9 Proven Tricks for Reducing Test Anxiety

Let's face it. We ALL experience test anxiety, right? Maybe not all the time; maybe not on every test. For a lot of us, it's always there—even when we are well prepared and it's just a little quiz that won't affect our course grade one way or the other.

As we all know, test anxiety really does affect our performance on a test. So it's important to develop skills to manage it and reduce it as much as possible. But how does one do that?

Below, I briefly outline some of the best ways I know of to reduce test anxiety. As you look through them, it's natural to think "this one probably won't work" or "that one is just plain silly" or "I'm not doing that!" But the the thing is, these have actually proven to be effective. Okay, maybe there are some that won't work for you—or won't have a big effect during every test—but you won't know that until you try them!

1. Own up to your stress.
   
   The necessary first step in fixing anything is to recognize—and admit to—the problem. If you're reading this article, you've probably already done that. However, it is too easy to stop there. Many students blame their poor performance on test anxiety, but do not take any steps to reduce anxiety and improve performance. So the trick here is admitting to the test anxiety AND taking responsibility for personal improvement.


2. Be prepared.
   
   This is probably the most effective trick in reducing test anxiety—but the least often practiced. There are several kinds of preparation for a test, all of which are critical to reducing anxiety and improving performance. The most obvious preparation is to study the concepts that will be tested. The other kind of preparation is a bit less obvious—you need to make sure that you have the skills needed to study effectively. Many college students have not learned effective study skills and thus their preparation for a test is inadequate. Putting some time and effort into learning how to study improves test preparation and reduces test anxiety.


3. Don't cram.
   
   There are two kinds of cramming that can increase test anxiety.
   
   The first is putting off your study of the concepts to be tested until a day or two or three before a test. Even though you hear the opposite all the time, NOBODY really works best under pressure—at least not the kind of pressure created by putting off your studying. So don't tell me that! You really need to study a little bit every day so that the day before the test, all you need is a light review. By trying to squeeze it all into a few days—or one very long night—you are increasing your stress levels tremendously. And that stress is going to carry over into the testing situation itself.
   
   The second kind of cramming is that fast and furious review of notes and flashcards while you are sitting in the hallway before you go into the test. Even if you have studied well and really know your stuff, this frantic one-more-time review can really ramp up your stress levels. One of the factors involved is when you do this with other students who are projecting their anxiety on to you. You may have arrived to the building with confidence, but that can all go out the window when surrounded by panicked classmates. So just stay away from them! What to do instead? Check out item 6 below.


4. Don't forget to breathe.
   
   Okay, I know that you're not going to forget to breathe. What I mean by this is you you should try focusing on your breathing as if you might forget to breathe. A lot of research shows that you can reduce anxiety by putting everything out of your mind except a focus on your breathing. This is especially effective if you gradually slow your breathing to a very slow rate—maybe half your normal resting breathing rate—with long inspirations and even longer expirations. This works even better if you practice it every day—not just when you're getting ready to take a test. Check out 7 below.
   
   By the way, this breathing trick can also be very effective when you find your anxiety level increasing while you are taking a test. By taking just a moment to focus on your breathing and slow it down, you can reduce your anxiety. If you instead focus on your anxiety instead of your breathing, things will just get worse.



5. Write your stress.
   
   It seems weird at first, but studies show that if you write out your stressful feelings right before you take a test, your test anxiety will be reduced—or even go away. Even if what you are writing is that you are way, way stressed out and that you hate the test and hate the material and hate the course and hate the professor and hate that you did not study, your anxiety will dissipate. At least a little bit, but often quite a lot. Try it—you may be surprised at how effective this is!


6. Search out serenity.
   
   In trick 3 above, I mentioned that you shouldn't spend the minutes before a test cramming and feverishly reviewing your notes because that will ramp up your anxiety. So what should you do? One option is to induce relaxation with a breathing exercise, as described in 4 above. Another option is to write your stress, as described in 5 above.
   
   But there are other stress-relieving options. For example, leisurely stroll inside or outside the building before the test—trying to focus on what you see, rather than on the test or the course content. Is there an aquarium you can visit? Are there windows looking out onto a peaceful scene—or even just a parking lot where you can focus on the people and cars moving about? It's probably not a good idea to seek out digital serenity, however. Videos and social media and digital games are more likely to ramp up your anxiety than to get rid of it.


7. Practice daily stress-reduction.
   
   
   
   In trick 4, I mentioned that slow breathing to relax is more effective if it is something that you have practiced regularly. There many other stress-reducing practices that you can do every day so that you are always starting from a less-anxious state. With many of these techniques, mastering them also allows you to take some control of your anxiety when it pops up in a stressful moment.
   
   What does it for me is tai chi. Others find that meditation, nature walks, yoga, fishing, and other relaxation strategies can have this effect. Besides helping you with your test anxiety, such a practice is a good life skill to develop ways of promoting relaxation and reducing stress.


8. Take lessons in managing stress.
   
   The one "trick" that does not work to reduce test anxiety is to "just chill out." Managing stress is a skill—and like any skill, you need to learn it somewhere. Many colleges offer workshops and mini-courses in managing stress and reducing test anxiety. There may be other opportunities for such lessons in your community. Look around!


9. Get professional advice.
   If your test anxiety is severe, this might be where you should start. Many colleges provide professional academic counseling that can help you learn to manage your test anxiety—
   or at least refer you to a professional who can provide you with specific help. Another option is to ask your physician for help or a referral. There are some professional counselors who specialize in test anxiety.
   
   Professional help can often have a dramatic effect in your life by helping you find the tools you need to reduce test anxiety and improve your academic performance.

Want to know more?

• What is Anxiety?


• Survival Guide for Anatomy & Physiology


• Trick to Reduce Test Anxiety


• Don't Forget to Breathe!


• Ten Exam Strategies for A&P


• Practice. Practice. Practice.

Scan test: David Hartman
Hand writing photo: Lavinia Marin

Tai Chi photo: Rayko Swensson

Trick to reduce test anxiety

We all get it.  That nervous—sometimes paralyzing—anxiety just before a big exam.  Or worse—we panic and forget even the simplest things during a big test.

Test anxiety.  It’s not just annoying, it can affect your performance.  And your grades!

And final exams are almost upon us.

Recent research has revealed an easy and effective trick for reducing test anxiety during your next big test.  You do this trick just before the test.  I mean in the few minutes you have just before the text begins.  You know, that time you are sitting in the hallway nervously awaiting for the doors to open and the test to begin. Listening to your classmates talk about all that stuff you’re not sure you know well enough.  Frantically going over your notes one last time.  Making yourself a nervous wreck.

OK, so what is this nifty trick?

Journal your anxiety.

What?!  Write out my feelings like in a middle-school diary?

Well, yes—sort of.  Research shows that if you take about ten minutes to write out (not just think about) your feelings at the moment, you’ll feel less anxious during your exam.  And because of that (the research shows) you will do better on the exam! 

On average, students that use this technique raise their grade and average of one whole letter grade.  So even if you think it’s silly, isn’t it worth trying?

Students in a research study reported that by writing out their feelings, they quickly got to a point of calm and confidence.  The writing somehow took the energy out of the anxiety and replaced nervousness with readiness. 

So on exam day.  Get there ten minutes early.  Ignore the raving of your frantic pals.  And just write what’s going through your head.  When the exam starts, you’ll be ready for it.

Want to know more?

Read the story behind this trick:

Testing Anxiety: Researchers Find Solution To Help Students Cope
my-ap.us/TlD6Ba

Check out my advice on breathing to reduce test anxiety:

Don’t forget to breathe!
my-ap.us/dIdsS9

Need some advice on preparing well for exams?

Previous articles on exam strategies
my-ap.us/2CusmI

Brief video on preparing for exams
youtu.be/yrgNyDH3HrQ?hd=1

Another strategy with proven results: 

Tame Test Anxiety: Solid Anxiety Reduction Training
amzn.to/UDScQC

 

 

Photo by Josh Davis under CC license

Don't forget to breathe!

Exam time is just around the corner!  I have some advice for you:

Don't forget to breathe!

Well, duh-uh, of course you are going to breathe.  What I'm referring to is a proven, effective way to quickly and easily reduce test anxiety during a final exam.  We all suffer from some degree of text anxiety, right?  So I think we can all benefit from this technique.

It's simple: when you start to feel anxious or stressed during an exam simply stop focusing on the exam and start focusing on your breathing.  Breathe slowly and  try to soften your focus, so that you're not really concentrating on anything in particular.  But you are vaguely aware of the slow inhalation and exhalation of quiet breathing.

As a recent report on National Public Radio reminds us, this seems to trigger our parasympathetic "quiet breathing" response . . . thus counteracting the sympathetic "stress response" that is often characterized by rapid breaths.  This "trick" gets the body to reduce the stress response all around.

Because we know that stress can reduce test performance outcomes, it's a good idea to do what you can to reduce test anxiety during an exam right?

By the way, it seems to work better if you practice it frequently . . . so why not start right now?

Listen to (or read) the story at Just Breathe: The Body Has a Built-in Stress Reliever.

To help you get ready, look at some of my previous blog articles for tips, tricks, and videos on various other exam strategies.

Top: animationfactory.com used by permission

Bottom: Tonatiuh Martinez

Get Your Head in the Game - 5 Tips for Success in Learning

If you have any awareness of sports—or any type of game—you've heard that the only path to success includes keeping your "head in the game."  In other words, you have to think about what you are doing (or about to do).  And you have to understand how you are thinking and make sure you are "thinking correctly"—that is, in a way that will let you perform at your best and get you closer to your goal.

This idea of "thinking about your thinking" is called metacognition (met-ah-kog-NISH-un).  And it works both in sports and in learning.  It is especially important and effective in learning a subject as overwhelming as human anatomy and physiology.

In other words, if you regularly step back from what you are doing and think about the strategies you are using (or forgetting to use) in your A&P course, you'll do better than if you just struggle along trying to "get it" all into your brain.

There's evidence that metacognition alone can improve your success in learning. That means that just the process of regularly thinking about how you are managing your learning—by itself—can make you more successful.  But that's probably because when you thus reflect on your own struggles in learning, you are more likely to tweak your strategies and watch for pitfalls in ways that make you a better student of A&P.

Some students do this kind of metacognition on their own because they've either learned it along the way, or they have a mindset that naturally tends toward metacognition.  But even if your mindset doesn't naturally think this way, it's okay—it's easily learned.

Following are some ways to get more "metacognitive" about your coursework—and thus get your "head in game."

1. Schedule regular self-strategizing sessions. Set up a brief daily session (just a few minutes will do) and a weekly session. Put them in your calendar.  You have to have a calendar to be successful in college—even if you're not a "calendar person."  This way, you'll get in the habit of doing it regularly. 


2. Review your progress. During your scheduled sessions, go over what you've accomplished. This is most effective if you keep notes or a journal on your progress. What kind—and how much—reading, studying, class work, and other strategies have you done since yesterday?  ...since last week? How am I performing?  I can expect to do poorly on self-quizzing activities at first, but am I getting better?  Are there concepts that are giving me particular trouble?  Am I going downhill fast? ...or am I holding my own?


3. Get help.  If an athlete has trouble focusing their thinking in productive ways, their teammates and coaches can offer great advice.  So discuss this with students, your college learning center, and your professor. Use their advice to tweak your strategies. Then in future sessions, think about whether the new strategies have helped—or if you need to try something else.


4. Have a positive attitude.  The worse thing you can do in metacognition is to focus on possible failure. Learn how to avoid learning and test anxiety. Evidence shows that you have to fail—forgetting what you've read, heard, or studied—before you can really learn it deeply and for the long term. So learn to value those aspects of your learning, knowing that it's a necessary step to success. After decades of helping A&P students succeed, I can tell you that returning learners, underprepared learners, English language learners, and students with all kinds of challenges can succeed in A&P if they maintain a positive, self-improvement attitude. 


5. Try new things.  There's always a better way to do things. You've probably heard of successful athletes who have broken through some plateau they'd reached by learning a new technique or shifting their mindset in practice and/or performance.  For students, that means always being on the lookout for new ways to read a textbook, study, or take class notes. Or new ways to focus on learning and avoid anxiety.

This is just the start.  Once you make a habit of thinking about your learning, and gain specific skills in keeping your head in game, you can be more successful in all your courses—and in your career!

Explore the resources below for more tips.

Want to know more?

• Metacognition: The Gift That Keeps Giving


• Why Are You Here in A&P?!


• Scheduling, Calendars, and Time Management


• Dealing with Anxiety


• Test-Preparation, Test-Taking and Test-Analysis Strategies


• General Study Tips

Photo (top): melodi2

Photo (bottom): yalcin Eren

Take a Nap Before Your Next A&P Test

New research shows that napping before a test or exam is just as effective as cramming.

I've offered advice on the value of sleep and napping in this blog many times before. We don't know exactly how it helps us learn and remember, but neuroscientists are getting closer. But why it works isn't as important as the fact that it does work when you are getting ready for that next exam.

The recent research points out that cramming can have a bit of an edge if your goal is short-term memory. But for the long-term memory needed for most exams, especially cumulative or comprehensive exams, napping works just as well. And let's face it—it's way easier than cramming.

You also need long-term memory so that you can "take it with you" out of your A&P course. You are required to take anatomy and physiology courses in your program because they give essential concepts you need in later courses—and in your career. So why waste your time and effort by purposely "throwing away" all those concepts by failing to get them into your long-term memory?

Of course, napping cannot be your only preparation for a test!  (I know where your thoughts were going with this!) There's a lot of work you need to do.

But in the brief time you have before your test, it may be better to get your brain in shape—perhaps allowing some sleep-time consolidation and organizing of knowledge—than to review and revise what you've already (hopefully) been working on. It might also prevent the escalation of test anxiety that often accompanies last-minute cramming.

Want to know more?

Advice from this blog about sleeping and studying:

• Sleeping through A&P
• Sleeping Helps You Succeed
• A Nap After Class?

Napping before an exam is as good for your memory as cramming.

• This is an article giving more information about the recent research I mentioned.

Taking Tests

• Over a dozen brief blog posts about learning strategies and preparing for (and taking) tests and exams.

Photo: Jocilyn Pope

10 Things You Should Never Ask Your Professor (And What To Ask Instead)

We all say things we would avoid saying—or saying it in a particular way—if we knew their impact ahead of time. We professors often get questions from our students that are ill-considered—and often reflect badly on the students asking them.

The thing is, such questions are often innocently asked but usually come across as insulting to the teacher or dismissive of the whole learning process. Some of them may also be taken to imply that the student asking the question really isn't committed to success in the course.

So I'm going to give you a few of the common questions we hear from students that will probably have unintended negative impacts. For each of them, I explain why it can come across badly and offer suggestions for a better way to ask it.

Before I do that, however, I want to address the matters of tone and facial expression. Sometimes we are not even aware of it, but our demeanor when asking a question can come across as irritable, snarky, condescending, whiny, entitled, accusatory, or just plain snotty. Not good. You will not endear yourself to your professor (the one who assigns your grades), nor to your fellow students within earshot.

Make a habit of always checking your manner and tone before asking a question. Even if you don't like your teacher or the course. Everything will go much better for you.

Think carefully before asking these 10 questions!

• When are your office hours?
• Where is your office?
• What is your email address and phone number?

These questions are okay to ask in a few, rare circumstances. For example, if you've already looked up your professor's office location, but are having trouble finding it on campus.

But in most circumstances, what a professor is likely to hear is, "I don't want to bother looking this up online or in my course syllabus, so take some of your time now to tell me."

What to do instead? Look it up, so you don't have to ask. This may seem like a small thing, but when a professor has several students asking these questions as they are busily trying to make room for the next professor to set up for their class, or get going to the next class or meeting, or set things up for your class, it can make a bigger, more negative impact, than you may realize.

• I emailed you on Friday afternoon and you didn't respond all weekend.
• I emailed you last night and you never responded.

We live in world where online help desks are often staffed 24/7, or at least for several hours every day. Often, there are helpers standing by on a chat line to give immediate help. And a lot of college-age people seem to continually check their devices for new messages. And so we have come to expect immediate responses to our questions.

Professors, however, have many responsibilities. The majority of us are part-time faculty who are trying to scratch out a living by teaching many courses at several different institutions. Both full- and part-time faculty have meetings, appointments, grading, lecture preparation, research, constructing quizzes and tests, setting up labs and demos, and more. And we have our additional "life" responsibilities to ourselves, our friends, and our families.

So it's just not possible to be available to respond to emails 24/7. We are not blowing you off. We are attending to our duties—including eating and sleeping.

Besides that, many of us are of a generation that simply does not "check in" with digital messages very often.

I realize that not having an immediate answer to your question can provoke anxiety. First, reflect on the actual urgency of the matter. Can it wait a day or two? If not, perhaps there are other resources to use, such as asking other students, asking someone else at your college, or looking in more places to find the answer (have you tried the syllabus?).

If you find that you really are having a hard time regularly connecting with your professor, ask them (nicely) what times and manner of contact generally work best for them? Who else might you contact if you have a truly urgent matter and the professor is unavailable?

Also consider that some questions take some time to answer. Perhaps the professor is researching a technical issue for you, or has to check with colleagues, the department chair, or dean before responding to you. Or is double-checking their facts. Or trying to hunt down "that page in the book that says..." for which you forgot to give the page number.

• I'm going to be on vacation for two weeks this semester, okay?

Really? Assuming you are taking a 16-week course, you are asking to skip out on 12.5% of the course—and still expect to pass. That's a huge gap in your ability to learn what you need to learn.

Besides that, it implies that you want the professor to individually accommodate your "catching up"—if that's even possible. If it is possible, then you are asking your professor to take on a significant additional workload. For your vacation, which you may not realize is not even an option for your professor during the semester. What if ten or twenty students ask this? Yikes.

Professors often hear this question as, "I want to blow off much of this class and still get a good grade—and make you work harder—so I can lay on the beach for a couple of weeks."

So I can tell you before you ask it—it is NOT okay to take a two-week vacation during your course. But don't fret, we have a way around this! Take the course next semester instead. Sure, you'll be a bit behind your planned graduation date, but that's what it will take to make it work.

Once you understand that it's nearly impossible for most students to succeed in A&P when they miss that much of the course—and that it's a big imposition on your professor to accommodate this—it's okay to present your situation if it's something more important than a vacation keeping you out. Like a surgery that can't be delayed, for example. Or you must go to Sweden or Norway to accept your Nobel Prize.

I suggest laying out your circumstances, clarifying that you acknowledge the extra work an accommodation will mean for both you and your professor, and ask your professor for suggestions. Likely, they will recommend taking the course during a later semester—but they might have another solution they can offer.

• That's not how my other professors do it.
• It would be easier if you ran this course differently.

The first of these two questions can imply that you are questioning your professor's ability to design an effective course. One of the fundamental roles of a professor is to choose from a variety of proven strategies and examples, based on their professional judgement, training, and experience. This is an application of a core principle of higher education called academic freedom. Your professor probably already knows that their course is not quite the same as other sections of the same course. What is the constructive purpose in telling your professor?

A better approach is something like, "I've noticed that your course is different than some others I've heard of and I'm interested to know the benefits of your approach." Then ask them about specific things that you want to know about. For example, "why do give more tests than some other teachers?" Or perhaps, "not all sections have a term paper assignment—why do feel that's important for us?"

This leads us into the second question listed above. The role of a the professor is not to make the course as easy as possible. Learning is hard, not easy. So why even take the course if you want your professor to be easy on you? Maybe the professor has found that the learning benefits of more frequent testing or writing assignments have a big impact on learning outcomes. You want a good course—an effective course—not the easiest course.

Instead, consider asking, "What is it about frequent testing that works better than fewer tests?" But if there's something not likely to impact your learning, it's okay to bring that up in an office discussion with your professor. For example, you might ask, "you require that our paper be submitted as a PDF file, but most of us don't know how to do that--have you considered allow us to submit them as .docx files?" There may be a good reason for the requirement, and you'll get a chance to hear it (and appreciate it). But it could be something with which the professor can be flexible.

• Are we going to be doing anything important in the next class? in the last class?
• Did we do anything in the last class?

Just assume that your professor takes the role of facilitating your learning process seriously and is not going to be wasting the class's time. When you ask one of these questions, the message that is often heard is, "we normally don't accomplish anything in this class, so missing a class is no big deal, right?" Or worse, "I really don't value what you are doing for me." It's far worse when this is asked during class. But it's not something you want to ask privately, either.

Instead, privately tell your professor about an unavoidable absence—and it really should be unavoidable. Then acknowledge that you are missing a great opportunity for learning. Then ask if the professor has any suggestions for limiting the damage to your learning.

Sometimes, the real question behind these potentially insulting questions is really something like, "are we going to have any graded work during class?" such as a quiz or case study or something like that. In that case, apologize for the unavoidable absence and ask specifically if graded work was required and ask for suggestions on an alternate activity.

There are more!

These are only a few of the many such questions that students commonly ask, such as "can I turn in my assignment late?" When I first got the idea for this article during a discussion with faculty and students, I started jotting down examples—and before I knew it, I had dozens of them! So expect some additional examples in future postings.

Now may be a good time to subscribe, so that you don't miss any new articles as they are posted. And you'll know how to ask questions in a courteous, professional manner! And make it clear to your professor that you really do care about your learning!

Photos

(middle high) Benito LeGrand

(middle) Iwan Beijes

 (bottom): Holzi Holzer