Study Tips to Ace Your Math Exams
Are you one of those students who are naturally good at exams or do you turn into a nervous wreck before each, even when you’ve done all your revision and know your topic well? Want some study tips to ace your maths exams?
The good news is that maths exam techniques can be learned and by going into the exam with the right “battle strategy”, you can pick up some easy points you might otherwise have missed.
We’ve broken down some tips for you here on what to do before you go into the exam and what to do while sitting in that dreaded exam hall so that you can pick up some easy marks.
BEFORE the maths exams
Read, practise, and repeat. We’ve talked before about preparing for exams. Read your class notes and practise solving different maths formulas over and over again. As you repeat the same type of question, you will begin to see a pattern to it. Once you identify this pattern, you’ll be able to solve any problem of the same type. It then just becomes a matter of substituting numbers.
• Be prepared. Ensure that you pack all the essential supplies to bring with you into the exam hall. Do you have a choice of pencils for rough working? Are they sharpened? Take a sharpener too in case the lead breaks mid exam. Have a few pens just in case you run out of ink. Check what other items you can bring into the exam if they are allowed, such as a ruler or calculator. These are some study tips to ace your maths exams. Here’s more.
DURING the exam
• Read through the exam paper first. This is the simplest technique to follow in an examination, yet the one that many ignore. Don’t be tempted to rush straight into answering the questions. Read through the whole paper to understand exactly how many questions need answering. Do you need to answer all or are there options to choose from in sections?
• Plan your time. Once you know exactly how many questions you need to answer, work out how you will divide your time within the exam. Section 1 will take you how long? How much time do you need for Section 2?, etc. Not all questions need the same amount of time. Make sure you leave enough time for the harder or longer questions. These study tips to ace your maths exams may seems logical but you’ll be surprised how many students go blank and forget it all in the exam hall.
• Read the instructions carefully. Read the instructions to know if you are required to show your working out, where you are supposed to write your answers, if you can use rough paper and have that submitted with the paper, etc. If you don’t follow the instructions, it is likely that the examiner won’t consider your answers, even if they are correct. That would be easy marks down the drain.
• Do the easy questions first to secure all your easy marks. Keep an eye on the clock and stick to your time plan. But be aware of questions that will score you more marks and ensure you leave yourself enough time to tackle them. This is one the the easier study tips to ace your maths exams to remember!
• Don’t waste time on questions you can’t do. You may find some questions harder than others and there may be a few you simply can’t do. If that’s the case, don’t waste time on them. Use your time wisely by getting marks for the questions you know you can do. By all means, attempt that difficult question, but after trying it and you know you aren’t going to get marks for it, leave it and move on. If you have time at the end of the exam, you can always come back to it.
• Leave time at the end to check your answers. Go through all questions at the end to double-check your workings and your answers. Check for silly errors like getting the question right in the workings but transferring the wrong answer to your answer paper. Do the same for multiple step questions to ensure that correct calculations have been transferred to the next step. It’s so easy to lose valuable points by making these careless mistakes. Don’t leave easy points on the table!
By following these simple tips, you’ll be armed with the best strategies to ace your next maths test.
