just curious about how you tackle this topic... (1 Viewer)

[misericordia]

so as the title says, please let me know how you have studied, how many hours and what materials you used...if you are good at bio you must tell me!

i decided to spend 2 weeks of this holiday-from now on-just cramming this topic...
i have materials to choose from but just not too sure what is the best for me...
i have a school textbook, syllubus dot point notes (32pages long and yet to be completed) and excel revise in a month...i'm not that bright in this area and i'm not good at memorizing this stuff so i need your valuable advice (of how to learn the bare minimum in 2 weeks)-i really want to get something aroud 75 to 80% for half yearlies coming up next term...

 

[ari89]

so as the title says, please let me know how you have studied, how many hours and what materials you used...if you are good at bio you must tell me!

i decided to spend 2 weeks of this holiday-from now on-just cramming this topic...
i have materials to choose from but just not too sure what is the best for me...
i have a school textbook, syllubus dot point notes (32pages long and yet to be completed) and excel revise in a month...i'm not that bright in this area and i'm not good at memorizing this stuff so i need your valuable advice (of how to learn the bare minimum in 2 weeks)-i really want to get something aroud 75 to 80% for half yearlies coming up next term...

cramming this topic? 32 page long dot points?
Its too early in the year for you to be cramming...especuially considering half yearlys aren't for a long long time and you most probably would have forgotten it by then if you're not good at memorising or biology. Try working on concepts until you know them inside and out..then once you know that you can summarise it and try and remember that....?
I think you're dot point answer's might be a bit too detailed...i did some really raelly really detailed ones and they by no means were that long...especially considering that this topic had the least amount of dot points (i think).

 

[misericordia]

hmmm so would you suggest on reading normal textbook...? but textbook is kinda hard to understand...also do you have any suggestion on choosing notes on resource section of bored of studies bio?

 

[-pari-]

there's nothing wrong with using a variety of sources for your notes, ( i tend to do that too )

but do review the length of your notes. i have fairly lengthy notes as well, but mine are mindmaps + handwritten so they look longer than they are.

think hard about what you DO need and what you dont.
remember you dont get any marks for having great notes its being able to use them that matters...

{something i just realised myself }

so along with knowing you're material, like going throuhg the syllabus, i suggest leaving some time to actually practice questions, get to know exam structure etc

hope that helps

 

[misericordia]

thanku so much you did help and indeed telling me how far the half yearly is made me feel indeed so much better...so ah, thanku

 

[lil_georgie_gal]

When i did my bio notes for this topic, they were just as long as yours are.

For the very first time i read and then studied these notes. However as i studied, many concepts began to flow into each other and i didnt need to study big slabs of writing.

I suggest that you stick with firstly reading your notes over a couple of times, so that you understand everything you have covered in this topic. Then you could start studying some parts of the content that contain more detail or just trouble you. If you spend a solid week of doing this and testing yourself with practice questions such as those from the success one book or your excel bio in a month you should be doing fine.

Hence when it comes to your half yearlies it should take you only a few days to go over this topic, if you are consistently re-reading what you have learnt. This will then give you time to study new content that you have learnt.

Goodluck with the study

 

[arheniz]

for me i just wrote lots and lots of notes. definately have a look at the student notes on this site and check out other sites around like http://hsc.csu.edu.au/ as these are a really good start point if you're confused with the fundamentals of something.

i did my best to stay on top of my notes over the year so sometimes that meant working a little harder during the holidays if i'd been slacking in term or vice versa. generally i typed them up so i could copy in diagrams and colour code etc etc but obviously everyone is different..that just happened to work really well for me.

first thing i did for study was go over class notes..usually these were ok for a really broad overview of a topic. then i read the relevant section in the textbook and finally looked at other note sources (this website, the csu website...). while i was reading i'd jot down anything important in dot points and once i understood what was going on i expanded on the notes to make sure. it generally really helps if you go by the syllabus but you already knew that so all is good.

it sounds like heaps of work (at least to me) but in reality it isnt. i work really slowly and get distracted by anything but i still managed to pull it all together for the hsc. for revising bio before exams i'd do one of those stupid timetable things that never really work, but broke it up into half hour slots so every 30 minutes i'd change subject which meant i really had to focus to get whatever was at hand. best thing is definately to start with past papers, do lots and lots of these and eventually they highlight sections you aren't too sure about. later you can go back and cover the relevant dot points and info.

well anyways all that may be complete rubbish for you but it was the only way i found i could study effectively and by the time the hsc came around i didn't feel the stress nearly as much as i thought i would..so yeah, best of luck

 

[Survivor39]

hahaha. the timetabling thing never works for me as well. I usually spend too long on a certain subject, leading to the failure of my timetable system.

I guess you need to be motivated for any studying to be done. Otherwise it's impossible to concentrate. Well, for me anyway..