I remember sitting my high school finals. It was one of the worst times of my life. Now don’t get me wrong, I knew I was going to pass, (and I did – very well!) but the whole run up to the exam process was a nightmare because of the lack of materials actually dedicated to preparing for an exam properly.

Most study guides give the same old advice: Find a quiet room, limit yourself to doing 2 hours study at a time, eat regular meals, take a break and get some fresh air now and again, and don’t worry.

“Don’t worry” Easy for someone in their late fifties to say, they’ve already discovered that once you have got into college, your high school results count for jack, but when you’re fifteen, and you don’t have the wisdom of hindsight, and your parents are constantly on your back about revision schedules and test papers, the only thing that you can do is worry. A lot.

The fact is, the student guides should say something like:

Do the work that you need to do in order to pass the exam with a decent grade, and then relax, because in twelve months no-one will care. I remember when I got to university, and people would constantly ask me what I got in my exams. I’d tell them I got four a grades, and one C. Every single person would ask what the C was in. They didn’t care about how I’d actually done in the other courses, or what my GPA had been, in fact, I think they were only asking me what I’d got in my exams because they were mostly stuck for things to ask in the first place.

Anyway, back to preparing for an exam.

Step 1: Start working a couple of weeks before the test by reading through your notes for the year – You did keep notes didn’t you? If you didn’t, borrow some off a friend, or ask the teacher to give you a copy of theirs.

Step 2: There will be things you know you know and things that you know you don’t know. Concentrate on what you’re bad at, as you can guarantee that those will be the subjects of all the questions.

Step 3: Plan out a revision timetable and then throw it away, because you won’t keep to it anyway.

Step 4: Listen to music while you revise your work, you can then use the tunes as mnemonics to recall information later. Don’t worry too much about not wanting to listen to the music again in the future because you’ve polluted it with school work. You would have grown out of those tunes by the end of the summer anyway.

Step 5: Go for a good run or a workout so that you get a good night’s sleep the night before the exam.

Step 6: Turn up for the exam early, and read through your notes one last time before you take your seat in the hall.

Step 7: Pass the test.