Maths tips (For exams)

Back in primary school I was a pro in math. Any math question that would come in my way I could solve it no problem. However in 8th grade… Let’s just say math showed me flames.

8th grade humbled me a lot. Despite technically skipping a grade because of curriculum differences I had to learn to adjust in a short time. Adjusting was way harder than I thought. Back then, I decided to stay calm and let time do its thing but unfortunately it did not turn out the way I hoped.

I remember after my first test, I failed. And I kind of accepted it. My parents were cool with it and told me that I should try again next time. Next time came and I failed. It went on and on and it became a recurring cycle. Before I knew it, all my confidence was gone. Even though I would pass, my pass mark was around 50-55% which I didn't like.

I constantly had hope that as time passed my confidence would rise, but it never did. In fact, it got worse. It took me way too long to realize that I had to do something.

So here I am with my tips:

Do your homework always: Believe it or not doing your home can help you greatly when tests arrive. By doing your homework, you're practically studying without actually studying.

Listen in class: No matter how boring your math teacher is, make sure to grasp a concept as much as you can. The more you understand it, the easier studying will be.

Ask questions: Asking questions in class may make you seem annoying or as a 'nerd'. But asking questions about parts you cannot understand will leave you with no questions when you're studying and you won't have to panic about it when you're studying.

Find past papers: If you have a pending test or you just want to practice, using previous past papers can help a person get prepared for what they could find in their test. The questions might be different by usually the format is the same. Also there will be questions that require you to use the skills you learnt from a topic but have not really tackled that question. That’s why it’s an advantage to go through previous papers and get help understanding a question before the test. Oh and! You never know when teachers might decide to reuse previous questions from a past paper. That’s another advantage of practicing with past papers. When you’re writing your test you might find a question that it extremely similar to the one you’ve encountered before.

Repeat a math question until you get it right: Lets say you’ve answered this math problem and couldn’t get it right, which led you to probably looking at the answers and trying to figure out how to get the answer. Even if you might understand the way your teacher did it, redo the math question until you fully understand what to do and when you can get it right. It might take a few days or weeks but in the end you won’t ever forget how you should answer a similar question to that one.

List how you should answer a question: You get a question wrong but later figured out how to do it right? What you need to do is to highlight that question and your mistake and extensively write down the process that will lead you to the write answer. Of course it sounds like a lot of work but when you’re studying,you can just go through the notes and re-read the mistake to make sure you won’t repeat it again.

Practice, Practice, Practice: Youve all probably heard this sentence many times, but practicing allows a person to get used to a concert till it’s stuck in your head. Practice makes perfect.

Okay I’m done now. But, these tips have truly helped me in answering my math questions and have improved my confidence levels slightly. I’ve made great progress with learning maths and I do hope that these tips help you guys too.

See you next time! ^_^