• To help students develop strategies for organizing information for study and understand why the strategies work
• To help students develop skills for predicting what will be on tests

• Chapter 8 pages 169-185
• Chapter 11 page 231-239
• The Web site for Learning Skills Program http://www.coun.uvic.ca/learn/hndouts.html
• Predicting Test Questions
• Questions to ask before the exam
• Questions to ask before the exam Power Point Slides

• Chapter 8 of The Confident Student deals with organizing information for study. The discussion of concept maps, comparison charts, timelines, process diagrams, informal outlines and branching diagrams. Chapter 11 adds note cards for review. Students are more likely to "buy in to " these strategies if they know why they work. Have them make connections to the memory principles and their learning styles. Actually practice as many strategies as possible to let students discover what works for them.
• The Cornell note taking system and a similar label in the margin process for textbooks encourages predicting test question. These systems for taking notes and reading textbooks are about preparing for tests systematically instead of cramming.
• The Learning Skills Program web site is a good resource on organizing notes, reading, study time management. The section called Test Questions: Six Levels of Learning http://www.coun.uvic.ca/learn/program/hndouts/sociol.html is particularly helpful in predicting test questions from various materials.
• Have students prepare a list of questions that should be asked when a test is announced and discuss why the questions are important to ask. Click here for sample questions. There are also Power Points Slides on line for these.
• Give students a chapter from a text or a sample lecture and have them predict what the test questions will be or have them make out an actual test. For some guide lines to predicting test questions click here.
• Possible Journal Entries

After students have studied strategies for taking both objective and essay type tests, have students make a test taking test. Make sure the questions are about test taking strategies. For examples of student generated questions click here