Tip #1. Give More Time To Revise for KCSE Subjects That You Personally Find Difficult

This tip #1. in 2011 on how to pass KCSE examinations. In the following days, I will write 20 tips that can help you pass your KCSE examinations.

The tip I am giving today is very good and important.
It involves allowing more time to revise topic/subject that you personally find difficult.

There is no single subject that is difficult. But as a student, you might find a certain subject to be easier or difficult than others.

I used to find Physics and Mathematics easier than History. Since I wanted to pass in History, I allocated it more time than Mathematics and Physics. I did this in form one and two. From form three, there was a choice to drop History.

I always wanted to be scientist that is why I dropped History. Not all students  have a choice to drop the subject that they personally find difficult.

 

In other situations, the subject that you find difficult may be one of the most important and marketable subject in future and in the world. For example science subjects are always highly rated throughout the world. Those who excel in sciences go on to some of the world’s most prestigious careers such as Engineers, Doctors, Architects etc.

You might be one of the students who wish to pass in sciences but find them really difficult.

You do not have to give up.

I will give you a secret to help you pass in them. You will not just pass, but pass well. **Peter was my classmate. He was good in English and business subjects, but he was not very good in Mathematics when we were in form one and two. Surprisingly, he was among the top student in KCSE Mathematics in our year.

Peter was my friend, I was very close to him, and this enabled me to know what he did to come out among the top student in our class in KCSE Mathematics.

First he acknowledged that he was not good in Mathematics and therefore he needed to do something special to help him come out successfully in KCSE Mathematics. He liked novels and literature set books. But he realized he was too good in them. It was not wise for him to devote a lot of time in what he was assured of passing. He slowly started cutting on the number of novels, stories from set books and poems that he read and increased time to revise Mathematics.

Every evening, he ensured that he revised the Mathematics topic we were taught in class that day. If he found it difficult, he could for help from other students including me, if I did not know, he asked our Mathematics teacher the following day.

Initially, he complained of feeling discouraged and sleepy when he took out his Mathematics book to revise. This did not deter him. He always encouraged himself by the following analogy “when kids are learning to walk they make few steps holding on their mother or table. The first few days they fall. When they fall, they do not tell themselves that they will not try to walk again. They keep trying until they can walk comfortably”. So for Peter, he kept trying, starting with simple Mathematics problems. After solving simple ones, he started working on difficult ones. By the time we were in the third term of form four, he was the best student in Mathematics.

He emerged top five in the class in KCSE Mathematics not because he was very good in Mathematics, but because he allocated more time to revise what he found personally difficult.

Therefore allocate more time to revise what you find more difficult and even if you ‘fall, keep trying like a baby learning to walk, until you can walk comfortably’

**Not the real name.