The Learning Clinic

10 Tips for Getting Ready for Your Exams

1. Go to sleep early the night before the exam. If you have trouble sleeping try reading a chapter of a non-school book or watching a bit of TV, this will help you relax and take your mind off the exams.

2. Eat well in the morning and the night before the exam. Your brain like the rest of your body needs fuel.

3. Make sure you have all your pens, pencils, set squares, calculator and ruler ready the night before. Make sure your calculator has a full battery for your maths, science and geography exams!

4. Do a small bit of revision in the morning but don’t do to much cramming because that will just stress you out. Make sure you look over the marking scheme and a possible timing scheme so you can get the very most out of every minute if the exam.

5. Come in plenty of time for your exam, rushing in late won’t help you or anyone.

6. Scan through the paper first don’t just dive straight into the first question. Read quickly through it and do you best question first. This way you will insure maximum marks for the work you have done if you run out of time.

7.  Always, always, always read the question fully! and answer the question your asked not the question you have studied for!

8. Keep your answers concise and to the point. Rambling will just waste time and paper as well as annoying the examiner. Planning your answers out before hand either on paper or in your head will help you keep to the point.

9. Stick to your timing scheme and try to use every minute if your exam. If your finished early read and reread over your work correcting any mistakes you find.

10. Always try your very best. Use every single once of your knowledge and common sense and write an answer for every single question even if it’s just a wild guess.

Good Luck!

10 Tips for Writing a Good Essay

1. Relax – If you stress you won’t be able to think or organize your thoughts

2. Brainstorm – Write all your ideas on a piece of paper, just jot everything down quickly.

3. Be Original – Think outside the box and don’t go for the obvious story line

4. Plan – pick what idea you want to go with and write out the general plan. Give it a distinctive Beginning Middle and End!

5. Write about what you know – Write about something you’ve experienced or know about, you won’t write a good essay about something you don’t understand.

6. Characters – Only have one or two characters so that you don’t confuse the reader.

7. Story line – You get more marks for how your essay is written then what it is written about so don’t spend your time on extravagant or action packed story lines, focus on your language and keep it simple.

8. First and Last Lines – these are the most important lines in the essay and should be exciting, interesting and draw the reader in.

9. Use descriptive language – Use all your vocabulary, don’t say something was “small” say it was “tiny” or “microscopic” instead.

10. Punctuation and Spelling –  Don’t lose marks over silly mistakes, always, always, always read over your work

NEVER, EVER WRITE THE WORDS “ AND THEN I WOKE UP” AT THE END OF YOUR ESSAY.

The first few weeks of school are the perfect time to get rid of those bad habits and start afresh. Here is a list of little things you could do that will make a big difference both at school and at home when doing your homework and studying. Use these as goals and set yourself two or three goals every week. You will notice that bit by bit your work will improve and soon you will start to do better in tests! Good Luck!

My Goals Checklist

Back to school… Is your child really ready? The uniform and books are the easy part- these tips will help your child succeed in school.

10 Tips for Success in School!

1. No plan = no direction. Plan and set goals to get the most out of your time. If you have something to aim for, you will work harder.
2. Be positive, your attitude is very powerful, if you view yourself as capable, then you will be capable.
3. Avoid negative thinking. No. Never. Can’t. Won’t. Maybe. If. These words hold you back. Stop limiting your potential!
4. Don’t find faults, look for solutions – see a bad test result as an opportunity to learn from your mistakes. Mistakes are an essential part of the learning process.
5. Stop making up excuses and take responsibility.
6. Make a real effort– Don’t be afraid of failure, you only fail when you don’t try – so give everything your best shot.
7. Ask questions in class and listen. You make your learning more active this way.
8. Prioritise. Don’t let small things eat up your time – spend your time wisely. Focus on improving your weaker areas as well as your strong ones.
9. You must really want to succeed, not just hope or wish for success. If you want it, you will work for it.
10. Never ever give up.

This is the Learning Clinic Blog – giving you helpful tips.