Going from studying ten subjects at GCSE to studying three or four subjects at A levels, or even one or two if you are studying BTECs, is a breeze! Plus, you have free time to study in…or go to the shops, chat with your mates, go home…It’s definitely a breeze! Fast forward seven weeks to half term and you have piles of papers for each subject, notes that you don’t understand, assessments with grades that make you feel as though you’re failing and the first set of mocks looming in a few months’ time. It’s not going as well as you thought it would back in sunny September. But, it doesn’t have to be like this and here are seven study habits for sixth form success.
Study habits for sixth form success.
- Organisation of notes – work out a system early on for organising your notes. You will probably have two teachers for every subject who will all teach differently. Some will prefer discussion and expect you to take notes, while others will have handouts, or powerpoints, or worksheets, or knowledge organisers. Some will be all digital, while others will be all paper. Build in time every week for organising your notes for each subject and have a filing system that works for you. What do you take to sixth form each day and what do you leave at home? Do you need to re-write some notes, because you don’t understand what you scribbled in the lesson? Are all of the handouts important?
- Use your study periods – or free time to study and not do everything else that you can think of. It is tempting to talk with your friends, but the students who study in their free time have a lot more time outside of school to get other things done. You know how best to use your free time. It could be homework or writing up notes or consolidating learning. The more you study at school, the less you need to do outside of school.
- Consolidation of learning – build in time every week for consolidating your learning. For sciences and maths, this generally means checking your understanding of topics through the practice of questions. Maths teachers will generally give you questions to practice, but do this for the sciences as well. Have a store of questions that you can turn to and mark the answers. www.physicsandmathstutor.com is very good. For arts and social science subjects, consolidation can mean reading through your notes to check understanding, doing wider reading and research as well as applying knowledge to questions.
- Build up your “go to” resources – a good student has a library of resources that they can ‘go to’ when they need to deepen their understanding, broaden their knowledge or apply to questions. These can be YouTube channels, websites, revision guides and text books, podcasts and friends and family. Keep adding to them. If you find a good resource, bookmark it and store it away for when it is needed.
- A system for learning key information – each subject has its key information that you just have to learn. Quotes in English literature, studies in psychology and sociology, diagrams and graphs in economics, dates and events in history, formulae in physics and chemistry and lots and lots of key words and definitions in every subject. How are you going to learn them so that when you need them in an exam, you can expertly recall them? Flashcards, Anki, Quizlet, mindmaps, blurting. What is your method? It is better to learn them as you go along, rather than wait and cram them before an important exam.
- Good routines and a place to study – getting into good routines early on in sixth form will help you for the whole two years. Sixth form students are busy with part time jobs, hobbies, sports and all consuming social lives both on and off a games console or telephone. You can manage them all if you have a routine that works. A general rule is at least five hours of study for every subject. When and where is the best time to fit that in? When and where will you be most productive?
- Time to review your work before deadlines – some of us like to get work out of the way and others like to work close to deadlines and are a bit more last minute, waiting for inspiration. There is no correct way. However, allowing time to review your work and ensuring it is your best work is a good idea. Build the review time into your planning to avoid rushing and panicking.
These are all study habits for sixth form success. The sooner you can get into them, the sooner your sixth form studies will start to go more smoothly and efficiently.
Here at www.studentnavigator.co.uk we offer academic mentoring and academic coaching to GCSE and sixth form students. If you are interested in academic mentoring or coaching and would like to speak to us, please get in touch.