Interactive Revision Strategies

Steve Pendleton

Yvonne Kind

Warwickshire LA

History and connections

The context – personal observations

• Teachers have only a limited range of strategies to help students prepare for their science GCSEs

• Activities often involve a lecturing style of revising “content” or “death by past paper”

• Sometimes previous activities (which were not effective) are revisited

Year 11

• Students often lack the skills or motivation to revise effectively at home, consequently..

• Study leave for Year 11 students has been dramatically reduced

• Support materials (revision guides etc.) often concentrate on content, rather than strategies to address the barriers to success.

Questions

• Do you agree with the observations about GCSE revision?

• What are the “barriers to success”?

What are the barriers?• Students at the C/D borderline may not know

how to revise effectively at home, or have the opportunity or motivation.

• Students often lack the necessary technique in answering examination questions.

• Students are often disengaged after a year of coursework etc.

• Teachers often do not have access to a range of engaging strategies

Interactive Revision Strategies

Activities which:• help students develop the skills to answer

GCSE examination questions• help students revise more effectively• are designed to be interesting and engaging

• stimulate thought and encourage collaborative working

The Activities• Tasks to develop skills of interpreting:

graphstablesdiagramsquestion introductions

• Tasks to encourage different ways of using revision guides

• Tasks to help students develop a thinking strategy for answering examination questions

Task

Task

Response

• Teachers found the tasks useful. They selected activities suited to the students needs

• Some tasks do not suit all pupils

• Tasks need to be explained carefully

• Pupils responded well

Quotes• “..made me think”• “….very helpful….” • “I find it easier to learn now”• “It has made me revise more”• “I revise differently now. I use drawing

and revision cards”• “I know what revision is now!”• “It doesn’t have to be boring!”

Problem…..

• Teacher: “I would like you to try this new strategy. Draw a picture to represent all the key ideas from a page in your revision guide”.

• Pupil: “Then what do I do?”

• Teacher: “Then you revise it!”

Thanks!

• http://www.we-learn.com

• stevependleton@warwickshire.gov.uk