While few people are excited by the prospect of taking exams, exams are a fact of life in college. Exams, moreover, serve an important educational purpose by helping us to learn the material. While they can add to our stress levels, there are strategies to make exams a little less stressful and more educational:

Before the Exam

1. Stay on a reasonably regular schedule of reviewing, eating, sleeping, exercising, socializing, and relaxing. Start preparing at least a week, or preferably two weeks, before an exam.

2. Don't force yourself to study beyond your normal limits of concentration. Short and regular study periods are more productive than lengthy single sessions.

3. Don't try to pull an 'all-nighter' before an exam. Your instructors expect you to be able to think clearly while you are taking exams. Hence, a good night's sleep is crucial. Sleep deprived students make 'silly' errors on exams.

During the Exam

1. Listen carefully to all the directions and read all the directions carefully.

2. Use your time wisely. Don't spend too much time on any one question. Allocate your time on question in proportion to the question's value on the exam. For example, on a 100-point 50-minute exam, you should spend approximately 5 minutes on a 10-point problem. Don't spend 20 minutes working on a 5-point problem.

After the Exam

1. When your instructor returns the exam, make sure you look it over carefully.  Looking over the exam including what you got right and what you got wrong helps you place the information into your long-term memory. You will also begin to learn what the instructor was looking for in the answers, which can help you on the next exam.

2. If you don't understand your mistakes, talk to your instructor. In many courses, the material you don't understand is important in order to progress to the next topic in the course.

For more exam taking strategies, consult the following websites:

The Healthy Lives Tip of the Week: Hydration

• Platanos and Collard Greens written by Hip-Hop Scholar David Lamb will be performed in Baldwin Auditorium on Thursday, September 29 at 7:30 pm.

• First Sunday Dinner: Hispanic Heritage Festival on Sunday, October 2 from 5 to 7 pm in Ryle Hall Main Lounge. (The dinner is limited to the first 100 people, so call 785-4142 to reserve a plate.)

• Lorne Newman, a Gay, Jewish Comedian in Baldwin Hall Auditorium on Wednesday, October 5 at 7 pm.

Quote of the Week

"Empowered and informed learners are also responsible. Through discussion, critical analysis, and introspection, they come to understand their roles in society and accept active participation. Open-minded and empathetic, responsible learners understand how abstract values relate to decisions in their lives. Responsible learners appreciate others, while also assuming accountability for themselves, their complex identities, and their conduct. By weaving moral reasoning into the social fabric of life and work, they help society shape its ethical values, and then live by those values."

" To develop these competencies and commitments of responsible learners, education should foster:

• intellectual honesty and engagement in ongoing learning
• responsibility for society's moral health and for social justice
• active participation as a citizen of a diverse democracy
• respect for and appropriate use of intuition and feeling, as well as thinking
• discernment of consequences, including ethical consequences, of decisions and actions
• deep understanding of one's self and one's multiple identities that connect habits of mind, heart, and body
• respect for the complex identities of others, their histories, and their cultures."

--From Greater Expectations prepared by the Association of American Colleges and Universities