Whose Responsibility Is It Anyway?
Exams bring its fair share of stress and pressure. It is a time when teachers, parents and children feel overwhelmed by the volumes of work that need to be covered in class and committed to memory at home.
Parents often feel that teachers should provide more guidance about how to study. Teachers feel that they have mountains of content to cover and do not have enough time to review the content as well. This leaves one wondering, who will show a child how to get through all the topics on their exam scope?
Too Little, Too Late
There is no magic trick to replace making and spending enough time to review work covered in class well in advance. Children’s busy afternoon programmes barely leave them with enough time to complete their homework for the following day. If a child only completes homework and skims over work for weekly tests without making summaries of the work covered in class, it leads to huge chunks of content to be covered prior to the exam. Mom, is it perhaps time to help your child to cut down on afternoon activities?
Active Recall
Using active recall, by writing down all the facts you can remember about a topic, helps a student develop a starting point of what they know and what they need to review. Once this step has been completed, the student opens the textbook and supplement the missing bits of information.
Keywords are Key
Making summaries of work covered in class needs to be done on a consistent basis. It reduces the workload prior to exams. When the key points have been highlighted and summarised, the child only has to focus on what has already been selected as the most important content. The child can then use the keywords to formulate sentences in his/her own words. Children
often think that they have to repeat the words of the textbook verbatim. However, it is more important to retell the facts in a way that makes sense to them.
Mock Tests
Help your child to set his/her own test paper by formulating their own questions with answers. This will help them feel more prepared and less anxious before their exams.
Kip McGrath offers a study skills course to help children and parents address the entire process of studying.
Chrizelle Prinsloo is the owner of Kip McGrath Education Centres, Walmer. She has a background in psychology and has taught in mainstream and special-needs schools both locally and abroad. Chrizelle is passionate about helping children gain confidence in their own abilities and about finding different ways to help them learn.
The Kip McGrath Walmer branch is celebrating its 10th year of tutoring in 2025.
Contact Chrizelle at 041 581 0812 or 081 707 9822 or send an email to walmer@kipmcgrath.co.za.
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