Boarding School Tips for Teens: 5 Ways to Wow an Examiner

Show ’em what you got!

Exam season is fast approaching and as your teens gear up for mock exams and then the real one(!), it’s useful to think about ways to impress the examiners, demonstrate your knowledge and show them your full potential. Here are 5 tips our experts from British Tutors have for your kids who will be writing their exams soon.

Think Before You Answer

It may sound obvious but it’s a common exam pitfall to not read the question carefully and think before you put pen to paper.  Don’t panic when you open the paper and read the questions!  Stay calm and take a couple of minutes to process the question and roughly plan out your ideas.  A well thought through response is a sure fire way to impress the examiner and give them confidence in your expertise.

Pay Attention to the Basics

Careful management of your time along with exemplary grammar, punctuation and spelling are vital to doing well in an exam. Don’t let these fall by the wayside as you rush to get your ideas and knowledge across. Before you begin, work out how much time you need to allow yourself for each section of the paper and stick to this. Leave yourself a bit of time at the end of the exam to read through your work and to check and check again for any mistakes. As part of your revision process, make sure you set yourself some challenges to write against the clock. Practicing this frequently ahead of time will give you confidence that you can do it when it comes to the real thing.

Back Up Your Answers with Evidence

Keep a sense of focus in your answers and ensure that everything you are saying is relevant to the question. Writing lots is not necessarily a marker of success! Any time you give an opinion or viewpoint, make sure that you are backing this up with evidence, whether it be from statistics you are presented with, a line from a comprehension passage or information from your own revision. Don’t assume that the examiner will agree with you, remember that you have to persuade whoever is reading your work that you are correct and provide evidence to support this.

Vocabulary and Phrasing

Let your enthusiasm for your subject shine through in your style of writing and the choice of words you use.  Don’t fall back on clichés or standard essay phrases such as “in order to” or “ therefore in conclusion”. Vary your style and think about interesting words and phrases you can employ. While revising, why not create a vocabulary and phrase list that you can put into action when it comes to the exam itself.  Remember, examiners read hundreds of papers so you want to make yours stand out by being original.

Try to Enjoy It!

Where you have a choice of questions, choose the one that you think you will enjoy answering most.  Your enjoyment will be clear to the examiner and make your writing fun and easy to read while also displaying your confidence with the subject matter.  Don’t panic or stress about exams, take time to revise effectively, think about your exam strategy and then enjoy the challenge of the exam itself!

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Good luck on your exams!