How to Pass an Examination

This article is based on literature reviews and personal experiences. The author is a lecturer and a Registered Nurse who has appeared for many examinations in the UK, Canada, USA and Australia.

The most important thing about preparing for examinations is how desperately you want to do them and pass them. If you are not motivated to succeed no amount of learning and preparing will help. So, if you not motivated do not waste your time or other people’s time. Do not enroll, call it quit now because you have not wasted anything.

Failing examinations or withdrawing from them at the last minute will have consequences for the rest of your life. Further, there may be adverse academic performance consequences, a fail may be recorded in your academic record. This will hound you for the rest of your life. So, make up your mind before you enroll, be clear that you really want to do this.

Motivated people always succeed. They find ways to succeed even in very adverse circumstances. Unmotivated people look for excuses to fail. There are plenty to these too. So, the first step to success is to deciding to succeed. Once you have decided to succeed you will be able to make an action plan to succeed and you will succeed.

Studying for examinations is often seen as “difficult” because of the notion that examinations are difficult. Further, students feel that because the questions are unknown therefore the examiners have a large area to choose questions from. The truth is that even in large topics only certain topics are suitable for examination. Knowing the topic will help you narrow down the likely questions.

Predicting questions is one way of effectively preparing for the examination. It is true that you cannot predict with 100% accuracy but you will do really well even if you can predict with 50% accuracy. If you predicted 50% of the questions you have stacked up your chances of winning the examinations game.

Remember, what you are being taught is not always new subject matter all the time. You already know some of the background materials. So if a question which was not predicted shows up you should attempt it anyway and do your best. Give it your best shot. There is a good possibility that you will pick up about 50% or more marks.

Some students feel that the “teachers” expect the students to know “everything”. Teachers are human beings and they do not expect students to know everything because even teachers do not know everything. Honestly, now that I am a teacher, I realize more than ever before that I know very little. The reason for this is that I get asked lots of questions and when I research the answer I find that each answer raises more questions to be answered. As far as I am concerned it is only a myth that the teacher knows all the answers. So take heart, your efforts will be rewarded if you can demonstrate that you have put in the “effort”.