Most students go to school and get an education in order to begin a career—hopefully one that they are passionate about. And most of these students are going into a great deal of debt to complete their higher education. So they want to succeed, they want to get the most out of the experience, and they want to benefit the most as they begin their career.
And they are looking for ways to help themselves succeed – creating better study habits, study buddies, tutors, extra one-on-one class time, etc. Another tool that is being used is that of test or exam banks.
What are exam banks?
Test banks are a new tool that can be used to study and gain understanding. It is exactly as it sounds – a bank of tests or exams for almost any discipline and level you may be studying for. They may include short answer questions, matching questions, essay, multiple choice and true or false questions. They are being used to help students focus their study habits. How do they benefit the student? Following are 6 ways an exam bank can help degree students.
Financial value
Students are already trying to make every dollar stretch as far as they can, so finding something effective for a minimal cost is seriously beneficial. And the reality is that not every student can afford to hire a tutor. Instead of hiring a tutor, accessing an exam bank provides a different style of ‘study buddy’, still helping you focus on specific challenge areas through exam questions.
Specific focus of subjects
As most exam banks have spent years compiling their resources, they have become very good at streamlining what they have to offer, ensuring that one can search by subject, topic or in some cases even specific question themes.
By exposing oneself to numerous ways to look at similar subject matter, students are gaining a keen understanding of how their professor may ask the question, and they will be better prepared to answer it through their practice experiences.
Confidence
Exams are very emotionally charged for many people – practicing before the real thing helps build confidence. By using an exam bank to test potential essay questions, one can not only become confident with the subject matter, but will also create ease in the process of exam taking.
Customize your study methodology
Some students may have never written an essay format exam before, all past exams have been multiple choice. While they may have figured out how to excel at multiple choice, they now need practice and confidence to be able to sit down and write an essay form exam. This will give them the ability to divide their time accordingly to ensure that they complete all questions.
It can be quite deceiving to look at an essay exam, see four questions, and think no problem since you are used to 100 multiple choice questions. By practicing similar styles of exams, you will know exactly what to expect to successfully complete all four of those essay questions.
Many exam banks have options to help you customize your study methodology. As noted above, one way is to focus on a similar style exam; another way is to set your criteria for selecting questions so that you will get exposure to a wide range of methodologies – this is a good approach if you have no idea what format the professor plans to use.
Time commitment
Using an exam bank trims down the amount of hours spent reading text books. Exams for a particular chapter are prepared in such a way to identify the important concepts of each chapter. This is not saying that the test bank is a substitute for the textbooks, but rather a supplement.
Flexibility
One of the options available for most exam banks is the ability to be flexible in your medium. Should you wish, you can continue to work through questions online, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week without worrying about a library or study hall closing. For those who do not like to work on-screen, you can print out the questions and take them wherever you need to study.
There is no doubt that students can benefit from using exam banks as a supplement or additional study tool – it must be very clear that this is not used as a way to ‘cheat’ by studying anticipated exam questions, but a way to become more knowledgeable on the desired subject.
This article was written by Amos James, a well known writer specializes in topics related test banks and solutions manual.
