Winning is an attitude; to wing it in exams, have right mindset

I wrote my Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) exam at Kiambu High School and, by God’s grace, managed to score an A of 84 points.

As a way of helping others in this journey, yesterday I shared some tips and tactics I used to boost my performance.

(In case you missed it, please check the May 18 edition of the Nation).

And, as promised, here are other ways I employed in my academic journey:

• Discipline and time management

Discipline is actually the most important driver of academic success.

Write your timetable and make sure you follow it. 

Ensure you balance out all the subjects, including those you don’t like much.

With discipline, you will not entertain any thoughts of cheating in any test and you will manage your time well.

Ensure you get enough sleep since reading too late into the night is normally not beneficial.

In my case, I always reminded myself that I needed to sleep for at least six hours to enable my brain rejuvenate.

Above all, behave well, be at the right place at the right time and respect your colleagues, parents, teachers and staff.

• Work on the languages thoroughly

English, Kiswahili, French, German and others are not as hard as most students think.

The problem, in my view, is that most of us are not willing to pay the price: Reading widely and doing exercises daily.

A simple rule worked for men — include one language in your daily timetable.

Since literature is a big part of these languages, read set-books and appreciate the creativity that goes into writing them.

Examine how that short story, play or novel can influence your life positively as an individual. Relate with it. Own it.

This attitude will push you to reread these setbooks at least six times so that you understand them. 

Apply the same approach to poems.

Consult your language teachers as much as possible and request them to mark your essays, poems, compositions and other exercises.

• Do maths exercises daily

Work on at least five to 10 sums on a daily basis.

You will have to force yourself first but finally you’ll get to enjoy playing this game of numbers.

Smile every time you score that tough sum and challenge your friend to do the same.

Preferably, tackle mathematics when you’re feeling a bit tired in the evening or afternoon since it actually works up the brain.

• Do a thorough content analysis in sciences

Passing the sciences is all about enjoying them, reading, rereading and understanding what you read.

Repetition of concepts enables one to commit them to memory but not necessarily to memorise.

Use KLB and teachers’ notes as your primary books for revision because they are the ones mostly used to set exams.

Being curious to learn more about a certain concept from another credible book will also help you understand it better. 

Invest in personal assessment, preferably at least a week after covering a topic, so as to test your long-term memory.

Also, relate what you learn in sciences with the real life experiences to make study more interesting.

• Group discussions and teacher consultation

Perform group discussions only with people with whom you are sure the engagement will amount to something tangible.

Do not claim you do group discussions if the much you can achieve is discussing sports and memes.

Group discussions should be done only after you have had pretty good contact with the topic of discussion.

After discussion, consult your friends and then your teachers whenever you experience challenges in a topic or question.

• Choose credible revision books

Changing your revision book frequently will not help much; you may actually end up confused.

Consult your teachers on choices to make and stick to them.

Lastly, choose your own way of revising for exams — whether long-form notes, condensed notes, questions or a combination of the above.

Joseph Maina, an alumnus of Kiambu High School, scored an A in the 2020 KCSE.

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