10 common exam mistakes – and how to avoid them

1 Working too hard

While it’s vital to put the study hours in, there’s such a thing as working too hard – and burning out by the time you get to exam day. As well as looking after the basics like sleeping, eating and exercising, make sure you schedule downtime. “When I was studying, I had an agreement with my now-wife that I would finish revising at 9pm Monday to Thursday, and keep weekend evenings free,” explains Aaron Westgate, a tutor at First Intuition. It’s also important to identify the things that help you unwind the most, whether that’s reading a book, listening to music or going for a run. “What are the things you absolutely need in your life? There’s a lot of individuality to this, in finding what relaxes you and factoring that in.”

2 Not practising questions properly

Question practice is fundamental to exam success – but it’s about doing it right. There are three stages, explains Aaron, the first being starting early, practising questions in the learning phase rather than just reading your notes. “Then, as you progress, you build it up. If you have two months to revise, for example, you might spend the first week learning the syllabus, then two weeks doing questions – but not to time.” As you go into the last month, you should be practising to time – and this is absolutely key. “So many students don’t practise to time – or they do, but they always go over – and they think they’ll just figure it out on the day,” he says. “Very few students can solve that on the day. You’re more likely to get worse rather than better on the day with the added pressure.”

3 Writing too much

The quickest way to run out of time is to write too much. The first trap students fall into, Aaron says, is waffling. “They want to get going, so they start with something easy like restating the question back to the examiner.” Get straight to the point. Instead of saying: “There are a lot of things to consider…” just get on and list those things. Another common mistake is what he calls ‘the domino effect’ – listing every single impact a decision could have. “‘If we lose revenue that’s going to affect our profit. If we lose profit, it might affect our long-term future. If it affects our long-term future, we may not be able to exist. And if we don’t exist…’ You’re absolutely right, but you’ve gone straight from point one to point six, and now you’re trying to solve all six problems – and it’s an essay,” he explains. If you’re making a point, explain it properly. “It’s what I call overstating and underexplaining. ‘This will impact us financially, such as our revenue and our profit.’ Revenue is one point, profit is another – and you haven’t explained either of them. It’s not enough to state that a decision will affect revenue. How?”

4 Trying to get the perfect answer

If you make a mistake in a calculation, don’t waste time going back and trying to figure it out to be perfect – even if you don’t get the right answer, there are plenty of marks available for your workings out and demonstrating your skills of interpretation and evaluation. “If you’ve got the exact answer the examiner has got, you’ll get full marks for the calculation,” Aaron explains. “If not, they’ll give you marks for the bits you’ve got along the way. They’ll be marking so many that you’ve probably got the same answer as someone else, so they’ll know where you went wrong and award marks accordingly.” That being said, do take care when entering numerical answers, particularly at Certificate Level.

5 Not marking your answers

The other vital aspect to effective question practice is reviewing your answers properly. “Students often don’t spend much time marking their own work,” Aaron says. “They might work through an incorrect calculation, but they don’t tend to review written answers thoroughly – and by the time you get to Professional Level over half of your answers are going to be written.” As well as comparing what you’ve written to the sample answers in the question bank, he advises requesting marked answer examples from your tutors. You can also ask them for help, but make sure it’s targeted. “I get students to mark their own work and then send me any specific bits they’re not sure about, rather than the whole three-hour mock,” he explains.

6 Not balancing your revision

Many students take two exams at a time, and it’s all too easy to favour one over the other when it comes to revising. You either spend too much time on the subject you find more difficult and neglect the ‘easier’ topic, or do lots of question practice on the one you find easier because it feels more comfortable. As well as scheduling enough study time for both exams, make sure you’ve covered the key areas within each subject. Don’t fall into the trap of assuming something will or won’t come up because it ‘always’ does. “When I was at university, the same question came up 14 years in a row – and then in my year it didn’t,” Aaron remembers. “Loads of students messed that up, and I was one of the ones who had balanced my revision more and prepared for other questions.”

7 Not planning your time properly

Start the exam with an idea of how you’re going to divide your time – but don’t worry about planning shorter questions down to the minute and second. “There’s a rough cut-off where you should start planning your time for questions,” Aaron believes. “The tipping point is around six to eight marks: below that, you’re probably going to be spending around 10 minutes briefly listing out eight different points. Once you start going over eight or 10 marks, you’re going to have 15 minutes-plus and be writing a lot more – and you need to be very strict on time for those questions.” For exams with lots of shorter questions, think about them in chunks or sets to ensure a steady pace.

8 Not answering every question

It’s better to attempt an answer for every question rather than spend too long on some and miss out others entirely. Keep an eye on the clock and be strict about moving on when your time for a question or set of questions is up, advises Aaron. “You need to cut yourself off. If you’ve got something easy to say and you can say it in 30 seconds, do that. But if you’re thinking, ‘Now I need to develop my point’, then move on. Make a quick note of what else you were planning to say, then come back to it at the end if you have time.” Bear in mind, he adds, that you are much more likely to pick up marks at the start of an answer than at the end. “What you write early should really be what you’re confident about,” he explains. “Plan your answer so that you make all your good points at the start, then you won’t waste your time.”

9 Not answering the question

Before you dive straight into your answer, make sure you’ve read the question through properly and understood exactly what it’s asking. “Just because you see a question that looks similar to one you’ve answered before, it doesn’t mean it’s the same question,” Aaron explains. “It might start, ‘Discuss the ethical issues…’ and end with ‘in light of’ a particular aspect. And those ethical issues might be very different considering that thing. What ethical issues are you seeing? And why do they matter in light of that point that’s made right at the end of the question?” Think about it in the real world, he adds: “If I’ve said I’m an SME and you’ve just told me I need to hire a whole finance team, I wouldn’t pay for your advice. Because this was the question I asked you, and that was the one you answered.”

10 Not running your own race

While it’s useful to take advice and learn from others, at the end of the day this is your race, and only you can run it. “There’s no ‘one size fits all’ when it comes to learning – it’s about finding out what works best for you,” says Aaron. This might be trying out different study techniques, or scheduling revision for the times you feel most energised. The same goes for when you’re walking into, and out of, the exam room – don’t compare yourself to others. “People will always want to talk about which areas they’ve focused their revision on, or which question they found easy, and listening to them is the surest way to knock your confidence.”