Preparing for Online Exam in Limited Time | 5 Unique Methods

Let’s be real. The clock is ticking fast. Time’s running out, and you’re obviously not ready to take your online exam as of yet. Whatever the subject might be, all those months of procrastinating seem to have finally caught up with you. It might be tempting for you to think “I should pay someone to take my online exam”, but that won’t always save you- especially when you’re already running low on funds.

What to do then? Everyone has perhaps been in a similar situation such as this, and while not all of them manage to make it, we have five unique methods that will ensure that you pass your grade, even if you’re running low on time. But first, let’s discuss some reasons that make you leave things up to the last minute.

Why Do Students Procrastinate in Online Exams?

Online exams, although very popular, have presented a strange set of problems for students. Beyond the usual learning issues, they are often unable to prepare for these exams or engage in procrastination properly. Why is that? Let's take a look at some factors, classified into three major categories:

Personal & Psychological Factors

These factors are related to the motivation, fear and anxiety of the student. They might not see the relevance or importance of engaging with their coursework prior to their exam, which decreases their motivation.  Moreover, the constant ticking of the clock, albeit self-induced, does cause them to fear failure and makes them extremely anxious. This anxiety can often outweigh self-control and motivation, which ultimately makes them procrastinate.

Situational & Environmental Factors

Not every student is blessed with a perfect home environment, which is pivotal for something like online learning. There are plenty of distractions that obviously make them lose focus, making it harder for them to engage in their studies. In addition, the apparent lack of structured study reduces their sense of urgency and accountability. Perhaps the unclear instructions or technological barriers, too, play a significant part in making students procrastinate.

Behavioural Patterns

Most students also have themselves to blame, especially with their time management. Since these online exams are much more 'flexible', it makes students lose their discipline and leads to poor planning and time management. Oftentimes, students simply do not do their work or studies, even if they have the time, because of boredom or not caring about it when it gets done. This practice makes them give in to procrastination and doomscrolling.

Taking an Online Exam With Little Preparation

According to experts on websites such as Assignment Desk, even if you have engaged in such procrastination and have an online exam to write on the horizon, looking at you leeringly, there’s still hope left. How? Well, by taking note of the following five methods that we have curated for you, not only will you be able to clear your exams, but also score high grades! Here are the five unique methods:

Condense Your Source Material

At the last moment, engaging with the source material in its entirety would be a fool’s errand. Remember, you are running out of time, and you’re possibly not some genius student who would be capable of studying and understanding your entire coursework in a single night. This is precisely why the professionals always suggest that you condense your source material, to compress it down into small bits of digestible pieces of media or information that you can consume quite easily.

Prepare Mind Maps or Flowcharts

If condensing it is not possible, make mind maps or flowcharts of your study material. Engaging with your content from a visual point of view would make it a million times easier to understand. Not only that, a visual approach towards any given topic will also always lead to an in-depth understanding of the content, leading to longer retention, which is the make-or-break factor in something like an online exam.

Practice Spaced-Repetition

A simple technique to engage in to study when you’re running a bit short on time is to practice something like spaced repetition. What is it? Spaced repetition is a simple learning technique where material is reviewed in specific intervals. Yes, this technique still remains effective even when you're running low on time. Use it for short, focused review sessions and leverage apps or digital flashcards like Anki to manage your study schedule.

Engage in Group Learning

Group learning is something that might seem counterintuitive, given that you and your friends probably do anything except studying when you’re together. However, if you and your friends have the discipline and mental vigour for it, group learning can possibly be the one thing that helps you all score good grades. Read and discuss the material together, or allot specific topics to specific friends and explain these to one another to gain deeper insight into the nature of the study material.

Examine Sample Questions

Given the limited amount of time you have, instead of engaging with the entirety of your text, you should just examine sample question papers. What these will offer you is an insight into the type of questions you might be asked by your teachers in your online exam. While they may not be precisely the same question, it would still be a time-saving approach to studying, instead of having to read large amounts of text.

Day of Exam Preparation: Some Final Tips

It's the day of your exam, time is limited, and you have to answer a finite number of questions (albeit hard), but it is entirely doable. But what all should you consider when giving your online exam? Although suggested by the experts of a nursing assignment writing service, these are applicable to any field of study!

Answer Known Questions First:

Instead of starting in a logical order, start with the questions that you are highly confident about to ensure that you secure marks efficiently and build some confidence.

Don't Dwell on Questions

Instead of wasting precious time on questions that you don't understand, it is always suggested by experts that you not engage with them or dwell on them further.

Check Your Answers:

Given enough time, spare a few minutes at the end of your exam to review and check your responses. This will ensure that your answers were correct.

Know when to Cut Your Losses:

When running low on time, respond to questions in a manner that at least shows that you know a little bit about the given question, instead of leaving it entirely blank. You might still be able to earn partial credit.

Thus, these were some tips and techniques that would make your day of the online exam a bit less stressful.

Conclusion

In the end, this article aimed to discuss the reasons behind student procrastination, especially in the case of online exams. We looked at a few reasons, which were classified into personal, psychological/behavioural and environmental reasons. Then, we studied the five unique methods that would make it much easier for you to study in no time. Lastly, we saw some tips and techniques that make the day of your online exam less stressful- helping you not give in to the temptation to “pay someone to take my online exam”.