most effective. Your concentration lapses after about an hour. • This effect, known as “spacing”, helps because it allows time in between revision sessions to forget and re-learn the material. • Advice from research says not to overload yourself, stick to a revision timetable up to ten weeks before the exam, dividing learning into manageable chunks and share revision plans with parents and teachers to help you stick to it. • Why do you think a timetable actually helps with revision?

7. Test yourself • Leading researchers in the field of memory consider testing yourself as one of the most effective ways to improve your ability to recall information. • Testing yourself also helps you check for any gaps in your knowledge. Create a checklist for yourself for each topic/paper. Your teachers will most likely have these already. • Practice papers provide a good starting point, as well as quizzing yourself at the end of your revision session. • Use websites such as Seneca (senecalearning.com) or PiXL: https://students.pixl.org.uk PiXLSchool Number: 602578 Password: Indep142 How many of you are using these websites? Is this something you could look into this weekend?

8. Teach someone • After you have tested yourself, teach the material to someone else. • This has been found to help aid memory and recall: it is known as “the Protégé Effect”. • Teaching someone else requires you to learn and organise your knowledge in a clear and structured manner.

9. Did someone say snacks? • A day of learning/revision often starts with a pleasant trip to purchase tasty treats! • Even having a fun-sized pack of Haribo can result in a HUGE sugar crash by the afternoon. • You WILL struggle to retain information/function at your optimum. • Try popcorn, iced tea / low sugar drinks, almonds, apples and lots of water! Full fat/sugar fizzy drinks should be avoided during coursework/exam seasons. • Can you name any well-known ‘brain foods’? • Eggs, blueberries, oily fish, dark leafy greens, peanut butter, wholegrains, nuts.

10. Ditch the highlighter? • Prof Dunlovsky's research - found that picking out individual phrases with a highlighter can hinder revision. • But he's not suggesting that highlighters should be abandoned as he recognises they are "safety blankets" for many students. • Despite being the favourite weapon of many students tackling revision, research suggests they don’t work very well. People learn and recall information better if they connect it to other pieces of information. • Highlighters don’t do this, they isolate single pieces of information. • Quite often, students end up highlighting whole chunks and passages of text, which can give the appearance of having worked hard, but is of little value. • Try transferring the information onto flash cards straight after highlighting. Then reading through, rehearsing, getting someone to test you.

11. Rethink music • Students who study in a quiet environment can recall more than those who revise while listening to music.  • Previous research has found numerous benefits to listening to music before performing a task– it improves attention, memory, and even mental math ability. It has also been found to alleviate depression and anxiety before tests. • The University of Wales found that whether students enjoyed the music or not, having it on while they worked was just as distracting as hearing someone talk constantly. Scores were significantly higher for tests taken in a quiet environment. • If you insist on music, studies show it’s better without lyrics as easier to tune-out.

12. Fresh air and exercise • You cannot work all day, every day. Nor should you. Revision has to be about quality, as well as quantity. • Going outside and getting some fresh air helps people feel refreshed and better able to focus afterwards. • Furthermore, doing a little bit of exercise helps people deal better with stressful situations: it reduces anxiety and increases self-esteem. • A study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, stated of 5,000 students, there was an increase in test performance for every extra 17 minutes boys exercised, and 12 minutes for girls. • They claimed that since every 15 minutes of exercise improved performance by an average of about a quarter of a grade, it was possible children who carried out 60 minutes of exercise every day could improve their academic performance by a full grade - for example, from a 5 to a 6, or a 6 to a 7! • How many of you do at least 60 minutes of exercise a day?

13. Sweet dreams • Students are encouraged to work hard and revise a lot before their exams: however, there comes a time when they need to stop and go to sleep. Knowing when can be tricky. • There is a link between being a perfectionist and struggling to sleep. • If you are falling asleep within five minutes of your head hitting the pillow, you should probably be going to bed earlier. • Other sleep tips include having regular bedtimes, not being on your mobile phone in bed, but if you are, turning down the backlight on it (Night shift on iPhone) •  Multiple studies have shown that the blue wavelengths on the white light spectrum (i.e. phone screen) can disrupt our sleep patterns, because we only expect to see light in this spectrum during the day. Sleep deprivation is REAL. • The National Sleep Foundation recommend GCSE and Sixth Form Students need between 8 to 10 hours a night. • How many of you get this each night?