A combination of these will give you even more time

A combination of these will give you even more time.By doing this, you could leave some evenings free for recreation, which we all need. A balance between work and play is important, and it can be achieved by planning ahead.First, you need to know what you have to do and the time you have available. The syllabus book from the exam board will tell you what you have to do and past exam papers will show the sort of questions asked.Do as many of these as possible to improve your technique and to ensure that you can do them in the time allowed. But before you get to that stage, you will have to get your own notes in order so that information can be retrieved quickly and efficiently.Use a highlighter and write separate notes with the important details that you will need. You could make a chart to keep track of your progress.Work with a friend if it helps, but make sure that you work. Vary the topics that you study in an evening and move on if you become stuck Consult your teacher about any difficulty. All of us "waste" time to a greater or lesser degree and you are likely to be no different from anyone else.

But if you grab the 15- or 30-minute periods throughout the day that you currently fritter away, enormous gains can be made.Use the 30 minutes between arriving home and having your evening meal for one of your concentrated study sessions. You can do that for the rest of your life, when you finally qualify. Begin again as you started, working for 10 or 15 minutes without interruption and you'll do it again with another 30 minutes of pure study and progress under your belt, or even longer.Time management is important. By doing nothing else during that time, even the most reluctant of you will become hooked and gain in confidence as the 10 minutes stretches into a 15-, 20- or 30-minute session.Have a short break - you deserve it Walk around the room or the garden - but don't watch TV. Parents are often responsible for these marathon study sessions, in the belief that their prodigies are beavering away with enough time to spare to tidy their rooms and do chores that have not been tackled for ages. Getting yourself started is often the highest hurdle The secret is to work for 10 minutes only - initially. As this summer term begins, thousands of students preparing for school exams will be sitting in a daze, worrying about their lack of progress, despite spending hours with their books.

The good thing is when you come back after a long day of lectures and you have hours of study ahead, and Mum's got tea on the table and she's done your ironing.''. He has taken part-time jobs, and during his year-long work placement managed to save £1,000 from his earnings. But he has still needed to take out loans from the student loans company totalling £1,800."I would like to say I have paid my way; its a matter of pride But it has been cheaper all round to live at home Mum and Dad put up with me I suppose I invade their space as much as they do mine. I will be going into the world rather late in life.''Steven gets around £20 a week from his parents to cover travel and other expenses. I would have preferred to go abroad."But the biggest disadvantage is missing out on that whole experience of living away from home."Not knowing what it's like to be on your own trying to budget for bills, or doing the cleaning or going to the laundrette. The Sheffield course had strong links with industry and a work placement in Germany, whereas I ended up doing my year's work placement with a local firm.

Staying at home seemed more sensible."In some ways I feel I have missed out academically. What if I failed my course or did not like it? How would I have been able to tell my parents? If I went away I would have got thousands of pounds into debt. My dad is a chemical operator, a shift worker, and my mum is a book-keeper. We live in a nice house - but they have both got ordinary jobs,'' he says."My parents said they were willing to do anything, including taking out a second mortgage or selling the house and moving to a smaller one."But I felt that would put a lot of pressure on me. It is more a case of 'sorry we can't - my mum and dad are in','' he says.Steven had been accepted for an engineering course at Sheffield Hallam University, but turned it down after learning he was eligible for a grant of only £300 a year.