By Stratos Stratigakis
Mathematician – Researcher
[email protected],
www.estadiodromia.gr
National Exams start in a few days. The last few days are often difficult, as stress and anxiety about test results increases as the time for exams gets shorter. Stress is not easy to eliminate, but it can be controlled. Let’s look at some simple instructions.
Your objective is in the 4 days of exams from 9:00 to 12:00 in the morning to have the maximum possible mental clarity to achieve the maximum performance in each three-hour test, which will determine your success in school. of your choice. To be in excellent condition you should pay attention to the following:
Sleep
It doesn’t help to stay up all night reading the night before the test, trying to get all the material in your head. Your stressed and exhausted mind will not be able to successfully answer the exam the next day. It’s like taking a 100m runner and, after making him run 2 hurdles, tell him as soon as he finishes them: now run one more hurdle so I can time you. Do you think our runner will make a good time in the third in a row? So how do you think you’ll perform after a whole night? you won’t have You’ll do some of the classic nonsense, arithmetic for example, and you’ll lose a lot more than you think you’ll gain by staying up all night reading. Sleep enough, at least 7-8 hours, to be rested. I know, you’re going to tell me that you can’t sleep, because you feel like… undead. Things are not that tragic. And if you can’t sleep, lie on your bed and rest. Read a book that isn’t related to the exams to… change the subject. By God, no television or mobile. The screen does not rest. You may think you’re forgetting, but it’s driving you crazy (and not just during exam season).
Diet
This is not the time for experiments. Eat what you usually eat the rest of the time, making sure that dinner is light so that you can sleep comfortably. Don’t drink a lot of coffee, trying to push yourself to last longer. When you push yourself beyond its physical limits, at some point it will break and we don’t know when that time will be. He could be in the middle of exams. Needless to say, he’s not taking any kind of pill that promises mental clarity, resistance to extreme fatigue, and the like. It is not necessary to “dope” to pass the University. It is dangerous for your health.
Reading
Reading on test days should be a planned repetition, not trying to learn new things now at the last minute. The stressful reading of the last days, trying to “plug holes”, brings panic and frustration. Too often, stressed candidates panic because, as they say, they close the book and think they don’t know anything. Of course, this is not the case. It’s just that their anxiety has taken over their minds and blocked them, they don’t have the patience to think that it forces them to recall the knowledge instantly. A classic statement from a candidate these days is: “If I had 3 more days, I’d catch up.” Unfortunately you don’t have them and you can’t read like crazy to make up for lost time.
Your Health
Take care of your health during exams more than the rest of the time. The pandemic is here. Watch your contacts with other people. If you get sick and miss an exam in a class, you’ll waste your entire summer studying for the September Re-Exams. Repeat exams have much more unfavorable terms and try to avoid them at all costs. Some candidates who do not write well in a course consider pretending to be sick and sitting for the Re-Exams in September. Avoid it. In the Repetition Tests, the subjects are of greater difficulty and to be admitted the candidate must, in addition to the EBE, take the bases of the department and, in addition, the places granted are 1 for each department (0.5% of the number of admitted ).
Pay attention to the simple ones too. One of my students one year, to break with reading, went for a “basketball.” He had the misfortune to come back with a broken right arm and “running” to give oral.
your mental health
Frictions in the family environment and friendship are the most inappropriate time to manifest. It is not the right time to argue with your parents, break up with your partner, argue with your friends. You have time for all this after the exams. Avoid tensions now. You need peace, the trust and love of your own people.
Remember that the National Exams are not the most critical moment of your life. Other moments and other much more decisive decisions will follow.
Think that even if you don’t get it now, you will have other opportunities, either through the National Exams or beyond them.
Remember that you do not have to prove anything to anyone and it is not your purpose to please others. You are just trying to achieve your goals.
Your good psychological state is now your greatest weapon in the search for success. Remember how many statements you’ve heard from losing coaches and athletes blaming “bad psychology.”
Stress
The single word has the capacity every time it is pronounced to… sow panic. It is true that exams are an important moment in your life. It is also true that when we are judged by another person we always feel anxious. It’s natural. The opposite is a problem. But there is a great distance between anxiety and worry and paralyzing anxiety. However, most mistakes are made after the exams when filling out the computer form. So try to write the best you can, without forgetting that the most important thing is the correct statement of powers. Remember that success in life is not judged so much by skills as by choices.
the day of the exam
Go to school on time equipped with the necessary paraphernalia 2 pens, pencil, eraser (blank prohibited) candidate identification, water or juice. You should definitely have a wristwatch, something you’re not used to in your everyday life, but since cell phones aren’t allowed, you should have some way to check the time. Be careful with your cell phone. You are not allowed to have it with you during the exam, even if it is turned off. Just having it with you (even disabled) is enough to reset you.
Have a good breakfast and do not open discussions with your colleagues about possible topics. Think of something more positive such as the long summer that awaits you, without any commitment. This summer will last until October 1 because that is when, approximately, the courses at the University begin. He dreams of having a better time. You will never have such a long vacation again. Next year, when you are students, you will have exam period in September because you will have to give lessons.
the themes have arrived
Please read them carefully. Start with what you know best. As you know they have different degrees of difficulty. The 4th subject (in courses that have 4 subjects) will logically be the most difficult. Don’t start there. Now you are hunters of… units. Try to accumulate as many points as possible from the 100 available in the subjects. You’re not trying to look like a guy by solving the fourth issue. The 4th subject gives you 25 points, the same as the first, which is theoretically the easiest. There is no point in solving the fourth and losing the first.
If you find that you don’t know a subject well, don’t be discouraged. It can be very difficult and the other candidates don’t know it either. It may even be incorrect and invalidated. This has also happened. Try to write the best you can. At the time you write you cannot know if your rating will be enough to achieve your goal. So don’t be discouraged if you find that your writing is worse than you expected. Many times some candidates with very high goals when they realize that they cannot approach perfection they collapse and end up writing below the base. Keep calm until the end and only when the bases are announced will you see what you have achieved.
Unfortunately, your goal is to write better than your fellow candidates, so that by collecting more points than them, you will succeed in the school of your interest. The All-Hellenic Exams are a seat-filling competition and thus a competitive process by definition.
Don’t bother with your friends, who are desperately asking for “your lights” to write well. Unfortunately these exams are, as we said, competitive. You can lose focus trying to help or worse, get them to write better than you.
Remember that you have around 45 minutes for each topic in the courses that have 4 topics. If you get “stuck” somewhere and time passes, leave it for now. You’ll come back at the end after you’ve written everything else and run out of time. How many times have I heard candidates say: “I lost 2 hours on the only topic that I could not solve and finally I did not even have time to write what I knew.” Generally, these papers are classified below the base.
Be detailed and explanatory in the way you write. Do not create the slightest doubt in the proofreader about your knowledge and force him to cut the credits.
We are reaching the end. You have written as many topics as you knew, you are tired of intense effort, you are thinking of giving your writing. If there’s any time left, watch it again. Maybe with a second “styling”, you can fix some minor bugs, which cost units. You can improve some wording, complete some deficiency. Run out of time. It’s not magic to finish fast. It’s magical to write to the best of your ability.
after the exam
I don’t see the answers to the quiz. The comparison between what you see in front of you and what you remember writing is uneven. You may be filled with doubts about what you have written and your morale may drop. We are interested in the next lesson, not the previous one. Consider what all athletes monotonously repeat: “We watch each game individually.” This monotonous statement shows what you should do. Don’t look back, just forward. Think about the next lesson. We never give up. It will be reported at the end of the exams.
All of the tips above are meant to allow you to put your real knowledge on paper. It is not possible for a student who has read for 12 to write 18. But it is possible to write 9 or 10 and even 12. If you write 12 having read for 12 you have achieved the maximum possible and you have done as well as possible. So, in order to prove your real value in the exam, follow the tips above.
Big success.