Claas Röver's Teaching Pages - Exam Advice

As I said in the lectures, in my opinion, the following guidelines should be remembered during an exam.
  1. Read ALL questions first. Do those question you find easiest first. Then attempt the more difficult (for you) questions.
  2. READ each question you attempt thoroughly again before you answer it calmly and concentrated. Try to finish them off. Check that you have answered everything that was asked.
    It is easy to waste time by doing things that were not asked. Generally it is better to have three questions completely answered than starting five without getting far.
  3. Cross out stuff you don't want the marker to read. DO NOT leave the choice to the marker to 'pick' the correct answers! In particular, DO NOT answer more questions than you you were asked to, as this also leaves the choice to the marker who may not act in your favour.
  4. If for some reason you know you made a mistake somewhere in a longish calculation, then it is often quicker to do it all over again. It is in general very difficult to find a mistake.
  5. Once again, do not get stressed, stay calm, take a deep breath between questions, or look around the hall for 30 seconds.
  6. Concentration is the most crucial skill for passing exams besides knowing the material, of course. Also reading properly is important.
I know you think I'm taking the micky putting so much stress on reading but my experience shows that over and over again people answer questions that were not asked or leave out parts that are really easy - from which I conclude that they were overlooked.
Part of the problem is that you will have an expectation what the question should be because you have seen similar ones before. The stress is on similar which doesn't mean they are identical!