A-Level Psychology Revision

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Which exam board are you with?

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What ways do you like to revise? Are there any techniques you have found helpful in the past?

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If you are AQA, which units are you covering.

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Definition cards- While I know you said you don't like flashcards due to the amount of content, I found it really helpful to cut up small (posit-it-note) size pieces of paper and have one side for definitions e.g. Schizophrenia, hallucinations, delusions, and the other side for a shortened version of the definition which included all the key words. I found this helpful because it didn't take too much time and helped me to learn the definitions which AQA were quite strict on during the time I studied. While this might have changed (Check the up to date specifications!), I remember that missing parts or key words from definitions, or even not defining key words lost students marks, so this is an easy way to pick up those marks. I made these for all of my units😊

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Revision books- I used both of these books and found them super helpful when revising and getting the content down. Year one book Year two book. They are a bit pricey on the Illuminate Publishing website but can be picked up cheaper second hand online. They also have Flashbooks now, which I haven't used but these might be worth a try if they can be found cheaper second hand.

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Content- With each page/ individual topic in the book above, I used a bit of a boring revision method, but it worked for me! I used one A4 sheet of paper and took notes, specifically on definitions, the methods etc of studies, evaluations of the studies, and supporting/conflicting evidence. This allowed me a good understanding and those evaluations too for the 16 markers.😊

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Practicing Questions- It's great to see that you're already making use of past papers for your other subjects! Checking out past papers for psychology and checking your answers against the mark schemes is good practice before the exams as it helps you to work on your time-keeping for each question, and allows you to become familiar with what examiners are looking for. Each week leading up to my exams I tried to answer a few questions from a past paper, including those 16 makers too! I asked my teachers to mark them if they had time, but if not then I just checked my answer against the mark scheme😊

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It's also helpful to see if AQA or your teachers have any revision resources that are readily available. This might need some digging on the AQA website but after a quick search I have found these Knowledge checkers for year one of the Psychology A-level which might be helpful. But always check the content is relevant, and the note in blue at the top of the page if you use the Knowledge Checkers😊

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Tutor2U also provide revision videos on YouTube which I made good use of, and they also hosted live revision sessions too. My teacher suggested watching the live streams, which I found really useful. BUT- Always check the content is on your specification when looking at videos by anyone other than AQA to make sure you are learning/revising the right things!😊