It's that time of year again, when children and young adults the length and breadth of the country are preparing for, and stressing about, their exams.
My not-so-little-one Molly is now in year seven (or first year at ‘big’ school as we used to call it) and she is preparing for her first proper set of year-end exams. This inevitably means we’ve now also hurtled headlong into that age-old dispute regarding how and why it is best to revise.
The difficulty I have in this mother/daughter argument is that I was pretty rubbish at revising myself and I vividly remember the sheer boredom of reading and re-reading facts and figures, and desperately hoping they would somehow sink in.
So, for me to try to advise Molly on the best way to learn seems, if not hopeless, then at least deeply hypocritical.
I know the rules: have regular breaks; write things down; and don’t listen to One Direction while you’re doing it. But actually enforcing these things is tough when you have a daughter who knows her own mind and seems to do pretty well in tests even when she doesn’t really work that hard for them.
What I’m most worried about is that, just before the exams, she’ll fly into a blind panic about what’s to come and how potentially ill-prepared she is, and that her (and my) stress levels will rocket through the ceiling.
Of course, this is just the beginning. Every year from now on we will have to face this together until she finishes her A-levels or graduates from university. In fact, exam stress for students in higher education has become such an issue that universities are now trying to find all sorts of new ways to help calm them down so that they can cope.
This year Leicester University students’ union has had the great idea of setting up ‘bubble wrap stations’ so that when people need to let off some steam, they can go and pop some plastic bubbles.
Puppies will also be brought in to help reduce students’ blood pressure with a doggie cuddle. Other establishments agree about animals being great for reducing stress.
Bath University installed a petting zoo for students, who then had the opportunity to stroke goats and feed ducks to keep them serene. However, there have been calls from animal welfare groups, which say that although animals may help the stress levels of the students, the stress levels of the animals themselves also need to be considered when they’re put in this environment. Fair point.
The problem, of course, for university students is that we are living in a time when there is no guarantee of a job at the end of a course, so there is even more pressure to get yourself in the best position possible to enter the job market. No wonder they’re stressed.
You can take the start and sub-conscious build-up of that stress right back through A-levels, GCSEs and even as far back as year seven exams. I do worry that the pressure placed on children nowadays is far greater than in my day and consequently their anxiety levels will be greater too.
So what can I do to try to relieve that for my 12-year-old? I have to support her with her efforts, help her where I can and gently persuade her to work hard, but I also have to let her learn in her own way.
Maybe if her exams results are good, she can prove that her way of little and often revision, even if accompanied by One Direction, can be the best and most productive way for her. And if her results aren’t so good, what then?
Next year, Harry Styles and his mates will be removed from her music player, all social privileges will be revoked and she’ll be locked in her bedroom for several hours a day to revise in a way her mother never managed to!
NOTE TO SELF: When it comes to revision, do as I say, not as I did.
