FIVE THINHS WE SHOULD NOT DO BEFORE EXAMS

                                                  

Hi friends I am Yaw Berlin (The CEO of Berlin foundation and Berlin news gh). Since many of you have your final exams coming soon, I thought let me make a write up on exam preparation tips, rather than talking about the top 5 things to do, I thought it would be better to discuss the top 5 things not to do before your exams. Just as it's important to know what to do, it's also important to know what not to do, I’m sure "this not to do list" will be very useful for you and will help you to avoid common mistakes in your exam preparation. So let's get started.

        First thing not to do, don't beg, borrow and steal notes and question papers when the exams is near. Students become anxious when exams approaches leaving them vulnerable to irrelevant materials from friends and questions circulating online. To not fall a victim revise from your textbook or the notes that you have made because your friends notes may not be the best for your revision. It's important to practice sample papers before the exams to get an idea of the exam pattern and the type of questions asked, so rather than hunting for questions you can go and get a sample papers. I would recommend the Oswald books sample papers since these papers are well designed and the answers given are correct. They have 10 sample question papers including the one issued by the CBSC board. These sample papers will help you get a good idea of what your exams paper is going to look like, so you won't be in for a big surprise.

         Secondly, repeatedly telling yourself negative things like I’m tensed, I’m nervous, I don't know anything, I’m going to fail in the exams, and any other thought which makes you feel unprepared should be avoided; if you're doing this please stop right now and break this habit because you're creating the worst case scenario in your brain; you're telling your subconscious mind that you're tensed and nervous and guess what the subconscious mind starts believing it, your body automatically becomes tensed and you will feel nervous. Rather create a positive image in your mind, say positive things like I’m calm, I’m relaxed, I can do it, I’m going to give my best in this exam though it might sound fake and artificial: it works. This is scientifically proven your body will relax and you'll feel better, your confidence will improve and so will the concentration in your study, you don't have to keep saying the positive things the whole day just say it in the morning when you wake up and before going to bed this is when your subconscious mind is most active and you will start seeing the difference and feeling the positive impact.

          Number three “studying more will get me more marks” it does not work this way otherwise everyone will want to study 24 hours, don't work hard work smart before your exams. It's not the number of hours you put in what's important, it is how much your brain is absorbing and retaining for the exam so take short breaks give your brain time to rest have a good night's sleep that will help you remember things better, starting with a tired mind is never a good idea so remember it's not the quantity of your studies but the quality of your studies that matters.

        Number four reading each and every line in your textbook, often I’ve seen that students start reading the entire textbook line by line before the exams don't do that everything in the textbook is not important for your exam so get over that fear that you may miss some important line in the book revision of your textbook before the exams should be like reading a newspaper when you pick up a newspaper you don't read each and every line do you read only the important headlines you scan through the paper and read the parts that interests you, you should do the same thing for your exam revision mark the important things in the book and revise only the important stuff so be efficient in your revision and don't read the entire book line by line before your exams.

            Number five postponing the scary chapters while studying for exams, when a scary or difficult chapter comes up. We postpone it even I have done it, we will study it tomorrow or later and that tomorrow never comes or it comes the day before the exams and on the last day we get more nervous and the chapter seems like a horror story so please avoid this do the difficult chapters early when you have more time before your exams when you're more relaxed completing the things that you're afraid of will help remove your fears and you will feel more confident, so remember don't postpone the scary chapters or memorizing things like the periodic table and important formulas all this should not be left for the last moment i hope this not to do list was useful for you. Do let me know what is your favorite tip by putting it in the comments below and if you have some more things that we should not do before the exams do put it in the comments below.