Exam Preparation

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Exam Preparation
Directorate of Counselling, Career Academic
Development counselling_at_unisa.ac.za
http//www.unisa.ac.za/counselling
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What is academic anxiety?

• Normal tension is essential for performance
• Academic anxiety type of fear, a nervousness or
  apprehension about any form of academic activity
• Creates excessive tension

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What causes academic anxiety?

• General Academic Anxiety
• Attending group lectures/tutorials where you
  might have to answer questions or give oral
  presentations/participate in group discussions
• Drafting and submitting assignments/reports
• Examination Anxiety
• Exam preparation (studying)
• Writing the exam

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Symptoms of academic anxiety

• What do you experience when youre anxious
  about your academic work?

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Symptoms of academic anxiety

• Physical symptoms
• Headache and/or muscle pains when
  studying/writing your exams
• Excessive sweating (hands and face)
• Fast or irregular breathing
• Fast or irregular heartbeat
• Overeating or lack of appetite
• Disturbed sleeping patterns
• Nervous physical reactions facial muscular
  spasms, itching body, scratching face,
  restlessness
• Nausea
• Stomach problems indigestion, diarrhoea,
  butterflies
• Rapid and nervous speech, stuttering

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Symptoms of academic anxiety

• Intellectual symptoms
• Problems remembering recalling newly learnt
  material
• Problems with logical thinking and problem
  solving
• Difficulty in understanding simple instructions
• Inability to choose between 2 options
• Difficulty in concentrating during the exam
• Delayed thought processes and having to make a
  great effort to think
• Accelerated but inaccurate thought processes

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Symptoms of academic anxiety

• Emotional symptoms
• Feelings of panic, especially when feeling that
  theres not enough time to complete an exam
• Feeling inadequate, with negative thoughts such
  as Im a bad student, Im stupid and worthless
• Thoughts of punishment and humiliation if you do
  badly in the exam
• Anxiety concern about how well youre doing
  compared to your fellow students
• Feelings of pessimism hopelessness about the
  outcome of the exam
• Lack of confidence in your ability to answer a
  question

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Effect of academic anxiety

• Results in poor academic performance
• Overall
• Exams
• You need to rid yourself of this negative
  anxiety, otherwise you will not be able to
  reach your full potential

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How to deal with academic anxiety

• Physical symptoms result of negative attitudes
  thoughts
• Need to combat negative attitudes thoughts
• But how?
• Positive thinking
• Physical relaxation

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Positive Thinking

• Positive thinking technique
• Positive statements
• Stopping negative thoughts
• Rewards
• Accepting responsibility for academic setbacks

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Positive Thinking

• Positive Statements
• Often, negative statements have no foundation
  are unrealistic
• So why should we listen to them?
• Replace negative statements with positive
  statements

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Activity

• Write down any negative thoughts you have about
  the upcoming exams
• Which positive statements can you replace with
  these negative statements

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Positive Thinking

• As soon as you find yourself starting a negative
  line of thought becoming tense, say to
  yourselfStop it! I am playing with fire. I
  must start thinking more positively!
• Practise this strategy as soon as you feel
  yourself becoming tense

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Reward

• Use your successes to boost your confidence in
  academic activities
• Reward yourself for success with a positive
  statement
• E.g., after an examWell done. Now I know that
  I can be successful, and that I am capable of
  doing well!

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Physical Relaxation

• The breathing technique
• The peaceful scene technique
• Progressive relaxation

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The Breathing Technique

• Can be used in any stressful situation
• Lowers your level of tension heartbeat
• I feel calm, refreshed and in control of myself

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The Peaceful Scene Technique
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Progressive Relaxation

• Working through different muscle groups to
  stimulate relaxation

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Remember

• Relaxation techniques positive thinking alone
  cannot prevent academic anxiety
• Need to be supported by proper preparation
  sound study methods!

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What is Time Management?
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What is Time Management?

• Time management is a set of principles,
  practices, skills, tools, and systems that work
  together to help you get more value out of your
  time

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Why is it important?

• It is one of the top reasons why students drop
  out of university
• They dont know how to manage their time
  effectively social life, studies, family life
  etc.
• Improve quality of life
• Reduce frustration, irritability, anger
• Reduce negative stress
• Gain a sense of accomplishment
• Have more time to do things you want to do
• Improve organization in your life
• Peace of Mind

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The FACTS

• Research shows that
• Procrastinators produce inferior work, contrary
  to beliefs that the best work is done under
  pressure.
• (Tice and Baumeister, 1997)
• A study by Tuckman (2002), found that students
  who complete their work late or at the last
  minute are prone to say to themselves things
  like,
• "I'm just waiting for the best time to do it"
• "I know I can pull it out at the last minute"
• Students who indicated that they frequently tell
  themselves such things did relatively poorly.

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The EFT Principle of Time Management

• E Exploration 60
• F Fixation 30
• T Testing 10
• An effective method of managing your time with
  regard to any activity (assignments, exams, work,
  etc.)

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EFT Principle
Explore 60 Fix 30 Test 10
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Exploration Phase
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EFT Principle EXPLORATION PHASE

• Explore gain information knowledge about a
  topic

Explore 60 Fix 30 Test 10

• Work through your curriculum
• Complete your assignments
• Do additional reading in the library
• Discuss your field of study with others in the
  field
• Contact fellow students to sort out problems
• Make summaries for intensive study later
• Identify questions you have to answer
• Identify clarify difficult concepts

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Fixation Phase
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EFT Principle FIXATION PHASE

• Intensive study phase

Explore 60 Fix 30 Test 10

• Consolidating everything you need to study
• Making meaningful summaries
• Memorising the work!

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Testing Phase
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EFT Principle TESTING PHASE

• Test yourself

Explore 60 Fix 30 Test 10

• Asking yourself answering questions which
  cover the study material
• Use the study material to formulate questions
• Use old exam questions to practice
• Have group study sessions

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Example

• If you start exams on the 19th of October and you
  start studying tomorrow (28th of August)
• You have got exactly 50 days to prepare for these
  exams!
• How are you going to manage your time?

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Applying the EFT Principle
28 Aug 28 Sept
13 Oct 18 Oct
Explore 60 Fix 30 Test 10

• Read
• Do assignments
• Group discussions
• Summaries

• Refine summaries
• Study - memorize

• Answer exam questions
• Have group sessions
• Check old papers

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Questions

• What does EFT stand for?
• How much of your time should be spent on each
  phase?
• What does one do in the Exploration Phase?
• What does one do in the Fixation Phase?
• What does one do in the Testing Phase?

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Tips from other Unisa students
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Prepare

• Be mentally alert
• set up a time table and make a commitment to
  study hard
• Be physically prepared
• exercise, eat enough and get sufficient rest
• Learn to handle your stress
• A positive attitude will help you to cope with
  exam anxiety.
• Start your revision at least a month in advance
  of the exam.

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Prepare

• Stick to your time table
• Study every day
• Make time for other commitments.
• Arrange for study leave
• Contact your lecturers if you are unsure about
  aspects of your work
• Contact fellow students for peer support.
• Try to be so well prepared so that you can pack
  away your books the day before you write

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Revise

• Set up your revision timetable
• It is NOT a good idea to cram the night before
  you write.
• Definitely get sufficient sleep.
• Make sure that you have all your tutorial letters
  and check through them for guidance.
• Use the exercises in the study units as a way of
  examining your knowledge and understanding of the
  work.

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Revise

• Revise your assignment answers and pay special
  attention to the comments of the lecturers.
• When revising, build up a framework of key words
  and phrases for all the study units and chapters.
• Consolidate your knowledge of study guides and
  associated textbooks by summarising the key
  concepts from headings and sub-headings on a
  single piece of paper.

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Revise

• Look for questions when you study. Also set and
  answer your own questions by turning study
  objectives and headings into questions.
• Make sure that you know which format(s) of
  questions you need to deal with e.g.
  multiple-choice questions, short questions,
  essay-type questions.
• In problem solving subjects such as Mathematics,
  Physics, Computer Science and Chemistry ensure
  that you can solve at least one of each of the
  types of problems found in every section or study
  unit.

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Write

• Check on which day and at what time you write
  each paper. Be on time.
• Make sure that you have your student card and ID
  document.
• Dont study new material just before you enter
  the hall you will end up confusing yourself.
• Pay attention to the exam rules and instructions.
• Be positive and be yourself.
• Take a deep breath and focus on the task at hand.

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Manage

• In the case of the essay-type exam, decide which
  ones to answer and mark those ones.
• Start with the question you know best. Analyse
  the question by underlining the key words. Plan
  your answer by making notes in the back of your
  exam answer book.
• Make sure that you know where to start and stop
  with the answer. It does not help to write down
  everything you know if that information does not
  answer the question.
• Plan the amount of time to spend on each
  question. Stay on schedule when answering!

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Manage

• You must try to complete all the required
  questions.
• You have about a minute per question in a
  two-hour multiple-choice exam with 100 questions
  one and a half minute if it is a three-hour exam.
• Remember to clearly indicated on the cover of
  your exam answer book which essay-type questions
  you have answered.
• Revise after you have finished writing and check
  for inadvertent mistakes.