With Christmas behind us, the days are getting longer and spring starts waking nature up again. And, of course, your child is now in the same calendar year as their end of year exams.
So, if your child need some support getting ready for their exams… NOW is the time to get ready.
Let’s break it down:
- Looking after the basics
- Getting in the right frame of mind
- A revision plan
- Knowing what to revise and how to revise
Ok, let’s start with the basics!
The basics
Food and safety are central at our Red Bird Tutoring centre. We feed our learners hot chocolate, tea, fruit and toast, so that they are ready to learn. We also look out for signs of stress and talking learners through techniques to help them relax and focus.
This is all essential maintenance during the run up to exam season.
A healthy, energy laden diet and a safe space where your child is not using up their energy unnecessarily will give them the best chance to succeed.
We don’t encourage sleep at the centre (although sometimes lack of sleep is a major barrier to learning), but a regular sleep pattern without interruption, will give your child the best opportunity to stay focussed the next day.
Mindfulness
We practice mindfulness at our Dunstable tutoring centre and also in our 1:1 sessions.
We feel that this helps the learner (and tutor) feel calm and collected so that they are in the best place to be open for learning. It definitely gets students into the right frame of mind and the feeling of calm after mindfulness is amazing. But even just some deep breaths would work.
How do they learn?
Once your child is fed, watered, rested and calm, then it’s on to getting into good habits to prepare for exams.
For revision, little and often will work for most students, but it really needs to be down to individuals at this point. The trick is to get as many barriers out of the way of learning as possible.
With this in mind, firstly spend some time with your child to work out how they retain knowledge best.
For example, I really have trouble sitting still. While I’ll retain some information if a speaker uses visuals during their talk, it really sticks if I write notes, draw pictures, or even doodle while someone is talking.
If this sounds like your child, this could mean that revision cards or post its work best.
For a visual learner, YouTube videos and diagrams with lots of colours are the best way forward.
With time to experiment and talk it through, find the best way for your child so that they are not wasting precious time on techniques that don’t work for them.
A revision plan
Right! Down to the revision! There are steps within this to make the most of the time your child has allocated:
- What are your child’s subject priorities? Do they need to revise everything? Are they already performing brilliantly in a subject or alternatively, is there a subject they really don’t care about and won’t pass in a million years? Especially in Year 11, these sorts of decisions need to be made. Write out all the subjects and prioritise each one.
- How much time can be allocated to revision? How much time does your child realistically have available in their week taking clubs, meal times, family commitments etc. into consideration? Be realistic. You know your child best. Try not to let them be lazy, but also don’t over commit.
- Work out what they really need to revise. Using a website such as BBC Bitesize will help them work out what they know easily and then what needs to be worked on. It’s comforting, but pointless, to go over the subjects and areas they love. Make sure they spend more time on the bits they actually need to practice.
These things can really help to make the most of the time from now until the sunny months. Getting into good habits now will pay dividends later.
If you already have an Red Bird tutor, you don’t need to worry! They’ll already be working with your child to work on all of these things so that they will perform at optimum levels in their education.
Sue
Owner of Red Bird Tutoring
Sue launched Red Bird Tutoring in 2018, combining her 20+ years experience as a teacher and school leader with her interest in coaching.
Since its launch, Red Bird has helped hundreds of learners achieve success!
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