Step 4: Master exam environment — of 5 Steps to pass your Kubernetes exam
This is part #4 of the 5 Steps to pass your Kubernetes exam miniseries. In case you missed other parts, here are all the posts:
- Decide if you want to become Kubernetes certified.
- Learn Kubernetes.
- Practice exam problems.
- Master the exam environment.
- Day of the exam.
Today, we are going to cover how to master the exam environment. At this point of the journey, you should have solid Kubernetes fundamentals (Step #2) and developed muscle memory while practicing exam problems (Step #3). Now it’s time to get familiar with the exam environment. The goal here is to eliminate any surprises. Any pause or confusion during the real exam eats into the time you have to solve tasks.
We have several choices:
1. Schedule a real exam — remember, the Linux Foundation gives you two attempts. You can treat the first attempt as a learning experience.
2. Use kubewiz.com — my company offers a realistic Kubernetes exam simulator with tasks, detailed solutions, UI, and setup that match the real exam.
3. Use killer.sh — like KubeWiz, killer.sh offers Kubernetes practice exams.
Option #1 makes sense for people who feel confident about their Kubernetes skills. An obvious drawback is that you will be risking one attempt that is worth $300/2 = $150 (on July 1st, 2021, the price will increase to $375/2 ~= $187 per attempt). Compare it with KubeWiz that offers practice exams for $12.99 or killer.sh — $36 for 2 attempts.
If you are like us mere mortals, you will want to buy a practice exam before risking hundreds of dollars of the exam fee.
Here is the interface that KubeWiz offers:
You want to approach your practice exam as if it was your real exam. Make a full rehearsal including a clean desk policy, no interruptions.
Most of the UI elements are quite obvious. I’ll only describe flagging questions. It helps with an important time management technique: do not get stuck on a problem. You have roughly 5 minutes per task. If you are not tracking to resolve a task in 5 minutes, flag it and move on. If time allows, you will be able to go back to the flagged questions and work on them some more.
Summary
In Step #4 we covered techniques that allow you to eliminate surprises with the exam environment and build your confidence before the exam.
Coming up is the last step: Step #5 — day of the exam.
About Kubewiz
https://kubewiz.com/ offers realistic practice exams for CKAD, CKA, CKS (coming soon).
