Studying for the bac: a simple method, from September to June

Earlier than you think, but not for longer. The idea is not to work two extra hours every evening. It is to spend ten to fifteen minutes a day, from the first weeks, going over what you covered in class.

Why? Because we quickly forget what we have seen only once. Ebbinghaus measured it as early as 1885 with his forgetting curve. Reviewing a concept a few days after class, then a few weeks later, locks it in far better than rereading everything in May. That is the principle of spaced repetition.

The philosophy essay cannot be learned by heart. But to write a good essay, you need precise definitions, distinctions and author references at hand. That part can be memorized.

• Definitions: “What is consciousness?”, “Distinguish desire from need.”
• Syllabus landmarks: “Distinction between persuading and convincing?”, “Between in fact and in principle?”
• Authors: “Descartes, Discourse on the Method: which certainty withstands doubt?” (answer: “I think, therefore I am”).
• Short quotations you actually plan to use, with their meaning.

When you write the essay, these elements come on their own, and you can spend your energy on the reasoning.

For the written exam as for the oral, part of the work is memory: works and their authors, literary movements, figures of speech, and above all your texts for the oral.

• Figures of speech: “Definition of an anaphora?” with an example on the back.
• Movements: “Which authors belong to Romanticism?”, “Characteristics of Classicism?”
• Texts for the oral: for each text, one card per section of the text and one per key device you want to cite.

The text analysis itself is practiced out loud, timing yourself. The cards simply guarantee that you will not go blank on a text.

History-geography requires precise landmarks. Short cards are enough:

• “Start of the First World War?” (1914). “Armistice?” (November 11, 1918).
• “Fall of the Berlin Wall?” (1989).
• “Define metropolization.”
• A world map on which you hide the major regions or large areas to locate.

Also make cards “in the other direction”: “What happened in 1989?” That is how you learn to link a date to an event, rather than reciting a list.

Each specialty subject has its vocabulary and basics to know without hesitation: physics-chemistry and math formulas, definitions in SES (economics and social sciences), concepts in SVT (life and earth sciences), landmarks in HGGSP (history, geography, geopolitics and political science) or in humanities.

For the science subjects, cards with formulas help you remember a relationship with its units. For the others, one definition per card.

The grand oral (the final oral exam of the bac), on the other hand, is prepared out loud: you rehearse it in front of someone or by recording yourself. But you can make a few cards for the data, examples and definitions you want to cite without mistakes.

A simple plan comes in three phases:

• From the start of the school year to spring break: the day's cards, ten to fifteen minutes, and a card made after each important class.
• The weeks before the exams: past papers under timed conditions, and a self-test per subject to spot the gaps.
• The last week: no new concepts, only the day's cards and targeted review of your weak points.

To go further, our page on the exam study planner explains how to spread the work up to a deadline, and the one on active recall shows why quizzing yourself beats rereading.

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• Create one deck per subject: philosophy, French, history-geography, each specialty subject.
• Write front-and-back cards, cloze deletions for definitions, formulas for the sciences, and image occlusion cards for geography maps.
• Let the FSRS algorithm show you the right cards every day.
• Add your exam dates to the planner to spread the load over the remaining days.
• Take a self-test graded out of 20 before a test: it does not affect your usual reviews.

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