Revision

Revision is the act of reviewing and memorising material you have already studied and understood, as preparation for exams. If you don’t understand a topic or concept fully, you will need to get a teacher, carer or friend to help you to understand. Text books and other resources may also help.

There are various ways you can revise, for example:

• Making notes that summarise the topic
• Drawing diagrams or mindmaps that show how a process works or how ideas are related
• Using flash cards with a word or short phrase on one side, and a detailed definition or explanation on the other
• Look at past exam papers, and their associated mark schemes

It is important that you allocate enough time to revise for each exam you are taking. Creating a revision timetable can help you do this. To do this you will need to know:

• The dates for all your exams
• How many exam papers you will sit for each subject
• Which topics are covered in which paper
• An estimate of how much time each topic needs

With the above you can draw up a plan for what subjects and topics will be revised each week.
Be realistic about how much you can achieve each day, plan for short breaks every 45 minutes, and don’t revise late the day before exams.

Useful Revision Resources

In the table below are some sites we recommend for revision. Look on Fronter for additional subject specific revision material, as there is some material we have bought which we cannot make available on our website, and some resources require passwords. These including Autology, Sam Learning, Linguascope and MyMaths.

Resources	Subjects
http://acton.autologyworld.co.uk/uib/	All
http://www.revisionworld.co.uk/	Most
http://www.s-cool.co.uk	Most
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/	Most
http://www.revisioncentre.co.uk/	Most
http://www.languagesonline.org.uk/	Languages
Acton High School MFL Dept - French	Languages
Acton High School MFL Dept - German	Languages
http://www.iw-chameleon.co.uk/student/index.html	Business & Communication Systems
http://www.teach-ict.com	ICT and Applied ICT

Exam Technique

Although exams are supposed to be a means of measuring your understanding of a subject, some students don’t achieve the results they deserve because they don’t cope very well in an exam situation. Prepare for the exam by practicing past papers under timed conditions. The methods below can improve your performance.

• Read each question carefully, underlining key points
• If you can’t understand or answer a question, come back to it at the end
• Make sure you pay attention to the command word (i.e. state, explain, describe, contrast, etc)
• Give yourself enough time to answer each question.
• For multiple choice exams you could do this by dividing the length of the exam by the number of questions. This gives you a rough idea of how much time you should spend on each question (e.g. a one hour exam, with 30 questions means two minutes per question).
• For written exams, look at how many marks are available for each question, and allocate more time for questions with more marks, usually the later questions on the paper.

• Always attempt every question – guess if you have to rather than leave it blank
• Arrive in good time for your exam as arriving late makes you even more stressed than you would have been.
• Make sure you have the right equipment: you can’t rely on the school having enough spares to go round
• Make sure you have had a good night’s sleep before the exam – this is more valuable than last minute revision

Past Papers/Exam Board Information

In the table below are links to useful information on all the subjects Year 11 students at AHS are studying this year. On these pages you will be able to find past papers and mark schemes  and specifications. A specification is a document that describes what is covered in the subject and how it will be assessed.

The question papers (i.e. past exam papers), and mark schemes (the answers) are a crucial way of revising and improving exam technique. Make sure you know whether you are sitting for a Higher or Foundation paper by checking with the subject teacher or on your entry certificate.

Subject	Exam Board	Subject Code
ART AND DESIGN	Edexcel	1027
BUSINESS & COM SYSTEMS	AQA	4130
D&T: FOOD TECHNOLOGY	AQA	3542
D&T: TEXTILES TECHNOLOGY	AQA	3547
D&T: Resistant Materials Technology	Edexcel	1973
D&T: Graphics Products	Edexcel	1972
DRAMA	Edexcel	1699
ENGLISH A	AQA	3702
ENGLISH LITERATURE A	AQA	3712
FRENCH	Edexcel	1226
Geography B	OCR	1987
GERMAN	Edexcel	1231
HISTORY A	Edexcel	1334
ICT	CEA	2650
MATHEMATICS (LINEAR)	Edexcel	1380
MATHEMATICS (MODULAR)	Edexcel	2381
MEDIA STUDIES	AQA	3571
MUSIC	Edexcel	1426
Psychology	OCR	1989
SOCIOLOGY TIER	AQA	3192
SPANISH	Edexcel	1246
STATISTICS	Edexcel	1389
ARABIC (WRIT/LIST/READ)	Edexcel	1607
CHINESE	Edexcel	1666
ITALIAN	Edexcel	1237
JAPANESE (WRIT/LIST/READ)	Edexcel	1753

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