Best Intentions

This weekend I went home to celebrate Yom Kippur with my family and to have a little time to myself and relax. As I was packing my bag of things I would need while I was home, I thought back to my IC meeting I had just a half hour before and remembered that I needed to start working on my Exam Experiment. While I had already done "Anticipating Test Questions" during the week as part of my CLS homework, I figured that I could do a "Source and Topic Outline" over the weekend and use it for both my Tech Assignment and Exam Experiment. After all, who doesn't love making life a little easier? Unfortunately, as I was already halfway home to Connecticut my mind began to wonder back to CLS (it's a 4 1/2 hour drive, you have a lot of time to think) and all of a sudden Dr. Blumin's voice popped into my head and I heard "Always study by topic, NEVER by source."And that's when it hit me, I had left my Dynamics of Addiction textbook at school. I originally had thought that all I would need was my class notebook and syllabus since it lists the chapters I would need to study right there, but clearly I forgot about Wednesday's class and my mindwas already on Noodle Kugel (only after I fast, of course). So, despite my best intentions this week's blog will focus on the "Anticipating Test Questions" I made during the week.

The first class I applied the test-prep strategy to was my Nutrition course. During each class Professor Short reveals a few test questions that will be on the next exam. While this is extremely beneficial, the handful of questions she has given us by the time the exam comes around isn't enough to study off of. Therefore, by anticipating test questions I am able to provide myself with 60 potential test questions as opposed to 15.

To Create these test questions I thought back to our first exam and noted that since all of the questions were multiple choice, and the pattern of the course information is by definition, that the majority of the questions were, and will be, defining terms and fact based. As a result, a lot of the questions I wrote are based on one or two word answers, since that is how it will look on the actual exam.

I've learned that by studying by asking myself questions in the format that I will be tested on, rather than simply memorizing information off of a flashcard, I am learning the material but in a way that is much more effective since I have basically created my own mock-exam.

The second course I applied the test-prep strategy to was my HTW318- Dynamics of Addiction class. Similar to my Nutrition class, in HTW318 the Professor asks the students a few questions each class, to which we have to answer by using our "clickers". Although Dr. Bergen-Cico isn't blatantly saying "these are the questions that will be on your next exam" I've learned through CLS that the chances that those questions, or ones very similar to them, will be on the exam are very high.

As well, when the Professor asks these questions I am able to see the way in which she is asking them, therefore giving me insight on how the questions will most likely be phrased on the exam. I also created five questions on my "Anticipating Test Questions" sheet based off of the syllabus. When I looked at the calendar I was able to see that a lot of focus was placed on "Uppers" and especially "Downers". From this I was able to look back at my notes from class, find information on these subjects, and then write potential test questions based on the way the Professor had phrased the questions in class.

When I can remember to do so, I also use the "20 Minute Test Prep" that I had first tried out on my first blog. While this technique and "Anticipating Test Questions" are similar because they both involve creating potential test questions, I found that this new test-prep strategy opened my eyes to a new way of creating questions and studying. Now, instead of just relying on my class notes to anticipate questions, I can refer back to my syllabus or listen for questions the professor is asking in class.

Even though I wasn't able to get a head start on my Exam Experiment like I had planned, this new strategy will help me in the future and even with the exam I will be using for the Exam Experiment. Now I have 10 potential questions to study off of! Wohooo!!