Word on Campus: What are The Rotunda’s tips for conquering midterms?

Midterms. Introduced in high school and you can’t shake them until after you’re completely done with higher education (including graduate school.) Even though you wish you could take them in stride each year, the date on the syllabus never fails to rattle you.

Now, this topic is a little different for this Friday’s Word on Campus, less news-y or reflective, but relevant to this part of the semester so I’ll try my best for you guys and we can have some fun.

The top two negative things that pop into people’s minds with the word midterm is stress and study — which are basically the two dark clouds over college at all times, just intensified into a full-blown thunderstorm when major exams approach.

Really, let’s just break these down. (I’m a quote person, so bare with me, I use a lot of them.)

Stress

Its not stress that kills us, it is our reaction to it.

— Hans Selye, Austrian-Canadian endocrinologist who researched responses to stressors

I would say midterms are only as stressful as you make them, but I understand some people have test anxiety, making it more difficult to keep the steering wheel in their hands. According to studies by the American Test Anxiety Association, 16–20 percent of students have high test anxiety.

Plus, even if you aren’t diagnosibly stressed, the majority of students don’t enjoy or look forward to midterms.

Here are a few tips to beat the stress, tackle the trembling and knock out the nervousness:

~ Stay Positive: We all hear this every day, especially in response to complaints, but it’s true. Behavioral research reinforces the advice to use the power of optimism, visualize your desired result and smile. Embrace the happy thoughts.

~Talk it out: Discuss why you’re nervous with your peers, especially ones in the same class who can relate to the difficulties you’re having. Building that bond and recognizing you aren’t isolated in your own anxiousness can help give you the confidence to rise above your stress. However, beware your conversation turning to one of straight negativity and doubt, otherwise it may have the opposite effect and leave you feeling more worried. Make sure you both lift each other up in the end, recognizing the midterm is just a piece of paper.

~Music: Check out a chill mix on Spotify or Amazon Music while you’re walking to class and getting ready to study, it can help calm your nerves and open your mind.

“If you treat every situation as a life and death matter, you’ll die a lot of times.”

– Dean Smith, former UNC-Chapel Hill men’s basketball head coach

Studying

Studying is hard. We recognize this. Not everyone is good at it, not all students know what tactics work best for them and not all professors provide you easy guides or a subject list to start from.

How do you approach studying for an hour (or longer) exam on everything you’ve learned so far?

1. Talk to the professor outside of class: Sometimes, even though professors may not provide a printed handout during class, a visit during their office hours or a scheduled appointment can lead to some clues. Professors typically respect students who care about their grades and preparing for their class.
2. PowerPoints and Chapter Topics: If your teacher posts the powerpoints he/she uses during class, use those as guidelines for your studying — the professor specifically chose those topics to review in class because he/she believes they’re important. If your teacher doesn’t do that — (Alec Hosterman of Longwood’s COMM department, cough), look at the text book chapters you’ve read so far. Usually at the beginning or end of a chapter, they have the main topics covered as well as a summary. Look at the main topics and allow those to guide you as you make your own study guide or skim the book 30 (20, 10, 5) minutes before midterm time. The summary will show you the basics of the chapter and you can go back and add the detail.
3. Study Groups: Even Harvard professors recommend their students form study groups to help them retain information. According to an article in The Atlantic magazine, one professor believed it helped his students to associate learning with socializing, improving both the experience and the education. Maybe you all had meetings with the professor and received different clues you can all put together while you split up the chapters to cover so you all can share the responsibility of making a study guide. Teamwork, people.

Midterm season will be over before you know it and at least take comfort in knowing there is some research backing that they’re worth it.

Studies have shown in-class assessments force students to learn more than take home tests. While scientists encourage the assessments to occur more frequently and in smaller doses like daily quizzes, know that as a student, you are retaining more information from your tuition dollars by taking the midterm.