HOW TO STUDY A WEEK BEFORE AN EXAM
List out all your topics, and highlight those you are least familiar with. I also love listing out the resources/materials I have to study.
You should start reading and annotating the materials you are unfamiliar with.
If you have not started making notes at all, it wouldn’t be wise to start making notes now.
Instead, try to annotate things, write down explanations next to the things that you don’t understand, or definitions that you think can be elaborated.
Remember to be exam-oriented. Don’t spend time on things that are very trivial, or things that won’t be covered in the exam anyways.
At this stage, you should be focusing on annotating and enhancing your understanding of the materials.
You should make sure you have most of your notes ready and that you have digested everything.
If you haven’t done a summary card, you should probably do it at this stage. This is a great way to consolidate your information.
Get a bunch of index cards. Write out the title of each chapter on each card.
Write the outline of the chapter. Alternatively, you can make a question attack plan for each chapter.
Turn over and write down some key terms that you don’t know. Or, you can write down some common mistakes, formulas etc, depending on your subject.
With 4 days left, you should start memorizing things now. Focus on spellings and key terms.
By memorizing, you can do the following:
Read the notes out loud, and repeat them by not looking at the paper (this is the way I personally use!)
Try to memorize, and cover the sheet and rewrite everything
Teach yourself, or to an audio recorder, or to a friend
Draw a mindmap without looking at your notes.
You should go for some practice questions by chapter.
You may also try to complete the exercises at the back of the chapter in your textbook.
Don’t just do the practice question and throw them away. Make full use of it:
Check the answer. Find out what you failed to get right and failed to write down on the answer paper.
Understand your mistake. Understand why you make the mistake, and how you can avoid it.
Take notes of your misunderstanding and mistakes (as well as the correct answers). This will help you to avoid making the same ones.
Repeat what you have done on day 3.
Some teachers may also offer some mock papers or practice papers, or you may also try to complete past papers here.
You should do your very last review here. You should make sure you read through the following this day:
The notes you have made while doing the practice questions and papers
If your exam involves some formulas or difficult keywords or definitions, you may need to memorize them again this day.
Now that’s everything. With all the preparation above, you should be very confident since you have got everything covered! All you have to do is to take a good breakfast and focus during the exam! Good luck!
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