Eh up
Firstly, ~sympathy~. The level 3 theory is a ball ache, no getting away from it.
My strategies (and ones I try to pass on):
(1) Learn how to transpose formulas, and make substitutions. Not in a "yeah, think I could do this if I put my mind to it" sort of way. Learn in a "I can do this with my eyes closed, it comes naturally, like changing gear on a car" sort of way. You will learn by (a) maybe reading about it in a book, (b) listening to your tutor, (c) youtube, and most importantly (d) by practice.
Why is this so important? The answer is: because I'm lazy when it comes to stuff I have to remember, and I forget stuff. There are a dozen different ways of relating resistance, voltage, current and power. Twelve formulas. Do I remember 12 formulas? Sod that! I remember "V = I.R" (1 o'clock) and "P = I.V" (9 o'clock). If I need to, I work from those to work out the other 10.
(2) Get a physical understanding of what it means in the real world. Formulas are abstract. Real world stuff, you might have a hope of remembering, particularly if you can "picture" it. If you can get a physical intuition for stuff, then you can ask yourself the crucial question:
"Does this make sense?"
For example: Ib <= In <= Iz <= It. Your first difficulty is remembering what everything means.
Ib is your design current. Why Ib? No idea. Tricky one this. Only way I'm able to remember this is because my son, who's learning to write, gets letters and numbers the wrong way round. So he'll try to write a "d" but end up writing a "b". I imagine the boffins at the IET making the same mistake. Or perhaps they think it's the "besign current." Who knows?!?
"In" is your
Nominal fuse (or circuit breaker) rating. Sort of makes sense.
So, does "Ib <= In" make sense? Maybe ask the question another way. "If my shower pulled 43 amps, what size breaker would I fit? Would I fit a 40A, or a 50A?" You wouldn't want a breaker with a lower rating than what you'd draw (might not give you nuisance tripping, but it wouldn't comply with 433.1.1), so you'd need a 50A breaker.
... and you continue the story from there, remembering the bare minimum and using daft little things to trigger your memory, like "Ib" above, or "Cf" (derating factor for BS 3036 fuses) = "crap fuse", and telling yourself a story in such a way that it
makes sense. So when you're sat in the exam trying to remember it all, you don't ever need to stress about whether you've remembered it right, because you'll go, "well, this would make sense, and I remember that the whole of this stuff sort of made sense when I learnt it, so I guess that must be it."
(3) First rule of Steve: write down what you know, in terms you understand. If the question says summat like, "A potential difference of..." or "An emf of..." then write down "V = ..." Pick the numbers out of the question, write down their values, and also their unit.
(4) Second rule of Steve: if in doubt, draw it out.
Finally, folk learn by all sorts of methods. Some by listening to inspiring teachers, others by reading in a book, many people (like me) can learn visually. Whatever way the spark of knowledge originally goes in, the way we remember it is by
doing it. Whether it's theory, or practical skills of the trade, we learn it, and remember it, and get good at it, by doing it. Over and over again. Unless you've got some sort of photographic memory, you've got to put the hours in, and that's the same whether you're terminating SWA, or calculating current carring capacity, voltage drop, or maximum Zs values.
So ask yourself: what exactly am I stuggling with? Is it the concepts? Do I really understand it (so that is "makes sense")? If not, then you need to find whatever means you can (book, youtube, inspiring tutor) to get the knowledge in in the first place. If the concepts are alright, and you've got trouble remembering it, then either make yourself up some daft (or even sensible) ways to remember it (e.g. CIVIL) and/or, practice, practice, practice.
Good luck with your learning.
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