Surviving Revision

Yeah, I know, it totally sucks. You have to fit your life around going over stuff you've already learned, but even though you've already learned it, it still takes loads of effort and stress to go over it again. It's boring and feels like it's filling up your life, but as you get towards the end of your revision you get closer to the beginning of your exams, which are really scary, so you kind of don't want it to end either. This point in your life is almost zero fun, and the rare fun moments are besmirched by the thought of having to get back to revision soon.

However, as resourceful human beings, in the hardest of times we develop survival techniques. We CAN get through this! Other people have before us, so we can too. Everybody has the capacity to make it past the "this is so awful I can't take it any more" revision wall, to make it become bearable, and to eventually get through the exams and on to the good parts of the year. Here are a few techniques I've picked up:

1. Snackage. As a hardworking student you are permitted to eat more than usual, although rubbishy food might actually make you feel worse. I recommend chocolate-covered almonds, crackers with Marmite or chocolate spread or whatever floats your snacking boat, dry cereal (don't knock it, totally great).  Keep some small snacks beside your desk (or wherever you're working) and reward yourself whenever you hit even a minor achievement.
2. Revision websites. This way you can do games or quizzes and it doesn't feel so utterly dull. Plus if you get 10 out of 10 on a quiz, it makes you feel like you've made progress and achieved something, even if it's really not that difficult. Obviously there's BBC Bitesize for up-to-GCSE revision, and beyond that I recommend Get Revising. As well as using other people's flashcards and quizzes or whatever, you can make your own revision resources and also make a revision timetable. It makes the whole process a lot less like hard work.
3. Group revision. Okay, this one requires willpower, but it's totally worth it. If you get together with people revising the same subject you can answer each other's questions and have group discussions, which are particularly helpful for essay subjects. Also you feel much less alone in your suffering. But you really should try to keep on track for at least an hour. It's so easy to stalk that weird person's Facebook photos instead of talking about The Duchess of Malfi, but you feel racked with guilt afterwards, and you've missed an opportunity.
4. Flashcards. This isn't new to anyone I'm sure, but they're so great I want to mention them. When you've got a set of colour-coordinated (unless you're lazy like me) cards with condensed information on them, the stuff you've got to learn is a lot less daunting. Plus you can whip them out at any opportunity, 'cause they're small and portable and it's easy to flip through them.
5. Mind-mapping. Oh my god I love it. I know it depends on your personal learning style, and I'm not one for tables or lists, mind-maps just make sense to me. They're super quick to draw because you don't need to faff around with a ruler or sentencing or anything. If you've only got 15 minutes you can mind-map an answer to an essay question, for example, and you've gone through the whole essay thought process without writing an essay. Plus, if you've got the time, you can use it to revise by colour association: different coloured strands for different themes, or picture association if you're that way inclined.

There you are, four things I do to make revision more bearable. I'm not advising that you don't do other things like practise papers and re-reading texts and all the usual stuff too. Good luck!