Third Year Study Skills Exam Skills 2 Test

Third Year Study Skills Exam Skills 2 - Test Technique

Review of homework activity What went well with revision notes/testing yourself? What was more challenging? Did you make a timetable? Did you stick to your timetable?

Motivation - exercising the brain Imagine you are very fit and healthy. You eat well and regularly run long distances as well as lifting weights in the gym. How easy is it for you to run a marathon? How motivated are you to train?

Motivation - exercising the brain Now imagine you are old and overweight. You don’t exercise, you get out of breath when you do and get tired really quickly. You also get lots of aches and pains in your joints. How easy is it for you to run a marathon? How motivated are you to train?

Motivation - exercising the brain ● If you’re not used to exercise, you start small and build up ● Something is ALWAYS better than nothing ● There is no point comparing yourself to those who have had a lot more practice than you ● There is no point worrying about the marathon when you haven’t even gone for a walk yet

Where do we go wrong in tests? ● The cards have examples of where you can lose marks due to poor test technique. ● Read them and try to put them in order of most important (the area you tend to lose most marks) to least important (something you don’t really do). ● If you find it difficult to apply this to all your subjects, choose a subject you are reasonably comfortable with. (Don’t choose a subject you feel hopeless at - you’ll end up choosing everything as important!)

What do YOU have some control over? You’re now going to take the cards and put them in the ‘control / importance’ grid. Some things are important, but you feel you have no control over. Some things you can control but aren’t as important. Which mistakes are high control / high importance?

Control - what can we do before the exam? Fill in the ‘what do I usually do to prepare for a test or exam’ sheet.

Content, skills or feedback? Now compare your most common activities with the next table, which shows which categories activities fall into: Content: Used to memorise information (including retrieval practice) Skills: Testing yourself properly, in exam conditions, or familiarising yourself with the types of questions Feedback: taking work and checking its quality, looking for areas to improve

Which one are you? Just content - this is boring! You’ll never be able to keep going for long if all you do is read notes or use flashcards. Plus you won’t be prepared for exam situations. Just content and skills - better than just content, but there’s no point trying exam style questions if you don’t compare your answers with mark schemes or hand them in to be marked Just skills - this is frustrating. There’s not much point throwing yourself into questions before you’ve reviewed the material.

Spaced learning - reminder The things that makes this successful is: You don’t do the same topic all in one session. You make notes on the topic one day, then test yourself on it the next, then try exam questions - you SPACE it out. You don’t do the same type of activity in one session - you do some notes/mind maps, some testing yourself and some proper question practice.

What can we do on the day of the exam? ● BREATHE ● RUN ● FLICK ● TICK ● PLAN ● CHECK

Action Plan Choose three or four of your biggest obstacles. How will you tackle them? What support might you need? What specific things could you do? Remember the marathon - small, achievable goals!

Homework - Week 2 Reflect: For at least one subject, go back over a piece of assessed work. This could be a timed essay, test or just comments in your book on homework and classwork. Read through the areas for improvement and try to incorporate these ideas into your revision. Practice: Try doing sample questions under timed test conditions once you have reviewed a topic, then check your work using model answers or your teacher. Relax: At the start and end of every revision session, practice breathing and focusing your mind.