Choosing the best methods to learn

All work is not Equal

Choosing the best strategy to revise very much depends on what you want to achieve. You may be the type of person who spends hours reading and re-reading notes; highlighting chunks of text and completing all the revision tasks your teacher has set. However, your progress does not seem to be as fast as you expected. This is because not all work is equal.

For example, when you want to gain weight, eating extra portions of salad and vegetables is not going to be as effective as eating extra portions of pasta.

Choosing the right method to revise will automatically provide better results.

Consider the revision you need to do for a particular subject in preparation for the next test. Which of the following categories does it fall into?

  1. Remembering Key Knowledge
  2. Developing a deeper understanding
  3. Building sophisticated responses

Remembering Key Knowledge

You know you have covered a topic in class but you cannot remember any of it or very little. If this is the case, you need to complete tasks that will ensure the transfer of this knowledge from your working memory to your long term.

  • Create/complete quick quizzes
  • Flashcards
  • Reducing key information to 10 key words
  • Summarising using key words
  • Memory clocks
  • Mnemonics
  • Turn it into a story

Developing a deeper understanding

Once you are certain that you have a strong recall of the key knowledge, you are ready to begin to challenge your understanding. It is possible to remember something without fully comprehending the idea or concept. The tasks below will help you check what you do and don’t fully grasp and allow you to further investigate.

  • Mind mapping
  • Drawing diagrams and images
  • Explaining to yourself
  • Enacting
  • Questioning

Having completed these tasks, you should use them to make a list of knowledge gaps and areas that are unclear to you. This is when you need to return to your teacher and ask for some help. Preparing questions to ask is an essential part of this process.

Building sophistication

These tasks should be saved for when you can recall the key information with ease and are able to demonstrate a strong understanding of the ideas and concepts. If you are in this position, you may now be ready to target a more sophisticated understanding that requires you to be both evaluative and analytical.

  • Evaluation – this can include strengths vs weaknesses; differing views; diamond 9
  • Comparison – Venn diagrams
  • Transforming
  • Teaching