8 Great Revision Hacks Every Student Should Know

The hardest thing about revision is probably starting, but having a strong game plan might make the process somewhat more bearable?

So here are some revision tips and tricks that will hopefully make exam season easier to get through.

1.Tech Hacks

There are so many apps that can help you manage your revision, for example:

• Trello – Helps you time manage big projects like your dissertation or several exams in one week.
• GoConqr – This app lets you make online Flashcards/Mind Maps/Notes and Quizzes
• Evernote- This app is such a lifesaver! It allows you to take screenshots of text and annotate them as much as you want.
• Memrise- This app is great if you are trying to learn a new language because it has loads of different learning styles and options.
• Remember the Milk- This app lets you write down ideas instantly and it also syncs them with your laptop. It helps you prioritise your workload and gives you regular reminders to complete tasks.
• Forest: Stay focused – This is an anti-procrastination app.

Headspace – This one isn’t strictly about revision, but headspace is a mindful and wellbeing app and might be a pretty useful way to destress around exam season.

2. Highlighters and Colour Co-ordination

• One of my friends is studying medicine and I asked her if she has any revision hacks and she broke down her method in a series of lists:
• Make very neat notes that make you want to look at your revision
• Then use those notes to rewrite things that you can’t remember on a rough piece of paper or type it out on a word document
• Continue to rewrite the things you don’t remember again and again until you know and understand everything
• Then practice practice practice!

As a literature graduate, I also used this revision hack, for example, I created a highlighter system for when I had to analyse a piece of criticism.

• Pink Highlighter: Definitions
• Blue Highlighter: Keywords
• Orange Highlighter: Criticism

The idea Is to keep this method consistent across all of your notes in order to speed up the revision process.

3. Try Chewing Gum

A great revision hack is chewing gum with a unique taste and then chewing the same flavour during the exam because it helps with your memory and concentration.

4. Listen to Music

Listening to classical or instrumental music has been scientifically proven to improve concentration. Spotify even has a ‘Study’ genre filled with several different playlists you can choose from.

5. Use Google Docs

In lectures make a word document in Google Docs and add some of your classmates to it.

This can make taking notes so much easier especially when most professors like to move through the lecture slides pretty quickly.

6. Make Revision Posters and Stick them in your Room

This revision hack involves creating Mind maps, colour co-ordinated lists and posters and sticking them all over your bedroom wall! This is a great revision hack because you can get in a good revision session whilst getting ready in the morning.

7. Understand your Revision Style

There are so many different types of revision styles and the best revision hack is figuring out which style resonates with you the most. For example, some people are visual learners and others are practical. Once you figure out your revision style stick to it and your workload will seem a lot easier to handle.

8. Explain your Points out Loud

Talk to your Mum, or a nice tutor, or bribe your friends with cookies and go through your revision notes with them. This revision hack is a productive way of acknowledging the parts of revision you understand as well as the aspects you still need to work on.

There are so many other great revision hacks, comment if you can think of any more tips and tricks below!