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March 28, 2024, 08:52:38 pm

Author Topic: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice  (Read 1764 times)  Share 

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anon101

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Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« on: October 22, 2018, 04:04:17 pm »
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Hey Guys, I'm new to AtarNotes, so sorry if this doesn't belong here or anything!
So, I started preparing for the Psychology exam a while ago, and even though I've done 6 practise exams. I don't feel prepared for the real thing yet (which is coming VERY SOON), nor am I doing very well in them (for the last exam I did I got around 70ish %). The trial exams I have done are Trials for Teachers 2018, Neap 2018, Neap SmartStudy 1 and 2 (that's the last one I did), Psyched and TSSM 2018.
For every one of the practise exams I do I look at the questions I've gotten wrong and make a list of the questions I need to go through again/ones I'm confused on (and for most of them I have done this), so I don't get why I'm not getting better (like getting 90% in these exams or anything).
So, what am I doing wrong, I really need to get better at this soon (since I need a 40 study score in Psychology, and if I don't nail the exam I don't think I'll be able to get anywhere near this).
Thanks, AtarNotes users for all the feedback/help I get!!!

Bri MT

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Re: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« Reply #1 on: October 23, 2018, 08:22:41 am »
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Hey! Welcome to AN :)

This might sound a bit strange, but I'd recommend trying to do one of the exams you've already done again to see if you've made progress on that specific exam   (even if you just redo the questions you've gotten wrong).

What do you do with your list of questions after you've made it? Could you confidently explain why you were wrong and what the correct answer is?


Hope this helps :)

anon101

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Re: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« Reply #2 on: October 23, 2018, 08:42:11 am »
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I do redo the questions I get wrong, and for most of them, I can do them afterwards.
But there are some questions which I just don't get whilst in the exam. And some places where I write different things to what the exam solutions say someone gets marks for. Like I seem to lose a mark or so on a lot of the questions.

Bri MT

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Re: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« Reply #3 on: October 23, 2018, 08:51:05 am »
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I do redo the questions I get wrong, and for most of them, I can do them afterwards.
But there are some questions which I just don't get whilst in the exam. And some places where I write different things to what the exam solutions say someone gets marks for.


I wouldn't stress tooo much about wording tripping you up if the practice you're doing isn't from VCAA as ultimately it's answering the way VCAA wants that is important.

This shows that you are making progress then, even if it isn't as fast as you feel it needs to be. In this case, I'd look at your list of questions and see if there's a trend in a particular AoS or question style being more difficult for you - in which case it may be good for you to focus on that - and do more practice (even if fitting that in means you aren't following exam timing/condititions [I'd just recommend you do 2017 according to exam conditions])

Another thing is to tackle you just "not getting" them. When this happens, maybe try highlighting key words or phrases which suggests it may be about a particular topic, do a quick dotpoint plan and come back to it later.

Also feel free to post on here if you still don't understand how you could've known that that was the answer :)

anon101

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Re: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« Reply #4 on: October 23, 2018, 09:00:26 am »
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Would you recommend I focus more on Checkpoints then?
Because they are all VCAA questions right?

I'm also planning to do the VCAA sample and VCAA 2017 exams.
Would you say they are harder or easier than the ones I've been doing (e.g. NEAP)?

Bri MT

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Re: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« Reply #5 on: October 23, 2018, 09:06:39 am »
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Would you recommend I focus more on Checkpoints then?
Because they are all VCAA questions right?

I'm also planning to do the VCAA sample and VCAA 2017 exams.
Would you say they are harder or easier than the ones I've been doing (e.g. NEAP)?

I'd probably focus more on checkpoints for a bit (they're mainly VCAA but I *think* there's the occasional non-VCAA one in there) and then 5 or so days before the exam go back to practice papers. (This is just an idea though, don't rigidly adhere to it if it's not going to work for your learning style or stress management)


It really varies with company exams. I'd probably say harder because they're less targeted to the study design

anon101

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Re: Psychology Exam Preperation Advice
« Reply #6 on: October 23, 2018, 04:33:16 pm »
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Thanks a load, dude. Also, I would ask my questions here on the forum, but I've got quite a few, so I'm not sure if anyone's going to want to answer/I'm not sure if it'd count as spam or something if I put like 10-20 questions up all myself.
« Last Edit: October 23, 2018, 06:12:15 pm by anon101 »