How to crack the
Junior Cert
St. Joseph’s College, Summerhill, Athlone
2014-2015
TAMMY STRICKLAND used ‘mind maps’ to help her
gain nine As in her mocks – and says she has earned
€5,000 selling her study plans. Here are her exam
tips.
Mary Egan, Career Guidance.
Junior Cert 2014-2015
How to crack the Junior Cert
TAMMY STRICKLAND used ‘mind maps’ to help her gain nine As in her mocks –
and says she has earned €5,000 selling her study plans. Here are her exam tips.
Tammy Strickland, a 17-year-old student at Mount Sackville Secondary School, in
Chapelizod in Dublin, used mind maps to help her get nine As in her mock exams.
(Illness got in the way of her Junior Cert).
The maps are pictorial representations of subjects: a central word or idea in the middle
of the map has branches developing the theme outwards like a tree. She uses colours,
typefaces and lines to help fix the picture in her head. She says she has earned €5,000
selling the study aids through her website, JuniorCertMindmaps.com.
How to beat stress
 Get some exercise each day to get rid of tension. Don’t do any sort of
strenuous or particularly draining sports activities before studying. Walking is
more relaxing and doesn’t require as much effort.
 Don’t get caught up in mind games about your expected exam results. Focus
on doing the best you can. That is all that matters.
 Be organised, deciding before you start each study session what you want to
get out of it.
 Use a structured approach to learning, so that you can see your progress. I
have used mind mapping, a system developed by the psychology writer Tony
Buzan, as an effective way to summarise lots of detail so I don’t have to read
my textbooks at exam time. I memorise the maps’ logical structures, and I can
visualise the mind maps whenever I need to.
 Fit things you enjoy into your daily routines, so you don’t get caught up in
negative thinking. You may feel that studying for long periods every day is a
priority, but remember that balance is essential to a good study plan.
When you’re studying
 If you haven’t tried flashcards or mind maps as an aid to memory, try using
them now.
 Consider using mnemonics to help you remember detail. Whether it is a
rhyme, phrase or even a song, these quirky techniques are an excellent way
to recall parts of a topic. They are easy to make up and can make study time
more enjoyable. Here’s an example for remembering the order of the planets
from the sun. “My very easy method: just set up nine planets” helps you
remember Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune,
Pluto. (Although bear in mind that Pluto is so tiny – it’s smaller than the moon
– that in 2006 it was reclassified and is no longer officially a planet of our
solar system; instead it is a “dwarf planet”.)
St Joseph’s College, Summerhill, Athlone
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Junior Cert 2014-2015
 Highlight keywords or buzzwords that will help you remember essays or
other text. If you can recall these words in an exam, they should trigger
memories of previous lessons on that topic, making it easier to write answers.
Trying to memorise and regurgitate complete essays can be an impossible task
and wastes valuable time that you could invest else.
 At the end of your study session, close both the book and your eyes and
silently do a mind scan, to remind you of everything you have learned. It
may also help to write down the information after your period of silent
reflection. This is particularly useful for maths, as you may need to learn
equations or theorems off by heart.
Reward yourself for productive study sessions.
 Forget about everything other than the tasks you have set yourself for each
study session.
 Plan by way of goals and not time. It is not useful to say to yourself that you
are going to be sitting there for four or five hours. Focus on goals for each
study session.
 Don’t set yourself impossible goals, as this sets you up for failure.
 Chunk it down: break each subject into manageable chunks that you can
easily digest in the final three or four weeks before your exams.
 Focus on the here and now. The past does not matter, and the future hasn’t
happened yet – so why worry about it?
Time is of the essence
 Schedule your study session. It will be much more effective if you plan it.
 Be disciplined. Don’t run over time on some subjects at the expense of others.
 Use shorthand notes, flashcards or mind maps and avoid going back to read
textbooks.
 Study while you are fresh. Don’t wait until you are sleepy to quit.
 Do practical exam questions to test yourself. This can be a great confidence
booster. But only spend the amount of time on them that you are allowed in
the exam.
 During the exams, allow yourself only the allotted time for each question
and then move on. You will get more marks for attempting every question
than you will get for giving just one or two perfect answers.
In the final weeks
Mind maps are a shorthand for all the material covered in the textbooks and in class.
They are a pretty good summary of all you need to know to get excellent exam
results. As they are visual they are easy to remember for the vast majority of students.
If you have left it too late to start mind mapping, you could consider looking at the
ones I have created online. There are free samples in 10 subjects, so you can check if
they work for you before deciding if you think they’re worth buying.
St Joseph’s College, Summerhill, Athlone
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Junior Cert 2014-2015
How I prepared for my exams The Junior Cert subject by subject:
ENGLISH
 I used flashcards to revise the larger areas, like poetry and character analysis
in the texts. For poetry, my main study was constructing a mind map that
displayed all of the poets my class had covered and connecting them to
different themes and techniques. I wrote the most important lines out on small
flashcards – quoting to support an answer is vital. For the novel and studied
drama I wrote out shorthand summaries of every character and scene of
conflict in both works and then applied them to a mind map. Using flashcards,
I made sure to note the most important quotes that I would have to remember
and refer to in the exam.
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 In other areas, like functional writing and media studies, I placed all of the
formats and language tones I had learned and put them into categories in a
mind map. For example, when I was revising the different forms of letterwriting I constructed a “letters” mind map. Each branch contained shorthand
notes about the different types of letters and the vital parts of their structure
and language. Every branch about layout was made up of a fixed number of
points; that way I knew when I was in my exam that I needed to include a
fixed number of layout features to get the marks.
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 Many answers are about interpretation. It is vital to glance back at previously
attempted questions and see where you went wrong and where you succeeded.
English - In short:
 Write shorthand notes and pointers on the styles, layouts and language you
need.
 Write important quotes on flashcards and revise regularly.
 Write shorthand notes on important characters or conflicts in studied texts in
formats like mind maps.
 Where possible, attempt exam questions in the allotted times, as this is always
a struggle in this subject.
 When writing, use varied and interesting language.
MATHS
 The main part of my study for maths was to rewrite my notes, often on to
mind maps, then attempt questions from my book and eventually work my
way up to exam questions. When it came to things like important formulae or
theorems, my studying technique involved writing out the coursework with the
book open, then closing it, taking out a blank sheet of paper and writing it out
again. Depending on the topic, I sometimes wrote out short formulae on
flashcards and revised them daily.
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Junior Cert 2014-2015
Maths - In short:
 Attempt as many questions as possible on each topic, to let your revision cover
you from all angles.
 Write complicated formulae on to flashcards and revise regularly.
 Rewrite notes and make them as structured as possible (maybe with the use of
mind maps).
 Keep writing out things like theorems over and over until they sink in;
incorporate this into a regular routine of study.
 Time yourself at each question and make sure you are spending no more than
15-20 minutes on each question.
IRISH
 Irish is broken into two sections: a listening test and a writing test. To help
with the listening exam, you should either listen to the previous year’s aural
tests on CD or watch TG4 or Nuacht RTÉ. I tried out both methods, especially
coming up to exam time. With the written paper I made sure to revise
grammar by writing out all the rules of verbs on a mind map. For my studied
poetry and stories I again constructed a large mind map, linking themes to
writers and highlighting the phrasing I needed to earn more marks. I wrote
quotes on flashcards and revised them regularly, as well as browsing through
previous questions and learning from mistakes.
Irish - In short:
 Revise as much grammar as possible, as a huge amount of marks
depends on your accuracy.
 For studied texts, learn important phrasing by writing it out and
revising again and again. Also write significant quotes on flashcards.
 For the short story and letter areas of the papers, try not to learn long
pieces off by heart. Instead write out, under headings, broad phrasing
that you could apply to many situations.
 Listen to past-paper aural tests, as well as Irish programs, to prepare
for the aural test.
 Look through previous exam questions you have attempted and see
where you went wrong. Learn from your mistakes.
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Junior Cert 2014-2015
FRENCH
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For the listening test, listen to the aural CDs or even French news on the
internet to revise when you can. Look over vocabulary beforehand.
List out in a structured form all of the vocabulary for letters, postcards and
notes and take into account the layouts. Number the parts of the layout and
revise what goes where. Apply this information to a mind map or shorthand
notes.
Revise grammar by writing out the rules of each tense. Put the rules into a
mind map or other form of notes and revise this daily.
Conjugate a verb a day in each tense you know, to make sure your grammar is
accurate.
Attempt written questions and time yourself. Make sure you are not spending
too much time on one question.
BUSINESS STUDIES
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Write out the definitions and rules in big topics, like insurance and economics,
in a structured format. As these definitions can be quite lengthy, highlight the
words in each phrase that you think are the most important.
Remember formats of things like reports and letters by listing and numbering
important features and revising regularly.
Attempt as many book-keeping questions as possible, and make sure to remind
yourself constantly of the rules of double entry. Before you even attempt the
questions scan the layouts of the accounts to remind you of what to do.
Time every attempted question.
GEOGRAPHY
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Revise all physical geography by constructing short summaries. Make bullet
points of the most important parts of the chapter and only look in a more
detailed way at case studies. Look over these pointers regularly, maybe before
you get into studying a long question.
When dealing with long questions, it’s best to take one example of each topic
you covered and revise it. Do not look over every case study in one chapter, as
you won’t recall the detail required for one example at exam time. Highlight
keywords in the phrases that you feel you will remember best and revise them
regularly.
Write out pointers and practise drawing diagrams for your studied cases. Take
time to look over them and rewrite them regularly.
Look over your rules for OS maps and aerial photographs, then attempt a
drawing. It is worth practising these questions, as they come up frequently
and, if accurately done, earn great marks.
Time how long it takes to complete one long question.
(From Irish Times, 10 May 2011)
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Junior Cert 2014-2015
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Housekeeping:
Plan time – make sure to include recreational/sport & exercise breaks/family &
friends time.
Set goals each day in each class/subject, set medium goals for end-of-term
achievements, set long term for exam results and career goals.
Same time, same place, uncluttered space, only subject you’re studying at each
block
Regular breaks approx. every 40 minutes
Good Food:
Fish provide a healthy dose of omega-3 fatty acids - salmon, tuna and mackerel. Try creating
tuna or salmon salad sandwiches using fat-free mayonnaise, cranberries and diced walnuts.
Serve it on whole wheat bread or crackers.
Whole is Better: The brain needs a constant source of glucose, to properly function. Grains
are a source of glucose and whole grains provide fibre, which helps to slow down the release
of glucose into the body. Whole grain breads, pastas and cereals are good sources. Try
oatmeal topped with sliced fruit for a well-rounded and healthy breakfast.
Vivid Vegetables: Brightly coloured vegetables usually contain the highest amounts of
vitamins, minerals and antioxidants.
Root for Fruits: The brain is easily damaged by toxins encountered throughout the day,
resulting in oxidative damage. Strawberries, blueberries and other berries (high in
antioxidants), nutritious
Nuts and nut butter have long been known for their protein, but they also provide essential
nutrients for the brain. Walnuts provide omega-3 fatty acids, while peanuts and other nuts are
filled with vitamin E. Vitamin E has been linked to improved brain performance. Explore
different types of nut butters and pair them with sliced fruit or whole grain bread, or blend
them into a smoothie.
Eggs are an inexpensive way to add protein and choline, an essential nutrient for the brain.
Enjoy a hard-boiled egg as a grab-and-go snack. Be sure to thoroughly cook an egg before
consuming.
Beans are an affordable and delicious source of protein and complex carbohydrates. This
combination helps provide the brain with a steady source of fuel and vital nutrients.
Get Cheesy: Milk, yogurt and cheese: - glucose and protein, vitamin D and B vitamins, which
are essential for brain function. If either a dairy allergy or lactose intolerance is of concern,
choose calcium-fortified soy milk or almond milk.
Meaty Options: Adequate amounts of iron, iodine and folate are vital for the development of
the brain. Meats such as beef, poultry and seafood provide the brain with iron.
Dark Chocolate, in moderation, can promote brain health. Cocoa, found in dark chocolate,
contains flavonoids -- which are linked to improved brain health and memory. Choose dark
chocolate with a higher percentage of cocoa, which typically means a lower amount of sugar.
Pair a small serving of dark chocolate with fruit for a healthy afternoon snack.
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Loadsa water!!!!!
St Joseph’s College, Summerhill, Athlone
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