How to Review Your Mistakes So You Stop Repeating Them

Our answer: re-solve a mistake instead of re-reading it. Cover the solution, work the question again from a blank page, check your answer and fix the exact step that went wrong — then come back to it on a later day, and keep it in rotation until you get it right more than once in a row.

Re-reading a corrected mistake can feel like progress because the answer looks familiar. In memory research, practising recall and spacing practice over time have repeatedly led to better long-term retention than re-reading (sources below). Below is the method step by step, what each step rests on, and how ReviewNotes runs the same loop for you.

Why looking over your mistakes is not enough

In a study by Roediger and Karpicke (2006), students either re-read a passage or practised recalling it. Re-reading did better on a test five minutes later, but on tests two days and one week later the students who had practised recalling remembered substantially more — even though re-reading made students more confident that they would remember.

A large review of study techniques (Dunlosky and colleagues, 2013) reached the same verdict across many studies: practice testing and spreading practice over time were rated highly useful, while re-reading and highlighting were rated low. In our view, looking over a corrected wrong answer is a form of re-reading, and solving it again is a form of practice testing.

Step 1 — Gather only what you got wrong

Pull out the questions you missed, plus the ones you got right by guessing. We suggest leaving out the rest, so your time goes to the ones you do not answer reliably yet.

Keep the original question, its correct answer and, if you have it, a worked solution. You will need all three: the question to re-solve, and the answer and solution to check yourself against.

Step 2 — Re-solve from a blank page, solution covered

Cover the answer and the solution and work the question from the start, as if it were new. We suggest not reading the solution first "to remind yourself" — then you would be re-reading rather than recalling.

Try to recall the answer yourself before you check it. Recalling before checking is what the retrieval-practice studies above tested.

Step 3 — Check, then fix the exact step that failed

Compare your work with the solution line by line and find the first step where it went wrong. A review of research on learning from errors finds that making errors followed by corrective feedback is beneficial, and stresses that the corrective feedback is crucial (Metcalfe, 2017).

We also suggest writing one line about what went wrong: a concept you did not know, a concept you knew but did not think to use, or a slip such as a sign error or a missed condition. This is our own practice rather than a research finding — the three kinds call for different fixes, and the line gives you something to read before the next attempt.

We also suggest checking the answers you were sure of. The same review notes that errors made with high confidence are corrected more readily than low-confidence ones once people get feedback.

Step 4 — Come back on a later day

Getting a question right minutes after reading its solution does not show whether you will remember it later; the solution is still fresh. We suggest re-solving it on a later day. A large synthesis of verbal-recall studies found that spacing practice out over time led to better long-term retention than the same amount of practice in one sitting (Cepeda and colleagues, 2006).

Step 5 — Keep it until you get it right more than once

It is tempting to drop a question the first time you get it right. In an experiment by Karpicke and Roediger (2008), dropping items from further testing once they had been recalled correctly hurt later recall, while continuing to test them produced a large benefit. Continuing to re-study them after that first correct answer made no difference.

Studies of "successive relearning" — practising until you answer correctly, then doing it again in later sessions — found better exam performance and longer retention for students who learned this way (Rawson, Dunlosky and Sciartelli, 2013). What this research shows is that retrieving an answer again after the first correct one pays off; it does not set an exact number of correct answers.

Our suggestion is to keep a question in rotation until you have got it right at least twice in a row, on separate attempts. That number is a practical rule of thumb, not a figure taken from the studies.

Once a question has met your bar, let it go. If this works for you, the pile shrinks each round, and what is left shows what you still need to work on.

How ReviewNotes runs this loop

You add questions by uploading a photo or PDF of the page, or by typing them in. Then you solve them as a set, marking each answer right or wrong as you go — multiple-choice answers are graded when you tap one.

Right after a set, you can try the questions you just missed once more on the spot. That round is a practice pass and is not counted in your record. Whatever you missed then comes back in Today on your Schedule from the next day, so you do not have to remember which questions to revisit. That covers every note in your study plan — new notes are added to it automatically, and you can leave a note out in the plan settings.

A question keeps coming back until you get it right twice in a row. That is the app’s default setting, not a number from the studies above, and you can change it to once or three times. If you answer correctly and mark the question Easy, it leaves straight away — unless the app measured that answer as taking more than twice your usual time on that set, in which case the normal rule applies. If you turn on “Revisit problems marked hard”, a question you last marked Hard keeps coming back even after that. At the end of a day you can also go over the questions you missed that day one more time.

Common mistakes when reviewing mistakes

Reading the solution instead of re-solving. It can feel productive, but in the studies above re-reading did less for later recall than recalling.
Re-solving straight after reading the solution and counting that as done. Come back on another day.
Dropping a question after one correct answer. One right answer can be a lucky guess.
Never noting why it went wrong. We suggest a one-line note so the same slip is easier to spot next time.
Reviewing everything, including questions you always get right. We suggest spending that time on the ones you miss.