Speaker 1: Alright, so you decided to wait until the last minute to study for an exam and now you're sitting there, you're a little bit nervous, you're not too sure if you're gonna do well. Don't worry. In this video, I'm gonna break down my strategy for cramming for an exam. Alright so first and foremost, you have to strategically decide what to review. Chances are your teacher handed out an exam guide that breaks down every single topic that's gonna be on the exam and it probably even tells you which topics are gonna be tested heavily and which ones are gonna be tested lightly. Your goal is to look at this list of topics and be very diligent about which ones you choose to review first. Look, I think the mistake many students make, especially when they're cramming, and trust me it's one that I've been myself, is that they'll look at this exam guide and just cover all the topics in order. They'll be like, oh okay, this exam guide lists 10 topics so I'm gonna review all 10 in this exact order. But when you're cramming, you unfortunately don't have time to review everything that's gonna be on the exam. Which is why I want you to use something I like to call the cram matrix. For every single topic on the exam guide, ask yourself two questions. One, is this a strength or a weakness? And two, is this tested heavily or tested lightly? And based on your responses to these two questions, you'll be able to figure out the exact order to review the exam topics. If it's a weakness that's tested heavily, that becomes priority number one. If it's a weakness that's tested lightly, that becomes priority number two. If it's a strength that's tested heavily, that becomes priority number three. And if it's a strength that's tested lightly, it becomes priority number four. And look, I know that sounds a bit obvious, but back in high school I would often forget to do this. In fact, I genuinely believe if you don't take time to prioritize your exam topics, most students will naturally review priority four topics first. Which is a mistake, because those are the topics you probably don't have to review. And the reason this happens is because priority four topics are the ones we're most familiar with. So when we're preparing for an exam, it makes us feel most comfortable to review the topics we're already familiar with. And look, as I've said in previous videos, and as you've probably heard online, if you're uncomfortable, it probably means you're learning. And look, I know it's going to be uncomfortable to tackle those priority one topics first, but if you're watching this video, I believe in your ability to do so. Okay, now that you have a prioritized list of exam topics, you might be sitting there wondering, Gohar, how do I actually go about studying these topics? And this leads me to my second piece of advice. First things first, you need to cover your bases. So instead of diving right into the topic and memorizing all the little details like random formulas and vocab words, try to establish a high-level understanding of the topic first. And a great way to do this is to ask yourself some priming questions. For example, ask yourself, what is the significance of this topic? What are some key principles and ideas that underlie this topic? How would I roughly explain this topic to a five-year-old? The goal here is to get a rough overview of what it is you actually have to learn. Now once you've sort of primed your brain, I suggest you do these three things to further understand the topic. 1. Skim the chapter summary. 2. Review vocab. And 3. Patch any gaps by watching YouTube videos. And look, I do want to say that rereading your notes or rereading your textbook is not the most effective way to study, but remember, right now we are just trying to establish a high-level understanding of the topic. Reviewing chapter summaries from your textbook are great because they tend to be very information dense and have almost no fluff. And then when it comes to reviewing vocab, this might be a controversial take, but I genuinely believe knowing all of the vocab words and their definitions will allow you to at least pass the exam. And once you've gone through the chapter summary and the vocab words for a particular topic, now it's time to review any of the concepts that might be confusing by pulling up YouTube videos. Now as you cram for an exam, it's important to have the right tools and supplies, which is where the sponsor of this video comes in, Paperlike. Now if you take notes on your iPad, you might sometimes miss that feeling of taking notes with a pen and a paper. This is where the Paperlike Pro Bundle comes in. As part of it, you'll get three things. The first is the Swiss Paperlike, a screen protector for your iPad that'll give it a papery feel as you take your notes. The material is thin and durable and will ensure the image you see is super sharp and clear. Next, you'll get the Paperlike Charcoal Pencil Grips. Now as you might know, Apple pencils aren't the most comfortable, so these grips will help reduce grip fatigue and improve your precision as you write. And then finally, you'll get this refillable cleaning kit, which will help you keep your screen spotless. Head to this link, which is also in the description, to check out the Paperlike Pro Bundle. Alright, now back to the video. Now if you're really short on time and can't watch entire YouTube videos, I recommend pulling up BARD, pasting in the YouTube URL, and asking for a summary. Okay so once you're done asking yourself priming questions, reviewing chapter summaries, reviewing vocab, and watching YouTube videos, you should have now covered your basis for a particular topic. And this leads me to my third piece of advice. Now it's time to drill down. You need to do practice problems. As many as you can. Now truthfully, doing practice problems is how you should be spending most of your time when you're cramming for an exam. Back when I was a senior in college studying for one of my hardest math finals, I remember I spent 90% of my time doing practice problems and the other 10% reviewing my notes or online resources. And practice problems are great, especially for STEM classes, because this is where you'll pick up on knowledge gaps and those little bits of information you need to ace your exam. It's one thing to just learn the method for solving a problem, and it's another to actually practice using it. Okay, but now where do you find practice problems? Here are three resources that I recommend. Number one, you can do practice problems straight from the textbook. Chances are, at the end of a chapter, you'll find anywhere between like 5 or 20 practice questions that you can do to test your knowledge. Now if your textbook doesn't have any practice problems, you can do practice questions from previous exams. For example, if you're studying for a midterm or a final, bring up old exams and try to answer the questions once again. And finally, if you don't have practice problems in your textbook and don't have access to previous exams, you can use AI to generate practice problems. Head to a tool like Google Bard, tell it which topics you want to review, tell it what grade you're in, and ask it to generate some practice questions. The best part here is that you can adjust the questions to meet your needs. For example, if you want practice multiple choice questions, just say so. If you want practice open-ended questions, you can also say that. You can also ask the AI to generate harder or easier questions, and you can keep doing this until you feel ready for the exam. Okay, let's say you've covered your bases and you've done like a dozen practice problems for every single topic. If you still have time left over, well, first of all, congratulations, and here's my advice for how you can leverage any remaining time you might have. Call up a friend and quiz each other. Maybe just talk for 15-30 minutes, ask each other clarifying questions, and help each other understand confusing concepts. You know, one of the best ways to understand a challenging topic is to pretend to teach it. Shout out the Feynman Technique. If you can get on the phone and distill complex topics and explain them to your friend in clear and concise sentences, chances are you have a pretty solid grasp on the material. Okay, but let's assume you don't have time to talk to your friend and it's getting pretty late. That leads me to my fifth piece of advice. Get some rest. Numerous studies link sleep to memory consolidation. So assuming you've at least reviewed the priority one and priority two topics, you're much better off going to bed and consolidating that information than staying up all night and feeling groggy during your exam the next day. Alright guys, so those were my five tips, and let's just say you have almost no time at all to study, do at least tip number one and tip number three. Prioritize the topics and do practice problems. Be sure to like and subscribe if this video was helpful, and best of luck on your exam coming up. I know you're gonna crush it.