Helping your child revise can be tricky, especially if you know less than them. Nowadays a deep analysis for both GCSE Maths and English is a must, which might be something that you as a parent haven’t come across in years. But we are here to help you!
“I have a whiteboard in my home office to use for work. My son would draw on it, and then he started practising sums on it. He found it much more interesting to write things on the board than he did to sit at a table and go over things. So we used to play “school”, where he would teach me about maths. We used it a lot when he was getting ready for his SATs – it was really effective.”
It is easy for a child to become overwhelmed when faced with a pile of facts to revise. You can work with your child to distil all that information into manageable chunks and to develop the skills needed to tackle the task in a sensible, efficient way. The BBC education website breaks down all the subjects into their curriculum areas, which is a great help in ensuring everything is covered.
Helping Your Child Revise? Here Are 12 Tips To Give Them
Your child might have a particular way that they like to revise. Here is some advice you can give them if they are unsure:
- Don’t leave it till the last minute. Research has shown students are significantly more likely to understand and remember material if they revise regularly throughout the year.
- Focus on one topic of study, such as triangles in Maths or poetry in English, at a time.
- Get an overview of the topic. Read the information, make some basic notes and get an idea of how much you need to learn.
- Look at past papers. They will help you to identify exactly what you need to know about the topic.
- Test yourself on what you already know by simply writing it down or by trying to answer an exam question. Identify the gaps in your knowledge.
- Don’t get distracted, use the Pomodoro technique! This learning technique will increase productivity and keep your child away from the distraction of their phone.
- Pay attention to the feedback your teacher gives you. Read the notes on your work and homework. Don’t be afraid to ask if you are still not sure where you are going wrong – your teacher should be happy to help.
- Actively engage with the material. Don’t just sit and read – the chances are nothing will go in. Use a learning style that suits you – talk about the material, make notes or draw diagrams. It might help to revise with a school friend, as long as they aren’t too distracting!
- Take regular breaks. It can be tempting to “cram” if time is short, but cramming tends to be counterproductive. Make sure you have plenty to eat and enough sleep to maximise the quality of your revision sessions.
- Keep testing yourself as you study. Ask yourself questions to see if you genuinely understand what you are revising. Go back and look at the material again if you can’t answer a question.
- It might be better to learn one or two topics thoroughly than to try to cover everything if you are very short on time.
- Use platforms like SchoolOnline, who specialise in turning students knowledge into exam success. They provide easily fun and digestible bite size tutorial videos and access to quizzes and past papers for GCSE Maths and English!
Helping Your Child Revise Can Help You Too
Overall, people learn better visually as well as working with someone. In fact, repeating what you just learned or teaching someone can help you remember up to 90% more through a repetition process. You can help your child study to a certain extent, but tell them to try watching bite size videos, doing mind maps, trying learning techniques that suit them and do past papers. All you can do is help them through their revision if needed and give them some tips, they will appreciate you and your time invested in trying to help them! Even though these tips are great, platforms like SchoolOnline cover all of these and more… in fact wouldn’t it be nice if within 6 weeks your child could improve in their English and Maths exams by up to 100.5%? Subscribe now and see how we can give your child these powerful results.
