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Date:         Tue, 15 Dec 1992 01:21:18 -0500
              <PSYCGRAD@UOTTAWA.BITNET>
From:         "STEVEN T. HARDY--GALLAUDET UNIVERSITY" <12SHARDY@GALLUA.BITNET>
Subject: Do it yourself final exams.....stress break :)

>Preparing For The Finals: A Pass-It-Yourself Guide
>==================================================
>
>                     by
>                 Syed Shibli
>            sya@admin.keh.utulsa.edu
>
>
>Contrary to popular belief, most final examinations
>are actually very difficult. Face it, finals are like
>sex: the more you think about it, the more nervous you
>are about performing better than you did last time.
>Sure, given enough time to prepare and study for a subject,
>a student can succeed, but to what purpose? Idiot. To
>get good grades, of course. Therefore, to help you
>achieve just that, I have drawn on my long experience
>as a professional student to come up with this
>handy pass-it-yourself guide on preparing for that
>important final. Cramming for that Gynecology class?
>On the brink of flunking that Proctology course?
>Just read on: there's not a nugget of useful information
>that can be derived from a careful reading of these
>study tips.
>
>(1) Getting Rid Of Your Roommate
>    ============================
>
>With careful planning and execution, a roommate can be
>your ticket to academic success. Roomates can be divided
>into two categories: the loud, boisterous ones who go about
>defacing public property, and the silent, astute types
>who pick their noses when you're not looking. Regardless
>his or her personality, your roommate can always be
>relied upon to give you that extra peace and privacy while
>you study for that important Calculus exam. Getting rid
>of your roommate is easier than you think. If your roommate
>has a foot fetish, tell him about that free 200-page shoe
>catalog they're giving away at JCPenny's. If your roommate
>is a health freak, comment on how tight her jeans look
>on her lately. And if your roommate is a loud, bad-tempered,
>350-pound nose tackle, don't say anything.
>
>
>(2) An Apple A Day Keeps The F's Away
>    =================================
>
>Good nutrition is frequently a governing factor in a student's
>academic achievement. After all, if food doesn't make the man,
>what does? Stupid. The point is, a well-balanced diet can go a
>long way in transforming an otherwise hormonally-imbalanced
>college student into a healthy, vivacious `A' student. Good
>nutrition means clean, freshly prepared meat and vegetables,
>so this will exclude all cafeteria food and food served in
>recycled cardboard boxes and styrofoam containers. For that
>important late night study binge, a handy list of food items
>to have would include a glass of water, one Chiquita banana to
>replenish the whole of last year's lost nutrients, and an
>Indiana baloney sandwich.
>
>(3) Stress Management: Fact or Fiction?
>    ===================================
>
>Over the last few years, some so-called ``stress management''
>techniques have come into vogue on college campuses. While
>it is not the purpose of this guide to expound on the virtues
>and shortcomings of such techniques, suffice it to say that when
>under stress, cuss. If your neighbour's stereo system is stretching
>the limits of your ear drums, by all means, cuss. If you think your
>professor's assigning you one too many chapters to cover, cuss.
>Cussing is an art, so good cussing is a good art: done correctly,
>it can make a person feel a million and a half times better. Done
>poorly, it can fly back in your face and leave you feeling like
>someone pulled your nails out with a pair of pliers.
>
>(4) That Interim Period Before A Final: Things To Do
>    ================================================
>
>So now you are all done with studying. You have read all the
>necessary chapters and done most, if not all, of the exercises.
>What do you do in that interim period right after you finished
>studying and just before the final? Do you sleep? No! Do you
>do your laundry? No! Do you bath your pet hamster? No! Check
>first to make sure that all of these important chores have been
>done before putting your life in the hands of the examiner:
>
>(a) Inspect cheat sheet and see if it has been properly
>    photo-reduced so as to render intelligible all important
>    formulae, theorems, lemmas, and corollaries.
>
>(b) Arrange to meet with professor two hours before exam, and
>    utilize brown-nose skills to extract every last bit of
>    information about the test. This might not always work.
>
>(c) Check to make sure that all pencils are sharpened. Plan on
>    sitting as far away as possible from annoying student (there's
>    one in every class) who likes to borrow stuff from other
>    people.
>
>(d) Also plan on sitting as far away as possible from students who
>    make whistling noises with their noses because of overabundance
>    of nasal hair. This can get very annoying.
>
>(e) Draw mental plans of building where exam is to be held. Note
>    exits and entrances, location of restrooms, water coolers,
>    stairwells, sharp objects, and the like. This might come in handy
>    if you might have to beat a hasty retreat for being caught cheating.
>
>(5) The Moment Of Truth: Tips On Answering Exam Questions
>    =====================================================
>
>Three kinds of exams dominate today's college campuses: the
>take-home exam, the multiple choice exam, and the essay exam.
>None of these is actually preferable over the other; regardless
>the type of the exam, a professor will always find ways to
>rip you to shreds. Nontheless, a brief discussion of each
>is in order:
>
>(a) The Take-Home Exam:
>    -------------------
>
>This kind of exam, long the favorite of graduate students
>with masochistic tendencies, is rapidly gaining popularity
>due to its relative ease of implementation. It's name,
>however, is misleading. Frequently, a take-home exam involves
>more leg-work than a visit to the zoo. A lot of time
>is wasted digging for information in books that offer little
>or no chance for you to find a solution to the question. A
>better alternative would be to drop in the professor's office
>from time to time to ask for the book that you need. Here's
>a sample session that you might want to emulate on your own:
>
>You : I don't want to bother you but I was doing Question Two
>      and realized that I left the reference I needed for that
>      question back in my apartment. Could I borrow yours
>      instead?
>
>Prof: Sure. Did you say Question Two? Then you'll probably need
>      this book. I think I've marked the page numbers.
>      (hands you his reference)
>
>You:  Thanks.
>
>Prof: You're welcome. Come see me if you need anything else.
>
>Now that wasn't too hard was it? One item to beware, though: Never
>try this stunt more than three times. If your professor is smart enough
>he might begin to suspect that you're using him.
>
>(b) The Multiple-Choice Exam:
>    -------------------------
>
>Myth: Multiple-choice exams are easy.
>Fact: They are.
>
>Countless students have wailed about the difficulty of multiple
>choice exams when the truth is that given four choices in a
>question, a student is more likely to pick the right answer than
>Madonna is likely to turn into a nun. The crux of the matter
>is this: be careful when choosing the right solution. A student
>should consider all possible choices and eliminate the bad ones
>before marking his or her choice. For example, given the following
>hypothetical question, which would you choose?
>
>Which of the following is correct?
>
>(a) Keats had diarrhea after he wrote La Belle Dame Sans Merci
>(b) Keats complained that he had diarrhea when he wrote
>    La Belle Dame Sans Merci
>(c) Keats had diarrhea before he wrote La Belle Dame Sans Merci
>(d) Keats wrote Ode To A Grecian Urn
>
>An English major would choose (d), but looking at the question
>again carefully, one can conclude without a doubt that the answer is
>(a) Keats had diarrhea after he wrote La Belle Dame Sans Merci. Using
>proof by induction, (b) is clearly not the answer because Keats
>couldn't have written his masterpiece if he had diarrhea before that.
>(c) is eliminated following the same train of thought. (d) is incorrect
>because we know for a fact that (a) is already correct, so there
>cannot be two correct answers in the same question.
>
>(c) The Essay Question
>    ------------------
>
>Perhaps no other exam is more dreaded than the essay exam. Essay
>exams offer a lot of flexibility, but this flexibility comes
>associated with it a tangled mess of details and sub-details
>that the student needs to memorize in order to come up with a
>choice essay. To give an example, the following two paragraphs
>are excerpts from actual essays written by a poor student and
>a good student. The topic is Fitzgerald's book, "The
>Great Gatsby."
>
>Poor student:
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Gatsby saw the green light and knew right off he had to
>have Daisy no matter what. It was almost as if the light
>meant "Go!" in his tender heart. To get Daisy he arranged
>to have parties at his house, hoping that Daisy might turn up
>some day to meet him. Let me quote something:
>
>    "There was music from my neighbour's house all through
>     the summer nights. The men and girls came and went like
>     moths among the champagne and the whisperings and the stars.
>     In his blue gardens ..."
>
>Fitzgerald also wrote "blue gardens" here but I think he must
>have meant green instead of blue. Could it be a literary faux pas?
>Only Fitzgerald knows.
>
>Good student:
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Perhaps it was the green light that pulled him towards Daisy.
>Perhaps it was the stars, or what part of it was his, that gave him
>such an intense longing for her that made such an irrefutable
>claim on his desires. Or perhaps it was Tom Buchanan, and
>all of his ilk, who drove him to try once again to capture
>the woman of his younger years. Whatever it is, we can only
>conclude that Gatsby suffered an intense nostalgia to relive
>the time he spent with Daisy.
>
>The first paragraph is neanderthal, simplistic, and replete
>with bastardizations. The second paragraph is elegantly written,
>trenchant, and forceful. You be the judge.
>
>(6) What To When The Going Gets Tough: A Final Word
>    ===============================================
>
>In conclusion, let me just say this: don't expect to get it right
>the first time. Although these tips have been time-tested
>and proven to be reliable, their actual implementation might
>prove to be more difficult than it might seem to be. If this is the
>case, do not despair. Learning to study is a lot like learning to use
>a power tool: at times you never know which lever to press and
>which switch to turn. The key is to experiment: do whatever
>you feel comfortable with. In time, preparing for the finals
>will almost be second nature to you. I think it was
>Hemmorhoidus who once said, in a drunken stupor: "Be ye man or wuman,
>be ye learner or teacher, be ye beggar or rich, be ye
>learners all!" I don't know what he meant, either. Good luck.
>
*******************************************************************************
Steven Thomas Hardy                     Was mich nicht umbringt,
12SHARDY@GALLUA.BITNET                     macht mich starker
School Psychology Program
Gallaudet University
800 Florida Ave, NE Box 2635            202/651-5540 v/t
Washington DC 20002                     202/651-5747 fax
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