Study skills are simply the various skills you need to be able to study effectively. Many students have surprisingly poor study skills. This study guide is designed to help anybody who is studying for their GCSE exams and wishes to improve such study skills. This study guide is packed full of useful advice which will help you develop all the skills that you need to effectively prepare for your GCSE exams.

The guide starts off by showing you how to set up a suitable study environment. Then the guide goes onto to show you how to design and implement your study skills, planning your revision and dealing with stressful situations.
Feeding yourself good food helps to keep your body in good shape. Your brain works in a similar way so it is important to feed yourself positive thoughts.

Changing your study environment will also improve your ability to revise and will help with your self confidence. Negative thoughts on the other hand will undermine your self confidence and will destroy your-self image.

Nearly everybody has more potential than they realise. Plenty of people prevent themselves from learning just because they don’t believe in their own abilities. Believing in yourself can be a source of enormous strength. Essentially it is a matter of attitude; a calm quiet approach will lead to confidence and success. Be careful not to be over confident. This is often just an excuse for doing nothing. You fool yourself that the course is easy and requires little effort. So you do nothing until a month before the exam and then suddenly become anxious and nervous about the prospect of doing the exam.

A good way to boost your self confidence is to keep a record of what you have achieved and reward yourself from time to time when you have achieved goals that you have set yourself.
Constructing a SWOT analysis is an excellent way to help prepare for exams.
SWOT stands for:

• Strengths
• Weaknesses
• Opportunities
• Threats

Your strengths could lie in knowledge of certain areas of the syllabus; your weaknesses could be your motivation and organisation. Opportunities could be the free time that you have or the environment that you are studying within. Threats could be distractions in your life such as the TV, concentration levels and events that occur in your personal life.

The environment that you are studying in can have a vital influence on your ability to revise effectively. Radio, TV, Computers and DVDs may be great inventions but they can invade people’s privacy just as much as other people can. Finding a quiet place to study such as a library or your bedroom away from disruption is vital.

If you study at home ensure that you notify family members so that they are aware that you are revising and can keep noise levels to a minimum.

Remember not to study too much as this can be counterproductive. Ensure that you get plenty of sleep (typically between 8-12 hours per day). Working on the computer before you go to bed is not recommended as this can inhibit your ability to get a good night’s sleep. Ensure that you have regular meals and have time to relax and be with your friends. Doing plenty of physical exercise is also a good idea and when you construct a revision timetable ensures that you include some kind of physical activity within your schedule.

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