How to Get Your Students Revising

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We’ve all had this frustrating feeling when it gets towards exam time. You’ve provided your students with all the material they’ll need. The course content, the revision notes, the question examples, the practice tasks, the lot.

And then a couple of days before the exam, you overhear students chatting (or maybe they’re bold and talk to you directly) and hear them utter the words

“I haven’t even revised yet.”

It’s enough to make you want to stay in bed, rather than heading out in the morning!

So we’ve put together some tips you can try to get your students revising for their exams, so you don’t have to stress!

‘Test’ Regularly

This isn’t necessarily what you think. Rather than saving tests for the run-up to exams, try to use lower stake tests throughout the year. If students know that they’re going to be tested on what they’ve learnt that week, they’re a lot more likely to consult their notes, or at least look over their new material.

However, you don’t just have to rely on traditional testing for this to work. Randomly asking students to answer questions in class can have a similar effect, since they never know when they’re going to be called on to give an answer.

Getting your students to recall information regularly in classes, throughout the year, means that revision becomes normal and isn’t crammed in the month before the big day! Going about it in this way also means they take the feedback they get from these classes to inform what they study next, which means they improve!

Teach Them How to Revise

It’s a little backwards to feel frustrated at your students for not revising if you haven’t broken down what revising actually is and how to revise effectively. If they don’t know where to start… they won’t!

Take some time early on to teach your students some basic revision skills, don’t trust that they’ll have learned it from other teachers or in earlier years. Demonstrate the different methods they can use in class, which will make it easier for them to apply them at home. Show them how to build a mind-map; teach them how to quiz themselves or their friends. You’ll reap the benefits at exam time when they’re equipped with the skills they need to revise independently!

What Motivates You?

For a lot of students, revision and exams is difficult because they don’t see the point. It’s a lot of work for, in their eyes, not a huge pay off. This can be particularly true if you have students that don’t necessarily know what they want to do when they leave school or college.

So give them a chance to think about what they want their life to be like. This doesn’t have to be career-focused, they could just brainstorm the way they want their life to be once they’re not in education any more. Making the benefits of working hard real to them will make them more likely to put the effort in.

Don’t Do It Alone

Teaching can feel quite isolating sometimes, since you’re often chained to your classroom and teaching your classes solo. However, there is something to be learned here that you can apply to your teaching and teach to your students.

Ask for help! Speak to other teachers in your department or teachers across the school to find out how they encourage or teach their students to revise. You might pick up techniques you haven’t tried that will help you reach those challenging students.

The flip side of this is to encourage your students not to do it all on their own. They could  study in groups or pairs, to help each other with weaker spots in their knowledge. Hearing things explained by someone other than you might make it click for the first time.

Build Excitement

Finally, use the passion that drove you into your subject in the first place to inspire your students. Having enthusiasm for what you teach can make it fun for everyone else and therefore easier to study.

If your subject is one that students can opt for, rather than have to take, then try to use this to inspire them. Ask them what prompted them to choose your subject and what they’re hoping to get out of it. Remembering the start of the year when they chose the subject in the first place can remind them of their initial hopes and aspirations. Sometimes this is what they need to get them over the final hump!