A question I often ask my students as a cumulative midterm or final exam approaches is "How will you prepare?" Many students tell me that they plan to rework all of their old quizzes, tests, and homework problems. Although I admire their willingness to take on such a Herculean task, I encourage them to use their time wisely.
It does not make sense to spend a lot of time going over problems that you know how to do. Instead you should be focusing on problems that have given you a hard time. The trick is to be able to quickly diagnose your issues, and then find problems to work on that will help you master those topics.
One place to start is with a practice exam from your instructor. If your instructor does not provide a practice test, or you want to start your preparation sooner, try beginning with the chapter tests in your textbook. These problems typically have all of the answers in the back of the book so you will know which ones you have correct. (By the way, avoid looking to the answers until you have solved all of the problems. It is the only way to truly figure out whether you understand the material or not.)
For problems that are incorrect, or problems you don't feel completely confident with, back up a step and look to the chapter reviews in your textbook. Here you will typically find 3-4 problems for each problem that was on the chapter test. Again, the answers to the review problems are typically in the back of the book so you can check your answers. If you need help with any of these problems, make the best use of your resources - classmates, instructor, textbook, tutorial center, online videos, ...
If, after the review, you are still struggling with certain types of problems, it is time to go back to the section of the textbook containing those problems. Look over the worked out examples in the section, as well as the examples in your notes. Then you will find more problems to try in the exercise section. Now you should probably restrict yourself to odd numbered exercises so you can check your answers.
Hopefully, at this point you should be well prepared for your exam.
If you have any questions or comments, I'd love to hear from you. You can either use the comments section on this blog, or you can reach me through the contact page on my website - georgewoodbury.com .
- George
I am a math instructor at College of Sequoias in Visalia, CA and an author of a series of developmental math textbooks. If you have any ideas for future articles, would like to join a blogging group, or contribute a guest blog, drop me a line.
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