Almost all of us have faced or will be facing a competitive exam/test at some point in our recent history. Whether it’s the SAT, GRE, JEE, CLAT, GMAT, or a language proficiency test, there are a bunch of common problems we’ve got to deal with, and none of them are fun.
One of the hardest things to do is prepare for these exams entirely on your own. While many people take extra classes or go to tutors, others prefer to take the self-study route. On one hand, it offers you greater freedom to plan your study and use methods best suited for your needs; on the other, it’s easy to fall into the trap of overestimating your own working schedule and capabilities.
- Talk to people – Given that you may not have the benefit of a regular source of experience in the form of a tutor, it’s even more important to talk to other people who’ve taken these exams. A tutor or a former examinee will have the experience that a first-timer doesn’t. They catch the smaller things during their time that people with less experience might miss, such as registering offline, or certain snacks to keep in your bag to eat during breaks. Get in touch with them over social media, or even forums: you’ll find many people who might have the same doubts as you do, and someone would have answered at least some of them.
- Planning and Balance – Unlike a class where you might go for three or four hours on a weekend, self-study involves making your own schedule and deciding for yourself which days and timings can go into studying for the test. If you want to devote an hour a day, you’ll need to keep school, college, or your job in mind, not to mention other errands and study times. Devoting fifteen hours a day in the summer to studying for an exam sounds great, but consider your own limits and surroundings before jumping in headfirst. Balance out food, sleep, studying, and entertainment. You need a few breaks too, so take them.
- Hold yourself accountable – This is something I’ve had to deal with on most days. If I don’t study for my exam for even a day, one day turns into one week, or a month, and pretty soon I find myself registered for an exam I haven’t studied for since the registration date. It becomes easy to take an indefinite break if you don’t have someone holding you accountable and making sure you’re working consistently, which means you have to put yourself in charge and take steps to ensure you stick to your plan. The most basic one would be a system where you reward or penalize yourself depending on how much work you’ve done, but it might be better to remove the punishments if they don’t help. You could also get in touch with a friend who’s also studying for an exam, and sit together. Even if you two aren’t sitting for the same exam/test, it helps motivation and accountability if you know someone else is waiting for you, or would drag you out of your room if you don’t show up. If you’re studying for the same test, the work might actually become much more enjoyable and seem easier.
- DON’T compare – You won’t be the only one studying for this exam, as you know. There will be thousands of students like you, each one having a different method of preparation. Some might boast of it, some may not. Either way, if you find out someone else’s method, don’t compare it to yours. In some environments, the number of hours you put in a day appears to determine how well you will do (bonus if you don’t take a break). But that doesn’t work for everyone. We all have different learning methods and different speeds of processing information; so don’t feel bad about yourself if you want to devote four hours on Sunday to study while your neighbour ’s kid studies for five hours on a weekday AND goes to college at the same time. And really, boasting about how you stayed up all night a week before the exam, in front of someone who slept for eight hours instead, is not going to benefit you, let’s be real.
Ultimately, this is your schedule, and nobody can hold a gun to your head and make you work. You’re the best judge of what needs to be done to prepare yourself for this exam. Small steps may make the biggest difference, or major lifestyle changes might work better. But the real challenge is determining what works best for you, and what will help you achieve the goals you set for yourself.
Edited by: Priyanka Shankar
All images have been curated by Viraj Malani