oh no not again no matter how hard you try to stay on track sometimes the test just sneaks up on you I've had this happen many times we have so many classes and extracurriculars that we can't help but cram sometimes since we cannot completely avoid cramming might as well know the best way to cram hey team it's Amy I was valoran and I got fives on all 11 of my AP exams I also played Varsity Sports and got into a top 10 University while sleeping an average of 8 hours a night I'm hoping that my
experience and learnings from cramming will make it easier for you take a deep breath don't stress and have faith that by the end of this video you will know the most effective and efficient ways to prepare for your exam no matter how close it might be time to get focused let's go when you're cramming the key is efficiency someone called me the queen of efficiency the other day so thank you I love that title efficiency is maximizing your output while minimizing your input before we get into the study actions the following mindset is critical to
your efficiency it's important to stay stoic in situations of high stress as a famous stoic said we cannot control the external events around us but we can control our reactions to them so know you are in control and the most important thing for you to control right now and in the hours leading up to your exam is focus focus is essential to increasing your intensity of studying this allows you to absorb more information within 2 hours than someone who who is not focused and studying for 5 hours you know your own situation so do what
you got to do okay just do it Nike throw away your phone no music unless it's classical time to lock in let's get ready to rumble let's get ready to rumble now that you have the right mindset it's time for the actions the goal is to maximize the number of points you get and these steps will do just that number one get the big picture it's really natural for students to panic and try to study everything at once so take a step back use your syllabus if you have one and do a shallow skim of
all your Concepts at a high level this is where I'll do a quick flip through of my notes to remind myself of where things are this will come in very handy you'll see you later always think about things you can take advantage of to make things easier I really like to take advantage of the chapter summaries and again just skim them at the start of my study basically with this step of getting the big picture you want to understand the story as humans we connect to stories and therefore will remember them better you might be
wondering but where's the story behind biology or math the idea is to draw connections between different concepts and see how things all come together the point of a test is not just so you know these little bits of disperate information when you grasp the story similarities between things and connections then it's easier to BS things on the test you can scrape points even if you didn't review every little detail for example in in chemistry I remember how I wouldn't know every little thing about the gold foil experiments but I understood the story of how the
model of the atom came to be thus I knew the point of the Thompson model In Rutherford's gold foil experiments especially in those explanation questions it was much easier for me to overd deliver on my answers and scrape up extra points for classes like science and math the story is really understanding the reason behind each operation or step you're doing you have to know why you're even doing it when you do a step you have to tell yourself I'm doing this because this this way you can solve problems on the test you never even seen
before overall if you want the easiest way to get the big picture as you're studying something always be asking so what what is the point of this and make sure to answer it of course to cram most efficiently and effectively we must study what we'll pay off the most to maximize our points therefore step two is prioritize use any and all of these resources to determine how much weight each of the concepts will have for example one concept might be emphasized a lot more and there will be five questions on it while another concept only
has one multiple choice question on it write your list of Concepts in priority order starting from the highest weight down to the lowest weight this list will be important for you to do your subsequent steps of studying you will be working down your priority list of Concepts starting with the first one you will study that concept using actions 3 and four after that you'll go to the second concept on your list and go through actions 3 and four then you'll repeat as you go down your concept priority list so what is action number three it
is target practice problems going deep into all of your class nodes and your textbook and writing summaries isn't very effective but practice problems these are basically like a cheat sheet of all the things you need to know minus the little details in the textbook and notes this also helps you not waste time studying every little thing so just like I mentioned earlier with action two start with the most important concept on your priority list review or even redo questions covering that topic these practice problems can be from your homework quizzes the back of the book
even question Banks online if you're really short on time and can explicitly do active recall here are two things you can do to speed up your study one use parallel recall or number two Direct ly review the answer keys remember how you skip your notes earlier from action one instead of studying everything that's because now you have an overall idea of where things are located in your notes or chapter summaries while I'm targeting practice problems and I want more details or I want further explanations now I can flip back into my notes and review them
as needed the questions lead my studying while I use the notes as a supplement not the other way around Action Four if you want to improve move be content to be thought foolish and stupid weaknesses are huge opportunities because working on them can make a lot more impact than being a perfectionist on things that you're already strong on thus Action Four is Target weaknesses use any and all of your past work and practice problems to see what you missed go through each of these missed points errors mistakes one by one if you're having way too
much difficulty and get stuck on a problem then move on to the next weakness to be efficient you don't want any bottlenecks disrupting your flow of studying and you also don't want that to be decreasing your confidence the goal is to address as many weaknesses as you can so resolve the lwh hanging fruit first corporate lingo not only does targeting your weaknesses boost your score but psychologically it has a positive impact too you will feel better and more confident because otherwise it's one of the worst feelings to know that there are problems you've missed before
and you still haven't resolved them those steps SL actions 3 and four make sure to be repeating those for each of those Concepts in your priority list number five please please please listen to me okay do not sacrifice your sleep I don't care how much you feel like you need to study okay the more you sacrifice your sleep the more you're canceling out your ability to perform well anyway you are working down your priority list of Concepts but depending on how much time you have before your test you may not get through all the concepts
and that is okay that's why you cover the high priority ones first when it's getting late you have to make a decision based on your body and its needs the way to think about it is you want to strike a balance between staying up a little more than you usually do to make up for your lost time and giving your brain enough rest to stay sharp especially if your test is memory based please get some z's I've never said that word before don't take a hit on your health okay your health heal is a number
one thing and I feel like people don't prioritize that enough remember that your health is more important than anything else in this world including your grades okay no matter what your parents say just kidding your parents also want you to be healthy prioritizing my health is also why I could holistically accomplish so many things have a social life and play sports if I don't sleep enough I could get a migraine and that would ruin my chances of taking the test well anyway good job take another deep breath and remember it's just one test also remind
yourself that preparation leads to confidence even so test taking is really hard I understand the time pressure the stress so even if you study well sometimes it's really hard to get a good score if you're not a good test taker that's why I made this video where I cover how to deal with stress how to guess on the test and strategies to maximize points while you're taking the test itself keep it in mind if you need it if you want to improve your test taking but right now go to your studying close YouTube and stay
stay focused okay lock in I'll see you a team if you have any questions ask in the comments and your lovely a team members will support you and help answer good luck but hopefully you don't need it bye
