Hi there.
Update:
- Hi, everyone. I have been building an awesome new website - based on just how popular (and awesome) people have been finding this little blog.
- The papers on this blog are really nice, yes, but do you know what's nicer? That new site. On it, you can do practice papers and get results instantly! Here's the link:
As it says in the 'about' page, this site has been set up for you in mind. I'd like to help you achieve, improve, push your boundaries, stretch your horizons, further your borders. So each day I will publish a set of exercises in each subject's respective page; and tips, sample papers - basically every resource you can think of. So to start off, here are some tips on how you can study effectively:
1. Look for a quiet place.
When you are in a quiet place, you can concentrate with ease and study without getting easily distracted. For you, especially if you are in a boarding school; a class will do. Try however, not to be in a noisy class. If people around you are making noise, make them quiet. How? I hear you ask. Well, you could try enlisting a teacher's help, or a prefect - or if you are bigger and stronger than everyone else or if you have the guts you could shout above the din at them to be quiet; though to be honest, this rarely works. So you are probably better off with a teacher's help.
If you are at home, you mustn't sit near a TV. Or a playstation. You won't study. Plain and simple. And if right now you're saying to yourself, "Wrong, I can, I've done it before..." you are probably right. You did do it. Or you've seen someone else do it, but did you/they do it effectively. Did you manage to get something meaningful done? Yeah? Did you sit at the table and study for even 20 consecutive minutes without getting up or getting the least bit distracted? No? 20 solid fully-concentrated-on-nothing-else minutes? I'm right? Of course I am. As such, no TV. And no music either, for the same reasons outlined above. I once also doubted that point about music, but it is true. Music is distracting, even at the softest of volumes. You might be reading and you'll find your thoughts slowing drifting away, at first without your realising it. It's the music. Trust me.
Thus, the ideal study environment ought to be calm, well lit and comfortable - but not so comfortable as to have you nodding off.
PS: To beat sleep, sit near a window - a slightly open one, of course; or take a cup or two of coffee. You could also splash some cold water on your face or shed some clothes.
The best though is sitting upright; with your back very straight and your knees at right angles. However, don't try extreme stunts like dipping your feet in a basin of cold water. That’s never cool.
2. Plan your study.
Set a goal. And write it down. It could be 'I am aiming to earn 430 marks.' Be specific. The mind doesn't work with estimates very well. If your target is 429 marks, let it be that. If 431, exactly... you get the picture, eh? Have a clear and well defined objective.
Construct a simple time table. One that isn't rigid or complex. The key word here is simple.
e.g. Morning - Maths.
After lunch - Composition writing/practice.
Evening - CRE.
Arrange your notes making them close by you, not scattered all over the house/room/class. Or with different people. File your past papers, answer sheets, compositions, and other single sheet documents in different folders according to the subject.
If for example in the morning, you'd like to study English, gather the resources that you'll need for English so that once you start your session, you don't have to move around looking for stuff. You most certainly do not want to break your focus. Then focus on one thing at a time. If for example you are doing an exercise from a text book, don't have your dictionary open, piled up on a stack of past papers with pens and pencils rolling all around your desk. Push these to the side neatly. Make some space to focus on your exercise and only reach for, say, the dictionary or a rubber when you actually need it. Once done with it, put it aside and carry on.
Again, as you study make sure the room you are in is free of rubbish, dust, etc. Remember, cleanliness is next to...
3. Split your work into easy steps.
For example, if you are revising Std. 5 Science for the night, first make a simple plan with easy steps. Don't just take a text book and start rifling through it. Begin with the easiest topic. Make simple one sentence notes about it, moving all the way up to the toughest topic.
After each topic, make a small tick alongside it to show that you’re done. Then at the end, put away the text book(s); and review your notes.
4. Quality, not quantity.
Focus your concentration on one subject at a time; and again – not on everything about that subject. Your weak points first. To avoid being tempted to focus on only the weak points, do some light revision (polishing up) of your strong points to consolidate a few points here and there.
Therefore, identify your weak points, writing them down of course. E.g. for, say, Math.
5. Take a break.
After engaging you brain intensely for 40 consecutive minutes, I believe you will experience a little fatigue. What should you do? Take a hard-earned break. If in class, don’t be afraid to lean back a little in your chair. Take a newspaper clipping or a story book. You could even draw something, take a trip to the loo and back or, well, stare into space for about 5 minutes – if you are into that sort of stuff. Kidding, of course.
If at home, well, TV. Why not? But ONLY for a few minutes. Or you could make a sandwich or something. It’s your choice. Just don’t be destructive, you know, by maybe deciding to play computer games. Trust me, once you start, you won’t stop to even go to the loo. I’m serious.
The best though is to engage in a sport. Just for, say, 10 minutes. Juggle a ball, shoot some hoops, swim a bit, skip rope, whatever. It helps.
After the break (hey, it wasn’t forever) change subjects. Not topics. Subjects. You want to NOT make studying boring, that’s why. Then repeat the process all over. Breaks help you to freshen up.
6. Do not cram stuff.
Try to understand concepts. Try to avoid memorizing. Even for formulae, try to find out how they were derived, and PRACTISE deriving them. Don’t cram them. If it is something to do with dates, try to connect events as they happened. Find a pattern. Why they followed one another as they did. If it has to do with points and characteristics, try to find out the reasoning behind them. Cram only as a last resort. Use mnemonics (the one where you take the first letter of every point and make a word that’s easy to remember) or songs and diagrams to help you instead of cramming outright, though that’s not to say they aren’t mild forms of cramming themselves.
Because cramming is usually reserved for last minute hysteria, I’d suggest that in the long term you use practice – exercises, past papers, etc – to help you remember easily. They did say practice makes perfect, didn’t they?
7. Get a good night’s sleep. You see, the brain needs to relax and file the information acquired that day in its different lockers for easier retrieval later. 7 hrs of sleep are just what the doctor recommends. At night. The key word here is night.
8. Last but surely not least (actually it ought to be first), pray. Whatever religion you follow, I am certain that there is something close to prayer practised in it. So pray. And pray sincerely.
I hope this information proved useful. If or if not, do feel free to leave a comment below. Have a good time… er… studying. Later.
Update:
- Hi, everyone. I have been building an awesome new website - based on just how popular (and awesome) people have been finding this little blog.
- The papers on this blog are really nice, yes, but do you know what's nicer? That new site. On it, you can do practice papers and get results instantly! Here's the link:
Studying Online Rocks- I know you'll love it, because you have loved this blog here.
- One more thing, when you get there, you can choose to either log in with your Facebook account or Gmail account or Yahoo account, or create a new account manually (using FB/Gmail/Yahoo is better), or you can log in as a guest (*guests cannot attempt tests).- I as yet, haven't included any other subjects besides English, but we will. Notice that I have said 'we'.
As it says in the 'about' page, this site has been set up for you in mind. I'd like to help you achieve, improve, push your boundaries, stretch your horizons, further your borders. So each day I will publish a set of exercises in each subject's respective page; and tips, sample papers - basically every resource you can think of. So to start off, here are some tips on how you can study effectively:
1. Look for a quiet place.
When you are in a quiet place, you can concentrate with ease and study without getting easily distracted. For you, especially if you are in a boarding school; a class will do. Try however, not to be in a noisy class. If people around you are making noise, make them quiet. How? I hear you ask. Well, you could try enlisting a teacher's help, or a prefect - or if you are bigger and stronger than everyone else or if you have the guts you could shout above the din at them to be quiet; though to be honest, this rarely works. So you are probably better off with a teacher's help.
If you are at home, you mustn't sit near a TV. Or a playstation. You won't study. Plain and simple. And if right now you're saying to yourself, "Wrong, I can, I've done it before..." you are probably right. You did do it. Or you've seen someone else do it, but did you/they do it effectively. Did you manage to get something meaningful done? Yeah? Did you sit at the table and study for even 20 consecutive minutes without getting up or getting the least bit distracted? No? 20 solid fully-concentrated-on-nothing-else minutes? I'm right? Of course I am. As such, no TV. And no music either, for the same reasons outlined above. I once also doubted that point about music, but it is true. Music is distracting, even at the softest of volumes. You might be reading and you'll find your thoughts slowing drifting away, at first without your realising it. It's the music. Trust me.
Thus, the ideal study environment ought to be calm, well lit and comfortable - but not so comfortable as to have you nodding off.
PS: To beat sleep, sit near a window - a slightly open one, of course; or take a cup or two of coffee. You could also splash some cold water on your face or shed some clothes.
The best though is sitting upright; with your back very straight and your knees at right angles. However, don't try extreme stunts like dipping your feet in a basin of cold water. That’s never cool.
2. Plan your study.
Set a goal. And write it down. It could be 'I am aiming to earn 430 marks.' Be specific. The mind doesn't work with estimates very well. If your target is 429 marks, let it be that. If 431, exactly... you get the picture, eh? Have a clear and well defined objective.
Construct a simple time table. One that isn't rigid or complex. The key word here is simple.
e.g. Morning - Maths.
After lunch - Composition writing/practice.
Evening - CRE.
Arrange your notes making them close by you, not scattered all over the house/room/class. Or with different people. File your past papers, answer sheets, compositions, and other single sheet documents in different folders according to the subject.
If for example in the morning, you'd like to study English, gather the resources that you'll need for English so that once you start your session, you don't have to move around looking for stuff. You most certainly do not want to break your focus. Then focus on one thing at a time. If for example you are doing an exercise from a text book, don't have your dictionary open, piled up on a stack of past papers with pens and pencils rolling all around your desk. Push these to the side neatly. Make some space to focus on your exercise and only reach for, say, the dictionary or a rubber when you actually need it. Once done with it, put it aside and carry on.
Again, as you study make sure the room you are in is free of rubbish, dust, etc. Remember, cleanliness is next to...
3. Split your work into easy steps.
For example, if you are revising Std. 5 Science for the night, first make a simple plan with easy steps. Don't just take a text book and start rifling through it. Begin with the easiest topic. Make simple one sentence notes about it, moving all the way up to the toughest topic.
4. Quality, not quantity.
Focus your concentration on one subject at a time; and again – not on everything about that subject. Your weak points first. To avoid being tempted to focus on only the weak points, do some light revision (polishing up) of your strong points to consolidate a few points here and there.
Therefore, identify your weak points, writing them down of course. E.g. for, say, Math.
- angles
- fractions
- compound interest
Once you have identified them, start with the most critical e.g. compound interest for 20 minutes. Full concentration. On the concept only. Don’t study for too long. It’s all about quality, not quantity. Once you are satisfied, it’s now time to practice. Find examples from textbooks, past papers, past exercises from your teacher, etc. Practice for about another 20 minutes. That should give you 40 minutes of quality revision on that area of weakness and fewer problems with it in future.5. Take a break.
After engaging you brain intensely for 40 consecutive minutes, I believe you will experience a little fatigue. What should you do? Take a hard-earned break. If in class, don’t be afraid to lean back a little in your chair. Take a newspaper clipping or a story book. You could even draw something, take a trip to the loo and back or, well, stare into space for about 5 minutes – if you are into that sort of stuff. Kidding, of course.
If at home, well, TV. Why not? But ONLY for a few minutes. Or you could make a sandwich or something. It’s your choice. Just don’t be destructive, you know, by maybe deciding to play computer games. Trust me, once you start, you won’t stop to even go to the loo. I’m serious.
The best though is to engage in a sport. Just for, say, 10 minutes. Juggle a ball, shoot some hoops, swim a bit, skip rope, whatever. It helps.
After the break (hey, it wasn’t forever) change subjects. Not topics. Subjects. You want to NOT make studying boring, that’s why. Then repeat the process all over. Breaks help you to freshen up.
6. Do not cram stuff.
Try to understand concepts. Try to avoid memorizing. Even for formulae, try to find out how they were derived, and PRACTISE deriving them. Don’t cram them. If it is something to do with dates, try to connect events as they happened. Find a pattern. Why they followed one another as they did. If it has to do with points and characteristics, try to find out the reasoning behind them. Cram only as a last resort. Use mnemonics (the one where you take the first letter of every point and make a word that’s easy to remember) or songs and diagrams to help you instead of cramming outright, though that’s not to say they aren’t mild forms of cramming themselves.
Because cramming is usually reserved for last minute hysteria, I’d suggest that in the long term you use practice – exercises, past papers, etc – to help you remember easily. They did say practice makes perfect, didn’t they?
7. Get a good night’s sleep. You see, the brain needs to relax and file the information acquired that day in its different lockers for easier retrieval later. 7 hrs of sleep are just what the doctor recommends. At night. The key word here is night.
8. Last but surely not least (actually it ought to be first), pray. Whatever religion you follow, I am certain that there is something close to prayer practised in it. So pray. And pray sincerely.
I hope this information proved useful. If or if not, do feel free to leave a comment below. Have a good time… er… studying. Later.
This is a good article for 2012 KCPE candidates.
ReplyDeleteWell researched
ReplyDeleteWell researched
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