My secondary 1 (2018) has just started on the first week of December. Today i teaching one of my girls science ( yes, she was the one with quite a fair bit of problems with answering structured questions for her PSLE science. She survived and got an A this PSLE after 3 to 4 months of lessons.)

As i was going through the first topic of science, i realized that she was having a hard time remembering new facts and she took a long time trying to remember the names of laboratory apparatus and their uses. To try to overcome her own problem, she took out paper and copied the names and the uses and even drew the lab apparatus again and again. ( Does this sound familiar? I bet everyone reading this now would have at least tried this method once, including myself.)

I observed how she studied those facts. She tried memorizing the big chunk of information all at once. Its very ambitious and very tedious! For an aging person like me, this is definitely going to kill me too.

Verdict: too time consuming and ineffective.

I pulled out my favorite. THE FLASH CARDS. Many students know me for me and my ever evolving flash cards ( my flash cards changes with the objectives i try to achieve and they are not the normal flash cards you write!)

Its simple to see my intentions on my this set of cards. I want the student to remember in the following ways.

link the name of the apparatus to its appearance.
link the name of the apparatus to its use.
link the appearance of the apparatus to its use.

*Since i have loan out the laboratory apparatus cards to my student, i will continue this illustration with Card set 2: Hazard warning symbols.

The following will be describing the steps on how to study with these cards. First of all, always start with the easiest. The student will take all the cards, and learn the name - appearance relation. The student will then divide the pile of cards into two, namely the " I know" and " i am not sure" piles. The student will then put the " i know" aside and look through the "i am not sure" pile more often. When the student is ready, i will take over to test. I will also divide the results into the two similar pile and return the "i am not sure" pile to the student for further review. Then test only the " i am not sure" pile then continue with the original " i know" pile. The process sounds tedious and lengthy, but it actually only takes about 10 minutes to go through.

When the following is completed, repeat again with the second learning objective ( this will be a little more difficult than the first one) and eventually the last one which is more difficult than the previous. Finally, i will combine all three learning objectives and quiz the student a combination of questions.

*Show the front of the Cover, Ask for the answer which is on the Reverse of the Card.*

*The Answer is Covered! Student should Produce This.*

Principles of this Sequence:

1. Chunking

We want information to be easily absorbed. Small packs are easier to absorb. So information is divided into small packs.

2. Starting from the easiest

This provide student with more motivation to move on, since they know they can achieve what is required of them. Giving a task that is out of reach defeats the purpose of such an exercise because the student will not have enough control of their learning, and also suffer more roadblocks which encourage them to give up earlier. When they have the urge to continue, the learning activity speeds up more, hence shortening the time taken to remember.

3. Organised learning procedure

The student will have more control over their learning and encourages the information to be packed in a more orderly manner in their heads. Repetition will further encourage information to transfer from the student's short term memory to the long term memory.

4. No books and less words

Students who hates reading will be more open to learning, and finally less words will mean the student only remember the important stuff.

A reminder: Please do not use hundreds of cards in one activity. It is draining, and it is not effective chunking anymore.

I hope this helps for everyone!

Study Tip : Flashcards Secrets! This will Half your Studying Time.

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Kovan Rise,