Exams!!!
Yes, it's that time of year again! Examinations, midterms or finals... or even Diploma Exams! The time of year that will either show that you really do know something ... or will point you in the direction of a lifetime career behind the counter in McDonald's!
We're here to make things a little easier for you...
These methods are used by successful students world-wide.
They'll work for you too!

  1. Start early. Start now! Cramming in the last few days won't help you do well, and it will be too late to get help with things you don't understand. Check out the current Exam Timetable. Visit our 'Learning Strategies' page for ideas you can practice now that will guarantee you higher marks.
  2. Establish a regular study pattern. Set up a schedule. Stick to it. An hour or two every night.
  3. Plan on not having much of a social life for the next month. Students who learn this simple fact about the month before exams, whether in junior high, senior high, college, or university, usually do well. Those who never catch on, flunk out. It's that simple!
  4. Get help! If you don't remember something, or never learned it properly in the first place, ask your teachers for extra help. Don't wait ... by the end of the month, you'll be lining up with twenty other people. Get the help now and beat the rush!
  5. In general, listening to music will NOT help you to remember things. This has been demonstrated conclusively in many scientific studies ... you may feel more relaxed, more comfortable, or more able to concentrate, but if music is playing while you study, you will not remember things as well as if it had been quiet!
    The single exception?
    Those same studies found that classical music actually helped.

There are also different ways of studying, depending on the subject. How you study for Math or Physics is NOT the same as how you study for other exams:


  1. Reading your notes is a waste of time. You need to DO PROBLEMS! Use your notes for a source of example problems for you to try ... the answers are there so you can see what to do, if you've forgotten.
  2. Identify the problem types that you can't do. Get help with these from your teacher.
  3. DO MORE PROBLEMS! This can't be emphasized enough ... practicing the skills you learned during the course is the best way to help you recall them and get good at them again. Remember: just because you got 80% on a unit test four months ago does NOT mean you will get 80% on that topic on the exam ... unless you practice all the skills again!
  4. If you're studying with a friend, the most valuable thing you can do together is make practice tests for each other, work on them separately, and then correct the answers together.
    It really helps, if you are having problems, to find someone to study with who knows the material well and can explain it to you. And they learn the material better by having to explain it to you!


  1. Read your notes quickly, with a pencil in hand. Make a list of all the main topics covered in the course.
  2. For each topic, read your notes, again making note of all the important ideas within that topic. Do this for all the main topics.
  3. For each important idea, make sure you know all the facts. List them.
  4. Get help with any ideas or facts you don't understand.
  5. Show your list of main topics (each containing lists of important ideas, with facts listed) to the teacher. Ask if there's anything missing.
  6. Find someone to work with. Have them ask you to explain things from your lists.

These ideas work. If you use them you will do better on your exams. Guaranteed!
They may seem like a lot of effort ... but after all, that's the point, isn't it? Hard work pays off. It's what it takes to make your work all semester worthwhile ... and it's a skill you MUST master if you hope to attend college or university.






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