Exam Day: Survival Tips

Test-Taking

Part 3

Identify key words.

This helps you focus on the main idea of challenging questions.

Rephrase difficult questions.

To understand questions better, rewrite them in your own words. Be careful not to change the meaning.

Organize your thoughts before you write.

Take time to organize your responses to short-answer and essay questions. You’ll reduce the time you need to revise.

Write neatly.

Be sure you don’t lose points on answers the teacher can read.

Use all the time you’re given.

If you finish early, don’t leave. Use the extra time to proofread and review your answers.

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SQ3R

SQ3R=Survey-Question-Read-Recite-Review

Question

As you survey the text, ask a question for each section. Ask what, why, how, when, who, and where questions as they relate to the content. Here’s how you can create questions:

·        Turn the title, headings or subheadings into questions.

·        Rewrite the questions at the end of the chapter or after each subheading in your own words.

Write down your questions. Questions help you pay attention, understands the text better and recall the information more easily later on.

Read

Read one section of the chapter at a time, actively looking for an answer to your question for that section. Pay attention to bold and italicized text that authors use to make important points.

Be sure to review everything in the section, including tables, graphs and illustrations—these features can communicate an idea more powerfully than written text.

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Note-Taking Strategies

Part 3

http://www.collegeboard.com/student/plan/college-success/955.html

After Class  

As soon as class ends, review your notes and fill in any blanks. Underline, highlight and use symbols to sort through the information. If you don’t understand something, get help from your teacher or classmates.

After you’ve reviewed all your notes from class, in the left-hand area of the page write down key words and questions your teacher might ask on a test.

At the bottom of each page, write a summary of the notes. This helps you digest what you’ve learned. It also improves your memory of the material for the long term and for tests down the road.

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The Power of Study Groups

http://www.collegeboard.com/student/plan /high-school/50432.html

Part 3

Guidelines for Getting a Group Together

Here are some guidelines for creating and running a study group: How many? Create a group of four to six people. In a large group, it’s easy for someone to get left out and smaller groups can too easily get off track.

Who? Pick classmates who seem to share your interest in doing well academically. Look for people who stay alert in class, take notes, ask questions and respond to the teacher’s questions. Include someone who understands the material better than you and can explain the concepts and someone who doesn’t understand it as well, to whom you can explain the material.

Where? Hold study group sessions in a place that is free of distractions and that has room to spend out books and notes. How long? Meet for no more than two to three hours at a time.

Having a time limit helps the group focus. If you know you only have an hour, you’re more likely to stay in task.

When? Try to meet regularly, on the same day and time each week. Treating the study session as you would other activities helps you to keep to a schedule and ensures that everyone attends.

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7 Habits of Highly Successful Teens

Habit 6

Habit 6: Synergize

Synergize is achieved when two or more people work together to create something better than either could alone. Through this habit, teens learn it doesn’t have to be “your way” but rather a better way, a higher way. Synergize allows teens to value differences and better appreciate others. Synergize is the reward, the delicious fruit you’ll taste as you get better at living the other habits, especially at thinking Win-Win and seeking first to understand. Learning to synergize is like learning to form V formations with others instead of trying to fly through life solo. You’ll be amazed at how much faster and rather you’ll go. Synergize doesn’t just happen. It’s a process. You have to get there. And the foundation of getting is this: Learn to celebrate differences.

A good band is a great example of synergize. It’s not just the drums, or the guitar, or the sax, or the vocalist, it’s all of them together that make up the “sound.”  Each band member brings his or her strengths to the table to create something better than each could alone. No instrument is more important than another, just different.

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7 Habits of Highly Successful Teens

Habit 5

5. Seek First to Understand, and then to be Understood

Because most people don’t listen very well, one of the great frustrations in life is that many don’t feel understood. This habit will ensure your teen learns the most important communication skill there is: active listening.

Why is this habit the key to communication? It’s because the deepest need of the human heart is to be understood. Everyone wants to be respected and valued foe who they are—a unique, one-of-a-kind, never-to-be-cloned individual. People won’t expose their soft middles unless they feel genuine love and understanding. Once they feel it, however, they will tell you more than you may want to hear. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

Listen with your eyes, heart, and ears. 7 percent of communication is contained in the words we use. The rest comes from body language (53 percent) and how we say words, or the tone and feeling reflected in our voice (40 percent).

Most people are eager to talk and had rather talk than listen. We have one mouth and tow ears. This means we should listen twice as much as we talk. Learn to listen and listen to learn.

Listen, really listen, for understanding.

Seek first to understand then to be understood—LISTEN.

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7 Habits of Highly Successful Teens

Habit 1

(by Sean Covey but modified)

Habit 1: Be Proactive.

Being proactive is the key to unlocking the other habits. Help your teen take control and responsibility for her life. Proactive people understand that they are responsible for their own happiness or unhappiness. They don’t blame others for their own actions or feelings. Proactive people realize that the ball is in their court, that they are the captain of their own ship; that they are in control, control of their decisions, thoughts, choices, decisions, goals, actions, and priorities. Proactive people are self-starters; they don’t wait to be told what to do, they press forward with enthusiasm toward the achievement of their assignments, their duties, their responsibilities, their obligations. Choosing to do what is right is a proactive decision. Obey the rules. Obey the law. Obey the couch. Obey the school policies. Obey your parents. Obey with exactness, and great things will come to you. Be proactive and take the initiative.

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