What is the most effective way to revise for an English exam?

Revising for an English exam is difficult as there isn’t a simple list of facts or formulas to memorise and being creative within a time limit is tough. However, being prepared for the exam and knowing what is required of you will have a significant effect on your grade.The first thing to do is make sure you know the texts inside out. Your understanding of key themes and events will show in your writing and it also boosts your confidence when you know exactly what you’re talking about. Memorising quotes for closed book exams can be daunting but is often easier than you expect. Rereading the book or poem you will be analysing will help them to stick in your head anyway but another useful technique is to write ten versatile quotes down on flashcards with the themes and characters that they relate to on the back. Try to say the quotes to yourself just from looking at the back of the card. This creates a strong association between the quotes and its themes in your mind as well as helping you to remember the exact wording. Once you’ve learnt the ten, try ten more until you know enough quotes to tackle an essay on any theme.Doing past papers is a great way to get a feel for what you will be doing in an exam and to test yourself on how well you know the texts. Start doing essays with all your notes and in an unlimited amount of time so you can get used to essay writing without the pressure. As you get closer to the exam you can cut down on time and try to write your answer without the help of notes. Another way of practicing questions without doing a full past paper is to write detailed essay plans. This allows you to see how easily you could answer a question without using up an hour of your revision time. Having a well written essay plan for each of the themes most likely to come up can be reassuring once you are in the exam as you know that you have tackled a similar question before and understand roughly how to approach it.Finally, I would recommend reading the mark scheme or model answers as this is a great way to know exactly what an examiner is looking for and what standard of writing you should be trying to achieve in your answers.