How to Prepare for Final Exams
Final exams are a thing I’m sure all of you are familiar with, a final test to see what you have learned in the past couple months. Finals are huge, as they are 20% of your final grade for the semester, so be sure to prepare well for them all. Here are a few tips that can help you pass those tests with flying colors.
Take Advantage of office hours: Teachers set aside time outside of normal school hours for a reason. Since they are the ones who are teaching you the material, they would be able to help you out or answer any questions you have.
Create flashcards: Notes can be daunting since there’s a lot of information put into those large blocks of text that you take in class. It’s easy to make flashcard sets. While this doesn’t work for every subject, it can definitely help you memorize any formulas or bits of information that are important to a subject. Nowadays, you don’t even need to make physical flashcards; there are a myriad of apps that are used to make flashcards, my personal choice being Quizlet. This allows you to share flashcard sets you make with others and has more ways to study and memorize material. Even if you don’t like making flashcards, Quizlet probably has a set for your specific class, some even made by students in our school.
Tutoring: If office hours don’t work for you or you need extra help outside of the office hours, you can always use our schools peer-to-peer tutoring system to get a tutor to assist you outside of school. While many people brush off tutors, they can be a great help. I actually used to be tutored by a high school senior in math during the junior high who helped me out a lot with understanding the topics taught in class and gave better ways to remember formulas. I still use what he taught me to this day. So all in all, tutors can be very helpful when going over new material.
Take breaks and pace yourself: While it’s important to take in as much information as possible, it’s equally important to pace yourself. Cramming doesn’t work as well as going over the material slowly over a long period of time, and studying for hours on end without breaks can lessen your chances on retaining the information. This is why it’s important to go over your class materials as often as possible and in small chunks. If you want my personal method, I go over the notes and textbook of what we have learned in the classes the day that we learn it, and then on Saturdays, I go over the larger topic that the material is in. This helps a lot because it lets me see not only the specific details, but also the bigger picture and the themes shown in the unit.
If you use these tips and add some of your own, you will be set up for success to ace those finals! Go Knights!
