The Best Method to Revise for Kenya Secondary Examinations -KCSE

Revising Quietly in class

Introduction

Simple question: Why are you reading this?

Most likely you are reading this because you are a candidate waiting to sit for Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) exam. You may have started revising for the final KCSE exam or you will start soon. To all the candidates and non-candidates, feel at home and read on. I assure you that, you will not be disappointed.

In this post, I am going to share with  you the best method to revise for KCSE exam.  Normally, revising for KCSE should be easy and a smooth ride. However, due to lack of good revision techniques , the students find themselves overwhelmed by revision work load.

Having taken exams for many years, I developed a revision method that I think is the best. It can help any student to understand the subject matter and pass the KCSE exams. Give it a try and see what you think. This method involves 5 key steps. I can acronym the system as TONOMOTERE

1. Topic. Revise a Topic at a time
2. Notes. Make condensed notes as you revise
3. Model questions. Attempt to answer model questions
4. Teacher. Ask the teacher for help
5. Repetition : Repetition, repetition, repetition

Requirements:
1. An exercise book preferably squared exercise book
2. Class note book, Course book or text book of the subject you are revising
2. Coloured pens/highlighter
3. Sample past KCSE examinations questions and model answers (You can free past papers by checking the page menu of this website).

1. Revise a Topic at a time.

Lets say you want to revise Physics. I will choose a topic of Linear motion.

The first thing to do is to check the contents or outline of Linear Motion. This is very important. Many people ignore this part. But I emphasis that, it is very important to have an overview of what you are supposed to know after reading a topic. No need to memorise the subtopics. But it is good to have an idea at the back of your mind of what you are supposed to know. If you have time, write down the contents or subtopics

The outline a topic can be found from the syllabus, a recommended text book or in your class notebook. In this article, I will use the recommended Kenya examinations council (KNEC) syllabus.

The steps I have discussed in this section can be used for any other subject, let it Biology, Chemistry, Geography, Commerce etc.

LINEAR MOTION
Specific Objectives: By the end of this topic the learner should be able to:
a) define distance, displacement, speed, velocity and acceleration;
b) describe experiments to determine velocity and acceleration;
c) determine acceleration due to gravity;
d) plot and explain motion time graphs;
e) apply the equations of uniformly accelerated motion;
f) solve numerical problems on uniformly accelerated motion.

Content/course outline
1. Distance, displacement, speed, velocity, acceleration (Experimental treatment required)
2. Acceleration due to gravity free – fall, simple pendulum
3. Motion-time graphs- displacement time graphs, Velocity time graphs
4. Equations of uniformly accelerated motion
5. Problems on uniformly accelerated motion

The above are the objectives and the main subtopics you are supposed to understand in Linear motion. Now embark in revising.

2. Make condensed summary Notes
The first subtopic is distance, displacement or speed. Write the the Topic and subtopic with a coloured pen as the heading on your exercise book. As you revise, make revision notes of the most important points such as definitions and equations. The revision notes should be a summary. I used to condense my summary notes. I did this by using a squared exercise book. I went further and folded each page into half. I used to write the summary notes with smaller writing style. This helped me to condense a lot of information as possible in a single page.

Write down what you do not understand.
If you read something that is difficult to understand, write it in a separate page. Otherwise, you can have a problems exercise book. But make sure the problems are separate from your revision notes.Sometimes you can write the problems in a sheet a paper. This is not advisable because of the likelihood of losing the paper.

Keep the written problems carefully so that you will ask for help from the teacher or fellow students.

3. Attempt to answer model questions
After you finish revising, attempt to answer model questions related to the topic. You can use model questions from past KCSE papers. If you do not have sample KCSE questions, you can use other previous exam papers or you can formulate sample questions  yourself. Using all the three types of questions provide advantage of different format of questions.

Attempt to answer these questions without looking at the notes. It is not important to time your self at this point. After answering the questions, cross check the answers with the notes. If you find a difficult question, check the answer in the revision notes, if you cannot find the answer in revision notes, check the answer from the note book or text book. If you cannot find the answer, write it down in problems exercise book.

Quality Studies

4. Ask the teacher or fellow students
Take the difficult questions to your fellow students and discuss with them. If they cannot help you, go to your teacher. The teacher will do everything to help you answer those questions.

5. Repetition.
They say practice makes perfect. When you are revising the same topic again, follow the steps above.Re-write condensed summary notes and difficult questions. Read while writing down summary notes. Never revise without writing down summary notes. Revision notes are very important.

Re-writing the notes will help the material to stick in your memory. If you feel you have no time to re-write the summary notes, re-read previous summary notes.

6.Final Revision.
The days prior to the exam, use your revision notes. The notes are condensed and summarised,  they therefore provide less reading material this saves time. In addition, they are quick to scan than the whole book of class notes. The fact that you summarised them with your own style, they are easy to read.

Summary.
This is the summary of the 5 most important things to remember.
1. Topic. Revise a Topic at a time
2. Notes. Make condensed notes as you revise
3. Model questions. Attempt to answer model questions
4. Teacher. Ask the teacher for help
5. Repetition : Repetition, repetition, repetition