Sa

to your study skills workshop

Who am IWho are youWhy are you here

What do you expect?

When you go to the cinema you plan beforehand what you’re going to see

Time goes at varying speeds

With deadlines to meet time can weigh very heavily on your mindIf you’re bored it really drags

Objectives

How you remember things

Making learning easier

General principles not subjects

How your brain works

be sceptical

Memory check

Relax You will not feel a thing

Peg words1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

gun shoe tree door hive sticks heaven gate wine hen

Peg words1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

gun shoe tree door hive sticks heaven gate wine hen

hydrogenheliumlithium

berylliumboroncarbonnitrogenoxygenfluorineneon

Memory checkYour brain has about 100 billion active neurons or nerve-cells. Each one grows branches like a tree, to store information: up to 20,000 branch like dendrites with each cell. Each connects to other cells by sending electrical-chemical messages along a long axon.

Memory check

100 billion neurons

Assume an average of 2 seconds to count each number and 8 hours a day downtime for essential functions:

16rs =3600 x 16 secs

= 57600 secs

= 28880 numbers

With 365.25 days each year it is possible to count 10,519,200 numbers per year

which is 1,051,920,00 per 100 years

so 100 bilion would take slightly less than 10,000 years to count

Could you count to 100 billion?

The penny drops

periodically1 hydrogen2 shoe3 4 door5 boron6 sticks7 nitrogen8 9 fluorine10 hen

Peg words1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

gun shoe tree door hive sticks heaven gate wine hen

hydrogenheliumlithiumberylliumboroncarbonnitrogenoxygenfluorineneon

Image chains

Tree

House

Guitar

Pencil

Phone

Image chains

DogTable

ElephantTree

Pencil Mouse

ChocolateDonkey

PlaneWindow

WallClock

TVFlowers

BusClown

Different parts of the brain

LanguageLogicNumbersSequenceWordsOrder

RhymeRhythm and music

PicturesPatterns

CreativityImaginationThe corpus callosum links both sides

Are responsible for different

functions

Part used for words in list is restricted to seven discrete pieces of information (± two)

The visual part has no such

restriction

Image chains the list of five

TreeHouse

GuitarPencil

Phone

Image chains

DogTable

ElephantTree

Pencil Mouse

ChocolateDonkey

PlaneWindow

WallClock

TVFlowers

BusClown

O T T F F S S ?

What’s the next letter in this sequence?

abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

O T T F F S S E T T F F S S E N TT T T T T T T T T TT T T T T T T T T FF F F F . . . . . . . . . . .

One Two Three Four Five Six --------

TE N

Richard of York

YGVOIRB

R IchardO FY OrkG AveB AttleI NV Ain

Single letter mnemonics

MyVery

Energetic

MotherJust

SwamUnder

TheNorth

Pole

The Planets:MercuryVenusEarthMarsJupiterSaturnUranusNeptunePluto

Naughty Elephants SquirtWater

Is it relevantIf the story was made up from key words for an

exam

16 ~ we’ve just done it20~ should now be easy50 ~ should be possible for most people after

some practice

200 ? Think you’re good enough?

practice and see!!

A way to study

UnderstandCondenseMemorise

Review

UnderstandLink things until the penny

drops

Ask questions of friends, books, internet, parents and teachers

Respect your sources

Who are you?

Famous person or cartoon characterOnly questions with a yes or no answerRandom guessing is not efficient Try to structure questions

condense

Only important words

Do not worry about spellings

condense

Animals

30+ too many25 – 30 excellent10 – 25 good

<10 weak

Practice using tapes

condense

If you found the last exercise difficult it might be because of your learning style

Preferred Learning Styles

Some students are very visual:They have to see everything.

Others don’t want to see something written down: they are the more auditory types.Others are kinaesthetic: they have to stand and move.

Visual Auditory Kinaesthetic

Learn Learn best by best by seeing seeing pictures, pictures, diagramsdiagrams

Learn Learn best by best by hearing hearing and and speakingspeaking

Learn best Learn best by doing, by doing, moving, moving, experiencingexperiencing

Visual• Draw pictures and diagrams• Colour code your work• Use different colour paper and pens• Use your own system of symbols, etc.• Create images or scenes in your mind

Auditory•Say your work out loud•Give presentations to an imaginary

audience•Record notes (etc.) on tape•Hear the information in your mind•Use silly noises to remember things•Play instrumental music

Kinaesthetic•Do actions when learning key facts•Walk about when learning•No need to sit at a desk•Add emotions and textures to

exaggerate information.•Try to experience what you are

learning

condenseNow try previous exercise visually

All animals can be divided into two types, those that have an internal backbone and those which do not have an internal backbone. Animals that have an internal backbone can further be divided into those that have a constant body temperature and those that have a body temperature which keeps changing. Some animals which have a constant body temperature are birds and mammals. Animals such as fish, amphibians and reptiles have a changing body temperature.

Those animals with no internal backbone can also be divided into two types; animals with only one cell and animals with many cells. Animals with only one cell are called microscopic animals. Some animals have no backbone have a jointed hard covering over their body. Animals such as insects, spiders and crabs are of this type. There are also some animals with no backbone and no jointed covering. Examples of this type are worms and snails.

animals internalbackbon

eno internal

backboneconstant body temp changing

birds mammals fishamphibians

reptiles

one cell

many cellsmicroscopic

jointedinsectsspiders crabs

no jointworms snails

memorise

loci

review

Give your neurons a chance to establish solid networks

Surf the waves of memory!

mappingA way of ordering your

notes

Draw a diagram plot the key words in whatever way you feel most comfortable

mapping

Spider diagram as seen by visual brain

Association map ~ animals

visual brain only

Association map

The one rule of A-mapping?

The information should be placed ON the lines of the A-map,

( so your mind can find the information more easily)

What should I revise?

Choose subject individually

Work in pairsWork in groups

Time managementPriorities ~ make a list of 10 things you need to get done tomorrow ~

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Watch tv

Go to bed

Catch bus

Have breakfast

Get washed

Get dressed

Go to school

Do homework

Phone friend

Wake up

Wake up

Get washed

Get dressed

Have breakfast

Catch bus

Go to school

Do homework

Phone friend

Watch tv

Go to bed

Re-arrange them into the best order

Time management – long term

How many hours to go

How many hours for each subject

How many hours for each subject per week

Try to keep to these weekly targets

Time management- short term

review for

review for

review for

review for

10 minutes later10 minutes later

1 day later1 day later

1 week later1 week later

1 month later1 month later 2-5 minutes2-5 minutes

2-5 minutes2-5 minutes

10 minutes10 minutes

5 minutes5 minutes

Time managementRemember to include time for review

Time management

Remember and understand things by finding the keywords/storyline first.

Enter the information into your brain using your imagination in a logical way.

Visualise as much as possible.

I ncorporate a continuous review of your notes into your schedule.

Easy does it – relaxed concentration is the key to excellence!

W ork in short bursts: 30-45 minutes then 5 minutes stretch break for greater levels of understanding and memorising.