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Exam Prep
Preparing for a test or examination
Exam Prep is vital and can make all the difference between success and failure on the day. Everyone is different and each of us revises in our own way but the following techniques and advice should be helpful to any exam candidate at just about any level.
Decide what your goal is. Many students fall apart because it all seems 'too much'. The techniques you will find on this page are largely about making this task more manageable.
Exam Prep Tip No1
Remember that your first priority is to pass the exam, not to get 100%. Study past examination papers and practice questions with an eye to what topics make regular appearances or which are clearly deemed to have a high level of importance attached to them. Concentrate your studies on these areas at the expense of those areas which are given lower importance. If the preparation is for a non-academic exam, then you should also keep an ear on the education news in case there is a political reason for shifting the emphasis of the paper.
Exam Prep Tip No 2
Work is not everything. It is too easy to burn out long before the exam so pace yourself. Make sure you mix work and play. Do not work late on the night before the exam - go out, get some exercise and relax before bedtime. It is important you get a good night's sleep before an important test and this means your body needs to be physically as well as mentally tired.
Exam Prep Tip No 3
Do not get involved in conversations with other students about the paper. Imagine they are your competitors (they will be if you are preparing for an exam where a fixed percentage of candidates are awarded a particular grade). Keep your own counsel before and after and never engage in the 'what did you make of ...?' banter that follows every exam. If you get drawn on this, it may distract you from subsequent exams - what has been done has been done and there's an end to it.
Exam Prep Tip No 4
Remember no-one, but no-one can be relied upon to tell you with 100% certainty how many questions you need to answer or how the examination paper will be structured. Only one thing can be relied on - the paper itself. Examination instructions change over a period of time - today it is 5 questions out of 8, in 3 years time it may be 7 shorter questions out of 10, 3 of which must be from Section A. Read the instructions on the paper before starting and then read them over again. Your year could be the year that it changes - trust only what you read on the paper and no-one else.
Exam Prep Tip No 5
Having turned over your examination paper, spend the first 5 to 10 minutes scanning the paper. Use this time to rank each question - A, B or C. If you are not allowed to write on the paper, ask for some scrap paper.
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I can do this question easily in the time I have to allocate to this question.
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I can do all or most of this question without too many problems but it will take more time than I should be spending on it.
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No idea! Help!!!!
Don't forget the worst case scenario is that the bell goes for the end of the exam and your best questions are unanswered.
Start with your 'A' questions, then do your 'B's'. That way by the time you get to the midpoint of the exam you should already be confident of having passed. This reduces the pressure on you and allows you to focus on your least favorite questions.
When you start the 'C's', have a look to see if any part of the question is straightforward. If you need to know part a) of a question in order to answer part b) and you have no idea what a) is, then write 'a) Guess = ....' and then 'b) Using my guess from a), ....'. That way the examiner can see how you have made the connection. It is perfectly possible to get full marks from part b) even if the answer is wrong as long as you used the correct method and the only reason the answer was wrong was because you started off with the incorrect assumption in a).
An exam prep tip I used to tell my students is that an examination paper is neither a novel nor a crossword. What I meant by that was that you do not 'spoil' the experience by treating each question like a chapter (how can you read Chapter 10 before you've read Chapters 1 to 9?) nor does answering one question help you with another (crossword style).
Preparing for an examination is like a military campaign - good preparation, a logical approach and a high level of organization are key. You need to be in the best of conditions mentally and physically and you need to be clear-headed about tackling the paper. Trust your own instincts and what your eyes tell you and don't let others distract you.
Good luck with both the examination and the exam prep!
Exam Prep
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