Exam Techniques, Tricks and Tips

Exam techniques, tips and tricks

ALS Team, 2022

Preparing for an exam

24 hours before the exam

Contents

The exam

preparing for an exam

Actively Revise

Plan

• Everyone's learning style is different, but just reading through your notes is not the best way to revise effectively.

• Make a detailed but realistic revision

to-do list to keep on track of the topics you have yet to go over and ones you feel confident with.

To help you remember key information:

• Work on different tasks throughout the day, so

you don't get bored.

• Make up poems, songs, mnemonics
• Summarise your notes
• Copy out your notes and repeat
• Make up quizes
• Watch Youtube videos about the topic

Ask for support

Do past papers

• Your department should have access to past papers for you to take copies of, or you can alway check your exam boards website.

• Your tutors want you to succeed just as much as you do and will be more than happy to arrange a on-to-one meeting with you if you feel like you need extra support and guidance.

• Work your way through as many as you can!

If you cannot do a question, make sure that is is still on the syllabus and ask you're teacher for help.

• Do your past papers against the clock to get used to exam condirions.

24 hours before the exam

Get the important facts into your short term memory

Fuel your body

• You can’t ignore your body if you want your brain to work at its best. Stuffing it full of sugar, or energy drinks just before will work fine for the first hour or so, but by the end of a three-hour exam you’ll have completely run out of energy.

• Make sure you have a good breakfast the morning before an exam and equally, a good lunch before an afternoon exam.

• In the last 24 hours it's too late to try and understand anything new. What you can do is cram some facts into short-term memory. This is the time to go through the notes looking at those "key points" sections.

Relax

Prepare for the morning

• Most importantly, make sure you take some time to relax the evening before your exam and do something that you enjoy.

• The last thing you want and need before an exam is to be running late and rushing around. This will only increase your stress levels.Make sure that the night before an exam, you prepare everything you need for the next day.

in the exam

Do the easiest question

Plan

• There is absolutely no reason to do the questions in the order they are printed in the exam. Some people would recommend doing the easiest one(s) first.

• When your exam question is in front of you, make sure you read the question carefully a few times and break it up, so you can make sense of the whole question.
• Once you understand the question, make a brief plan of how you will answer what thw question is asking you - be careful not to spend too much time with this, you only need to spend a few minutes on this!

If you're running out of time...

Take water with you

• Suppose you've got time left to do one question, but two questions left to do. Which one do you choose? The way to maximise your marks is to do the first half of both of them. You gain marks faster at the start of a question than at the end.

• It’s a good way of remaining calm. Also, you can get through a lot of nervous sweat during a hard exam. Your body will work better if you replace it. There is research that suggests this can make a significant difference to your grades.

(see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-17741653)

good luck!