Taking Test Tips

• Read the question carefully
• If the most logical answer is readily apparent, choose it
• If not, re-read the question and start eliminating obviously wrong answers
• Then narrow the remainder down to what makes the most sense

You will have 1 minute, and 12 seconds for each question, use that time wisely.

Taking Tests

General Suggestions For Taking Tests

1. Plan your arrival so that you have plenty of time. Be sure to check your test taking material prior to leaving for the exam.

2. Read all directions. Underline key words in the directions that give indication as to how your answers are to be recorded.

3. Budget your time. Survey the test to determine the type and number of questions to be answered. Determine where you will start on the test. Check yourself at 15 or 20 minute intervals to determine if you are progressing at an acceptable rate.

4. Be aware that you may have problems remembering from time to time. If you find yourself blocking, move on to the next question.

5. Be aware of any negative statements you are telling yourself about the test. Such statements as "I'm failing, I didn't study for this, and the test is too hard for me" are sure ways of increasing anxiety.

6. Do not be concerned with what the other participants are doing. (Another sure way of increasing anxiety is to tell yourself you are the only one having trouble.)

7. As a general rule answer the easy questions first.

THE MULTIPLE CHOICE EXAM

Multiple choice exams are not a matter of recognizing true statements. You will be asked to do more than just recognize textbook material. Multiple choice questions require fine distinctions between correct and nearly-correct statements. These distinctions are not only of Recognition, but are distinctions that involve the thinking for Synthesis, Analysis, and Application. These higher-order thinking questions sometimes make the content of the questions unrecognizable. Questions are missed often because they are not read carefully. Therefore, it is an advantage to learn about the thinking required to answer multiple choice questions and to learn how to read the questions carefully.

Multiple Choice or Multiple Guess!?

In terms of their structure, multiple choice exams have a few unsavoury characteristics: first, these tests typically have many questions to answer and the topics you studied are typically scrambled and shuffled; second, the ideas you learned about in class or in the text may be reworded in different ways: colloquially, technically, by example, or by analogy; third, very often the multiple choice test is not simple recognition of basic ideas but recognition of the answer to a reasoned problem. Your reasoning must make use of the learning from the text and may go beyond the material covered in the core curriculum or require you to apply knowledge from the text. You may have to go beyond straight memorization to make an analogy or to solve a novel problem. You cannot just be familiar with the material; you must be able to write it down, talk about it, and analyze it.

Answering Different Exam Questions

Multiple Choice

1. Pay attention to qualifying words (e.g., always, never)

2. Do not look for patterns.

3. Read through the questions with the answer.

4. Estimate the alternatives.

5. Look for clues (e.g., grammar, tenses)

6. Guess if you don’t know the answer.

7. Work backwards — read the answers, then the question.

8. Choose the best alternative (more than one answer may be correct).

Read the directions carefully. The directions usually indicate that some alternatives may be partly correct or correct statements in themselves, but not when joined to the stem (The stem is the question and the alternatives are the choices). The directions may say: "choose the most correct answer" or "mark the one best answer."
(Some have 200 questions to answer in 3 hours). This means you may have less than a minute, on average, to spend on each question. Some questions, of course, will take you only a few seconds, while others will require more time for thought. Plan to progress through the exam in three ways:

– Read every question carefully but quickly, answering only those of which you are 100% certain. Put a "?" on those that need more thought.

– Then, examine/study the questions not yet answered. Answer those you are reasonably sure of without pondering too long on each. Erase the "?"

– Finally, study read the remaining unanswered questions. If you cannot come to a decision by reasoning or if you run out of time, guess. Erase the "?".

Use the process of elimination procedure. Eliminate the obviously incorrect alternatives.
Read all of the stem and every alternative.

– Read the stem with each alternative to take advantage of the correct sound or flow that the correct answer often produces. Also, you can eliminate any alternatives that do not agree grammatically with the stem.

– Some find it effective to read the stem and anticipate the correct alternative before actually looking at the alternatives. If you generally do better on essay exams, this strategy may help you a great deal. Some research shows that one is three college students scores better with this strategy alone!

Consider "all of the above" and "none of the above." Examine the "above" alternatives to see if all of them or none of them apply totally. If even one does not apply totally, do not consider "all of the above" or "none of the above" as the correct answer. Make sure that a statement applies to the question since it can be true, but not be relevant to the question at hand!
Note negatives. If a negative such as "none", "not", "never", or "neither" occurs in the stem, know that the correct alternative must be a fact or absolute and that the other alternatives could be true statements, but not the correct answer.
Note superlatives. Words such as "every", "all", "none", "always", and "only" are superlatives that indicate the correct answer must be an undisputed fact. In the social sciences, absolutes are rare.
Note qualifying words. "Usually", "often", "generally", "may", and "seldom" are qualifiers that could indicate a true statement.
Study Qualifications. Break the stem down into grammatical parts. Pull out the bare subject and verb (if it is in the stem), and then examine all the modifiers (qualifiers) to the subject and verb. This process ensures that you will examine every part of the stem.
Changing Answers. Research has shown that changing answers on a multiple choice or true-false exam is neither good nor bad: if you have a good reason for changing your answer, change it. The origin of the myth that people always change from "right" to "wrong" is that those (i.e. the wrong ones) are the only ones you will see when you review your exam – you won't notice the ones you changed from "wrong" to "right."

Do's for Answering Multiple-Choice Questions

For "conceptual" multiple-choice questions:

If the question is "conceptual", i.e., if the answer it seeks is a statement, begin by covering the alternatives with a ruler or piece of paper. Then, carefully read and understand the stem of the question before looking at the alternatives. Circle or underline key words in the stem, paying special attention to qualifying words such as "always," "major," "increase," etc.
Use your knowledge of headings to think about where in your text, notes, etc. that question is drawn from. Recall a few salient points about the information. Jot down any relevant facts you need to process the alternatives. This does not have to take much time, but this recall is an essential step!
Predict an answer, if possible.
Uncover all of the alternatives and check the format of the question. Is only one of the alternatives correct, or can several or all of the alternatives be correct?
Read each alternative carefully for understanding, not just for recognition - you may recognize it from the text, but does it answer the question being asked? Again, pay careful attention to qualifying words. Keeping the stem of the question in mind, respond to each alternative with a yes, no, or maybe/not sure.
If you know the answer, carefully mark the correct answer on your answer sheet.
If you do not know the answer, re-check the stem of the question. Narrow your choices, by eliminating any alternative that you know is incorrect. If two options still look equally appealing, compare each to the stem of the question, making sure that the one you eventually choose answers what is asked. If you are still not sure, make an educated guess.
If you were unable to make a choice and need to spend more time with the question, or you answered the question but are not at all sure that you made the correct choice, put a big question mark beside that question, and move on to the next. Avoid getting bogged down on one question. It is much better to move on and finish all of those questions that you can answer and then to come back later to process the problematic questions.
When looking over the questions again, change an answer only if you can logically justify the change.

For problem-solving questions:

If the question is a problem that requires calculations, think about what procedure you need to follow to produce a solution. At this point, with some types of questions, it might be possible to make a rough estimate of the scale of possible answer you are seeking.
Solve the problem. Be tidy with your calculations; many errors are made through untidy writing.
Compare your answer to the options given. If you are satisfied, fill in the answer on the answer sheet.
If the answer that you have calculated, is not one of the given options, check your procedure again, making any necessary changes, and recalculate your answer.
If you still do not arrive at one of the given options, put a big question mark by that question, and go on to the next. When you get to the end of the exam, go back to any questions that you did not answer the first time through.

Don'ts for Answering Multiple-Choice Questions

Don't select an alternative just because you remember reading it in the study material; it may be a "true" statement in its own right, but you have to make sure that it is the "correct" answer to the question.
Don't pick an answer just because it seems to make sense. You are answering from your knowledge of the content, not just from your general knowledge and logic.
Don't dismiss an alternative because it seems too obvious and simple an answer. If you are well prepared for the exam, some of the questions will appear straightforward.
Don't be wowed by fancy terms in the question, i.e., don't say to yourself, "That sounds impressive, so it must be the right answer!"
Don't pick "c" every time you are unsure of the answer. You could end up picking "c" far too many times.
Don't pick your answer based on a pattern of responses, i.e., don't say to yourself, "This can't be another "b" answer as we have just had three in a row."

In-test Strategies for Multiple Choice

· PREVIEW THE EXAM. As you browse through, take note of those questions which seem easier (i.e., those questions you think you can answer) and perhaps plan to skip those which seem harder, setting time limits, and getting settled; keep to time divisions for questions as they are usually equally weighted.

· START WITH QUESTIONS YOU CAN ANSWER READILY. Don't waste time laboring over troublesome questions at the start. Be sure to get credit for items you know well.

· RECYCLE THROUGH THE TEST. Now try the questions you could not do on the first attempt. Sometimes the answer will occur to you simply because you are more relaxed after having answered other questions. Sometimes, too, your answer to one question provides a clue to the answer of another.

· SET GOALS FOR TIME AND PACE YOURSELF ACCORDINGLY. Allocate your time according to the relative worth of questions. Try to save a few minutes at the end for review and revision. Remember: your first answer may not always be your best answer. Change answers, but only if you have a good reason for doing so. For instance, changing an answer from, say, selection "b" simply because your response to the previous four questions was also "b" and you cannot believe that five questions in a row would have the same item as the correct response, is likely not a good reason; be flexible in your approach.

· READ THE QUESTIONS CAREFULLY: twice if necessary. Avoid jumping to conclusions about what you think the question asks.

· CIRCLE OR UNDERLINE KEY WORDS IN QUESTIONS. Multiple choice tests examine your ability to read carefully and thoughtfully as much as they test your ability to recall and reason. Watch for words like "all," "always," "never," "none," "few," "many," some," "sometimes."

· TRY TO RECALL A CONCEPT FROM MEMORY or think out the answer before looking at the options. Doing this successfully may help you "wade through" the alternatives and find a reasonable answer or choice.

· CONSIDER THE COVER-UP STRATEGY, whereby you read the question and try to answer it by recall before looking at the alternative answers;

· CONSIDER THE TRUE/FALSE LABEL STRATEGY whereby you label the alternative answers as true or false statements and then look for a pattern in the answers;

· SOMETIMES ALTERNATIVES DIFFER BY ONLY ONE OR TWO WORDS or in the order of one or two terms. These can seem very confusing. It helps sometimes to read the stem of the question (that's the question part) with an alternative while covering up the others. By methodically thinking through the alternatives this way, you may be able to make more sense of the options by labeling them true or false and eliminating those that don't correctly complete the question.

· USE THE HINT OF HIGHLY SIMILAR PAIRS -- this says that often the answer is imbedded in one of two very similar pairs and the "most correct" answer is often the one that correctly uses text terminology; consider the all or none of the above cues -- if two of the preceding alternatives are opposites then one of them and the all or none of the above choice is also wrong;

· BE PREPARED TO CHANGE YOUR ANSWER if you can determine a clear reason why your first response is incorrect – don’t changes on the basis of a nervous feelings;

· YOU MIGHT WANT TO TRY TO ANSWER ALL THE QUESTIONS FROM THE SAME SECTION OF THE COURSE to offset the mixing of questions inherent in the design of the test -- this demands care be taken that answer sheets are correctly completed and that all questions have been answered;

· BE ALERT TO TERMINOLOGY WHICH LINKS the alternatives or questions to key areas -- this may help you narrow the field of possible choices and think through to the best answer.

· BE WARY OF DESCRIPTIVE WORDS which are overly exclusive or overly inclusive. These absolute terms tend to portray things as right or wrong where this is often not the case. Words like always, never, completely, and only are absolutes. Relative words like often, usually, seem and may are often more accurate.

· TRANSLATE DOUBLE NEGATIVE STATEMENTS into positive ones. Examples like "Not lacking" or "not none" become "having" and "some" and this can reduce confusion. Note that these are often partly in the stem and partly in the choices of a particular question.

· IF YOU MUST GUESS, look for some of these possibilities: the style of an answer option is very different from all of the others - this may disqualify it; the grammar of the question stem is not in agreement with the grammar of an alternative; some alternative is not in the area or topic of the question, but comes from some other part of the text- this may disqualify it.

· OVERALL, remember that you are looking for the best answer, not only a correct one, and not one which must be true all of the time, in all cases, and without exception.

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