The reason why a h2 biology tutor can be more effective than a school teacher is because we can emphasize our student’s learning with spaced repetition for H2 biology concepts.
In contrast, a school teacher is busy with admin work, presiding over student’s co-curricular activities, organizing school level events, attending meetings in and outside of school etc.
As a tutor, I don’t do much else except to teach and also curate the best flow of content within a class.
Outside of teaching, I spend time profiling my students, updating my teaching materials and thinking how I can bring my teaching to the next level.
Why the school teaching is not effective
In most schools, their teachers frequently split class time between lectures, tutorials and practicals.
Majority of these sessions revolves around content delivery which are mostly surface level.
In tuition classes, whilst I allocate a portion of time with students for that, I also spend time explaining, then repeating, emphasizing memorization and rote learning adapting certain memory techniques helpful for my students.
When students flip between the 2 realms of learning do they finally gain H2 biology subject mastery.
Teachers are setting their students up for failure if they only focused on content delivery.
This is bad because most students don’t understand the material nor have photographic memory.
Almost all my students gain understanding as I talk about the topic at hand asaking a whole list of why questions. However, the understanding can quickly slip away and the students have to start from ground zero again without practice and spaced repetition.
So when the big exams come, these students are not ready because they are cramming in the material they don’t understand and hence unable to gain fluency to use it in novel situations in examinations.
It’s no wonder hearing a new (failing) student recently remarked to me, ‘I don’t know how I could’ve done so badly, I know what my school teacher taught!‘
What is spaced repetition for H2 biology?
It is revisiting the subject material repeatedly but separated by a period of time in each instance right before the students forget.
It is much like once the car that is moving, the moment it slows down, pump the accelerator a little and it quickly gets up to speed.
This is in contrast to cramming, which is rote memorization right before an exams.
Cramming is proven to be very short term and does not translate to long term memory ⬇
Even worse, the student will have to spend a lot of time doing it. For difficult exams like the Singaporean A levels that I talk about, it is not possible therefore to be able to cover the entire material within a short period of time and remembering everything.
So poor performance ensues.
The main reason for the poor performance is that the student only recognizes the fact they should know using cramming. Recognition is not the same as recall.
And the latter is what spaced repetition enhances.
How to use spaced repetition for H2 Biology in exam preparations?
Fortunately there is an app for this.
The anki app is something my past students have success with.
Where you create a set of digital cards filling them up with a variety of facts covering the subject you learn.
The app registers the correct and incorrect responses to these cards and identifies which card is causing problems.
It then pushes the card with correct responses further back and increase the frequency of problem cards instead.
Over time this helps students to effectively commit concepts into long term memory.
Why spaced repetition is important in exam performance
If students use spaced repetition successfully, they will enjoy easy access to the concepts.
This is also known as chunking.
In contrast, students who use cramming concepts they don’t understand are much slower in response as they try to search for the facts. As such, the preoccupation prevents them from analyzing the novel question at hand.
A standard A level biology paper has a lot of questions but students have a short amount of time to complete it. So its clear which preparation technique is superior.
Tips for executing spaced repetition for H2 Biology
First, not all subjects can benefit from the use of spaced repetition.
Biology is suitable because it is content heavy but conceptually lighter versus physics or organic chemistry which is the opposite.
Second, because a student taking A levels is extremely busy, it is hard to sit through a deck with few hundred cards at a go.
My suggestion is to break it into chunks during the down times such as when you are eating, commuting, waiting in line, going from 1 building to another etc. And they add up!
Know that even working through only a few cards within a minute, you are already enhancing your content memory.
Third, work on the anki decks every day!
Yes, indeed it sounds like a lot of work. However if you fall behind, then the algorithm that anki is built on will not be effective.
If you do fall behind, dedicate a few days purely to catch up.
Fourth, do not spend too much time on the anki decks if you are already regularly using it!
Anything beyond 60 minutes without rest will saturate your brain and means you will not remember. Breaking it up into multiple sessions a day will be a better for developing long term memory.
In addition, this will complement the Pomodoro technique I talk about and personally use really well.
Fifth, the key idea of spaced repetition is recall not recognition.
So if you fail to recall even though the card contents look familiar, be honest and mark it as incorrect attempt.
Finally, before you attempt to start a deck make sure you already understand the concepts.
If you do not understand the underlying concepts, it is better to sort that out first before attempting spaced repetition.
In such scenarios, start work on those decks on those topics you already understand and then work on the topics you don’t . Then, work on the new decks that you recently started to understand.
Know the secret to H2 Biology mastery is one thing. How do you START?
Don’t worry, I am here to help.
I have been teaching since 2004. And that’s 2 decades. During this time, I conduct experiments on my students to test what works and what doesn’t.
And students who graduate from my guidance have gotten admission offers into great schools, finish the programs, and then gone onto great careers.
Right now, I have a set of ANKI decks for H2 Biology that you can buy and use right away.
Benefits you can expect
⓵ Gain H2 Biology memory database quick!
⓶ Faster response time to exam questions.
⓷ Finally complete H2 Biology exams before times up.
What Nicholas Chan, first ITE student, BYang class of 2017 says
I use your memory cards to help memorize concepts as well as having my notes wherever I go. Even squeezing revision in public transport as I travel between school, tuition, clinical attachment and home.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
What happens after purchase
⓵ Receive an email with receipt.
⓶ A second email with my H2 Biology ANKI decks as well as instructions on how to get the free ANKI app on any platform, and how to load the decks onto the app.
⓷ You are now ready to start building your memory database of H2 Biology!