question about studying

[technodisney]

So my teacher has explained that in the Methods papers the questions are normally in a similar order, like theres always 2 diff questions at the start, then a probability question and then drawing a graph of some sort, would I be best going through the past VCE exams in order one by one, or doing all the diff questions in all the papers, then doing all the prob in all the papers etc...

What study method would work best for you?

[jazcstuart]

So my teacher has explained that in the Methods papers the questions are normally in a similar order, like theres always 2 diff questions at the start, then a probability question and then drawing a graph of some sort, would I be best going through the past VCE exams in order one by one, or doing all the diff questions in all the papers, then doing all the prob in all the papers etc...

What study method would work best for you?

This is for HSC but it is the same for us in that the exams are structured very similarly.

Persobally I find the main benefit of doing past papers is that the questions are all mixed up, which breaks the repetition of doing the same sorts of questions over and over again. I find if I do similar types of questions all at once, I get into a pattern and when I come back to it a week later I forget how to do it properly.

So I would reccommend doing each exam paper in order. It will help you get used to changing between the different methods (I swear that pun was unintentional  ) required for ech question. This will also help you get used to the layout of the paper, so it will feel more familiar when you get into the actual exam.

Hope this helps 

[Lear]

I agree with Jazcstuart

You will benefit the best from replicating the real thing.

[NoNutNovember]

Straight up just doing practice exams. It's like a cheat almost; knowing the content is a third of the course, perfecting your exam technique is another third, and putting up with your teacher's dumb biases and mistakes with SACs is the other third (lol). It's basically rote learning; a worthless and annoying skill in the real world, but for whatever reason the education system here is rigged for rote learners to do well.

You want the idea of doing the exams to be very, very familiar. Doing a ton of practice exams also slowly filters out what you don't need to know, and hones your memory into what you do need to know. Doing exams from third party sources also exposes you to "bull**** questions", which are essentially questions very badly worded or not on the study design but you accomplish anyway; this unfortunately happens in some actual VCAA exams. A side note, oh boy, if you want to try out bull*** questions you have to try out the ITute exams  They're essentially medium to hard difficulty whilst having horrible wording compared to actual exams, but who knows, something like that could pop up.

Another side effect is that if you do tons of practice exams, the actual exam will be a breeze since you're so used to doing well on tons of practice exams rather than doing just 1. There is the obstacle of not getting burned out, but I'm luckily in a situation where I just know I have to do well, since I go to a bad school, currently don't have a permanent desk or study area, and haven't worked extremely hard all year like I should have.