This article was originally written by a Kip McGrath colleague who runs the Luton and Stevenage Centres and we loved it so much we wanted to share.  To view other great education articles go to http://leaderinlearning.wordpress.com/

Your son or daughter  has just got a mock exam/test result and has failed miserably.  He/she did lots of revision, but said he/she had a complete blank when faced with the paper. So what went wrong?  Here are the top reasons why students fail.

1. Not Enough Revision

First things first, revision does not = reading.  Revising is an active process. Students really don’t understand what they are reading. They should know what every word means, be able to analyse every diagram, bullet point, graph and date.  Mind maps, mnemonics, highlighting key point and notes summaries on cards are all useful ways of doing active revision.

2. Starting Revision Too Late

The path to success lies in good planning.  Start revision early. Little and often is better than a mad panic at the end. Revision should be started so that there is enough time to understand, learn, memorise and to practice past papers.  Students should create a revision timetable and stick to it.  This will ensure that all the topics are covered and not just the ones the student likes.  They should go over work a day later and then a week  later.

3. Stressing Too Much

Students can put themselves under unnecessary pressure during exam season.  Parents can relieve the burden by making sure that they are eating regularly and getting enough sleep.  Tiredness makes revision ineffective and affects performance in exams.  Revise for maximum 30 minute intervals and then have a 5 minute break.

The exam should be treated as a normal school or college day, other than that they are doing an exam. Follow your normal routine will help you relax.

4.    Running out of time in the exam

Students should answer all the easy questions first and then go back to the ones they have missed out.  They should spend more time on high mark questions and only answer questions they are asked to.

5. Misreading the question

It’s one of the first lessons our teachers teach us, but it is one of the most common reasons why students fail.  They did not understand what was required from the examiners and therefore didn’t answer the question. Students should get hold of a stash of past papers and make sure they also have the answers to check their understanding.  Then familiarise themselves with exam questions and the language used and always ask themselves “What do they want me to write?”.  They will be less likely to misunderstand if they have come across similar questions before and being confronted with an exam paper won’t freak them out.

Learning how to write a thesis statement is one of the most important skills a high school student can master. Without a strong thesis statement, a paper can feel disorganized and readers may not understand what you’re trying to express. The thesis summarizes the theme of your paper and tells the reader what the rest of the paper is about. The thesis usually appears at the end of your introduction, generally as the last sentence of your first paragraph. High school papers that typically include a thesis statement include argument essays, analysis papers, process essays and research papers.

1.Understand the Purpose: A successful thesis includes three essential elements: It presents the topic of the paper, offers a clear opinion on that topic, and summarizes the points you’ll cover in the body of the paper. A thesis statement can help you organize your essay, as each paragraph you include in the body of your essay relates to one of the points you included in your thesis. For example, if your thesis was that online learning is more effective than traditional classes because they are more flexible and affordable and offer students the ability to learn at their own pace, then your body paragraphs would focus on each of those three reasons. A successful thesis also acts as a road map for the reader, signaling what the rest of the paper will cover.

2.Present an Opinion:Your thesis must express a clear opinion about your topic. An opinion is debatable, meaning that someone else could potentially dispute it. If a reader cannot challenge or oppose your thesis statement, you may simply be stating facts or summarizing an issue rather than presenting a clear point of view. For example, if you said that online classes are becoming more common, that’s a fact, not an opinion, but saying that online classes are better or worse than traditional classes offers a debatable point of view.

3.Include Support:Your thesis statement should include evidence to support your point of view. This evidence gives you credibility as the author of the paper, telling the reader that you understand your topic, have conducted research, and that you have evidence to back up your opinion. The evidence you include in your thesis should summarize the main points in your essay so the reader knows what the rest of the paper is about.

4.Write Several Drafts:It takes practice to write a successful thesis statement. You may need to write several versions in order to capture your opinion and summarize your evidence in one or two sentences. It can help to use a checklist to make sure you’ve included all of the elements of a thesis. Your thesis should be one or two sentences, express a debatable point of view and include evidence to support your opinion. This simple test can help make sure your thesis is strong and organized before you write the rest of your paper.

Clinical supervision is emerging as the crucible in which counselors acquire knowledge and skills for the substance abuse treatment profession, providing a bridge between the classroom and the clinic. Supervision is necessary in the substance abuse treatment field to improve client care, develop the professionalism of clinical personnel, and impart and maintain ethical standards in the field.

Supervision of any school ordinarily refers to the improvement of the total teaching-learning situation and the conditions that affect them. It is a socialized functions designs to improve instruction by working with the people who are working with the students/pupils.The uses of clinical Supervision in our school are:-

(a) Inspection.This is actually a study of school conditions, to discover problems or defects of the students, teachers, equipment, school curriculum, objectives and methods. This could be done via actual observation, educational tests, conference, questionnaires and checklists.

(b) Research.This has something to do to remedy the weaknesses of the solution to solve problems discovered. The supervisor should conduct research to discover means, methods and procedure fundamental to the success of supervision. The solutions discovered are then passed on the teachers.

(c) Training.This is acquainting teachers with solutions discovered in research through training. Training may take the form of demonstration teaching, workshops, seminars, classroom observations, individual or group conferences, intervisitation, professional classes or the use of bulletin board and circulars, and writing suggestions.

(d) Guidance.Guidance involved personal help given by someone. It is the function of supervision to stimulate, direct, guide and encourage the teachers to apply instructional procedures, techniques, principles and devices.

(e) Evaluation.As an ultimate function of supervision, evaluation appraises the outcomes and the factors conditioning the outcomes of instructions and to improve the products and processes of instructions.

           

Application letters are written for official purposes such as job applications. These letters are sometimes called official business or formal letters. Application letters should be always be concise, complete, logically, planned, clearly, and politely expressed in grammatically correct and good English or language. An application letter regardless of their purpose, consist of the following parts or elements:

1. Writer’s/ sender’s address – this is written on top right hand corner. This part is also called a letterhead.
2.  Date – (this is under a sender’s address), it shows the date of the letter i.e. the day in which the letter was written.
3. Reference number (= if any) on right hand side below the date.Receiver’s / sender’s address – this is written on left hand corner /side. It consists of the name or title of the person, place of business or any place where the letter is intended to reach.
4. The salutation; this is the greeting that begins the letter. Use dear Sir/Madam if you write to someone whose name you don’t know i.e. he or she is not known to you.Heading; it should be very brief starting with RE: or REF:-the heading should carry a message (theme of the letter. It should be capital letter and underlined it if is handwritten but do not underline if it typed, bold it.
5.  Body /message -it contains the message or the information of the letter. It is most important part which requires good flow of ideas and well punctuated.
6. Complementary close. -it consists of the words of respect to show the feeling of the writer of the letter towards his/ her correspondent / receiver of the letter. It should also relate with the salutation.
7. Signature of the writer.
8. Full name plus the name of the company, office or firm which the writer represents, written at an extreme end of letter. Although sometimes a company name may be written above the letter.