5 methods for successful exam revision!

Revising for an exam can be a long and complicated task. Indeed, many people find it hard to revise efficiently over time. The stress of exams and the methods used are variables that have an impact on our productivity during the revision period.

But there are tools that allow you to find YOUR OWN method and approach exams more calmly. 👍

We present you with 5 methods with the hope that at least one of them will suit your needs. Psst, some of them may even make your revisions more fun! 😊

It is hard to keep a clear head with disorganised and chaotic notes…

But what to do when information accumulates more and more each day?

In order to manage this amount of notes better, take some time in the evening or at the end of the week to sort them and to check that they are complete. This will keep you from asking around for notes the day before the exam because you have lost them throughout the semester.

And if you want to keep your notes in a safe place and be able to access them at any place and time, SCRIBZEE, the app for managing handwritten notes might interest you. It allows you to easily scan all notes taken on any supported OXFORD product. You can also share your course notes with your friends in no time thanks to its sharing function. Your course notes will thus be well organised and complete without having to recopy them. 🙌

Of course, organisation is the basis of good revision. Apart from organising your notes, it is important to organise your planning schedule in order to follow a clear guiding principle before the exam. Even if some students are fans of revising at the last minute, we should not forget that the brain stores the information better when the learning process is fractioned. Therefore, we recommend you organise several revision sessions over time rather than revise everything for long hours the day before the exam.  Your attention and your memorisation skills will improve.

But what are the tricks to organise an efficient revision programme? 📅

First of all, take the time to make an assessment of the situation. For clarification purposes, think of:

• Your exam dates.
• Different revision activities you will do: reread your notes, make flashcards, do exercises and create timelines, study, make quizzes with your friends, etc.
• Set priorities, taking into account your current knowledge on the subject.

Once you have all this information, create your own plan, trying to alternate subjects within your day and foreseeing your break time. They are absolutely necessary to ensure your efficiency. Besides, set yourself achievable goals. A very tight plan might discourage you. On the contrary, include some extra time slots for resting or working on something more complex, as necessary. You can always put your programme on paper. This will allow you to visualise your progress and what is left to do. ❌

And if you tend to postpone deadlines and procrastinate, you can use SCRIBZEE with supported Oxford agendas to set reminders.

You will be notified directly for every event in your agenda. This way you can find the course notes to be revised on SCRIBZEE. Ideal to stay motivated and be ready for D-day! 🗓️

Flashcards are good tools to prepare your exams. They have two significant advantages:

• Flashcards allow you to review complex subjects, not always assimilated during lectures. In fact, summarising your lectures allows you to grasp the contents and thus rework abstract concepts. Reformulate using your own words and add content from other sources (online courses, videos) if necessary. The more personalised your flashcards are, the better you will understand and retain the information. 🧠
• Writing your flashcards by hand allows you to learn more easily, simply by gesture. ✏️

In fact, when you write down words by hand, your brain makes connections that allow you to retrieve the information more easily than if you type them. If you have a visual memory, use colours for your flashcards and underline or highlight important words. This will improve your memorisation.

Once your flashcards are ready, it is time to learn them. For this, have revision sessions spaced over time. This will favour information retrieval and memorisation. If you need to revise between courses, in a waiting room or even on the train, you can scan through them using SCRIBZEE. You will access several functions that will help you revise, such as the Revision and Quiz modes, which are used along with your flashcards, but also to follow your revisions over time, like the status than can be assigned to each flashcard.

So, are you ready to create your own flashcards? 😉

Have you heard about this before? The brain finds it easier to process visual rather than textual information. That is why it may be interesting to illustrate your course notes and flashcards as much as possible. You will memorise key concepts easily. In addition, diagrams usually allow you to understand a complex concept better by simplifying it.

It is sometimes hard to create a diagram with all the elements. But there is no need to be a good cartoonist. In fact, the most important thing is to grasp the concepts and show the link between the different pieces of information. For your diagrams, use colours to highlight different types of information. 🤓

And have you heard about mind maps?

They allow you to organise information diagrammatically. Everything is organised around a subject (placed in the centre), around which different types of information gravitate. It is advisable to use colours, pictograms, images and key words to make your notes as meaningful as possible. 🌈

Do you need to illustrate your courses with an element you have not noted on your OXFORD digital notebook? With SCRIBZEE, you can add diagrams and images to your digitalised course notes by importing an image from your photo gallery. And moreover, you can add annotations, shapes or colours directly from the web version.  💻

Once you have learnt your flashcards, testing yourself frequently will allow you to find your weaknesses and work on them to correct them. And confirming what you already know will allow you to consolidate your knowledge more deeply into your memory. This also allows you to know where you stand in your learning process and if you should increase your revision sessions.  In short, keeping record of the information is a good tool, but also a good indicator of your level of preparation for an exam! 👩🏻‍🎓

But how can you actually test yourself? 💬

Be it by yourself or with friends, the principle is to ask questions. You can also create specific question/answer cards (also called flashcards) that will allow you to revise while having fun. Whether the flashcards are on paper or digitalised in SCRIBZEE, you can just ask yourself the question on the front side and check the answer on the back. Using the app, you can access 2 modes of learning:

• The Revision mode allows you to learn the content of your flashcards, focusing on those you do not know yet.
• The Quiz mode is ideal for knowing where you stand in your revision thanks to a global score.

👉 Learn how to revise using FLASH 2.0 SCRIBZEE flashcards

We hope that all these methods will allow you to reach the summit and face your exams more calmly. They are obviously not exhaustive, and you can complete them according to your personality. It is important to know yourself in order to know what suits you best. In fact, who knows better than you how you learn your courses? We suggest that you try and test everything that might help you. Each person is unique and everyone should learn at their own pace. 🕜

You can also get some space away from your family during a day if the environment is too noisy or you are easily distracted. Go to a calm place where the environment allows you to work, like a library. 👏

We also advise you to download the SCRIBZEE app for free for iOS Android or even your PC. It is adapted to every learning method presented here. Combined with a digital notebook, flashcards or OXFORD smart charts, the application will assist your revisions during your education for you to be at the top! 💪