Monday, June 16, 2008
Chemistry Regents Eve
Just finished our review session in which we had a great variety of questions/topics covered.
Reminder: BRING IN YOUR TEXT tomorrow if you have not already done so.
Other things to bring: BLUE pen, BLACK pen (for your colorful illustrations on the test), pencils (for graphs), THE non-graphing calculator that you have practiced with and know easily how to use by now.
FINAL REVIEW: tomorrow/Regents morning from 9:30 AM to 11AM outside; I'll be in the stands at the girls' lacrosse field by the side of the high school. I'll bring bagels - good carbs for thinking during the Regents.
I'll answer ANY and ALL questions that you have about Chem or test-taking!
For each of the past four Regents, I posted this timely advice; as I scrutinized the Regents exams then, I could see that the advice was taken to heart and spectacular results ensued. So, let's do the same this year:
Most students are not as good test-takers as they could be. When they get through a test, they just sit and squirm or stare at the ceiling and do nothing until time is called. Here's what you can do instead:
Here are some tips on how you can thoroughly check your Regents exam if you finish before our classes' 2.5 hour minimum test time (though I encourage you to go the distance and put in an "A-game" 3-hour effort.
1. After you SLOWLY and carefully re-read a given question, carefully read your response and make sure that it contains the KEYWORDS from the question and, most importantly, that your response ANSWERS the question. You can always add clarifying details to your answer. Do not let space be a concern. You may write outside the boxes as long as you draw an arrow showing the continuation of your answer.
2. Make sure that your answer is EASILY readable/legible. PRINT BLOCK CAPITAL LETTERS IF YOU HAVE TO. Carefully cross out anything that you are editing out and clearly write in what you are correcting.
3. DRAW PICTURES/DRAW DIAGRAMS/ DRAW PICTURES/DRAW DIAGRAMS!!! to enhance your explanations EVEN/ESPECIALLY if you did not initially do so!. This may be the single best tip that I can give you. A clearly drawn and LABELED picture can organize your thoughts and it also paints a thousand words.
4. Plug your numbers back into the question to make sure that they produce the correct total. Check all values that you (mis)READ off of the Reference Tables.
5. Add SPECIFIC EXAMPLES of anything that you are writing about in general.
6. Directly above your solved quantitative answer, write the GENERAL EQUATION for the specific calculation that you did and make sure that you placed the numbers AND UNITS (that you correctly labeled from the question) in the correct location in the equation and that you didn't leave out any part of the equation.
If you follow these tips thoroughly, you WILL improve your test score ; also, performing these steps will keep you engaged and productive for the entire allotted Regents time.
A lot is riding on your performance. I will see and check everyone's complete test including scrapwork. You should display/demonstrate every sound test-taking technique that you now know.
My classes over the past few years certainly followed this advice and we lived happily ever after with 21 perfect scores, fifty-four 99's or 98's and a 95 class average, too.
Good luck to Cicale's 2007-2008 Chem classes tomorrow! Win like Curlin did on Saturday!
Reminder: BRING IN YOUR TEXT tomorrow if you have not already done so.
Other things to bring: BLUE pen, BLACK pen (for your colorful illustrations on the test), pencils (for graphs), THE non-graphing calculator that you have practiced with and know easily how to use by now.
FINAL REVIEW: tomorrow/Regents morning from 9:30 AM to 11AM outside; I'll be in the stands at the girls' lacrosse field by the side of the high school. I'll bring bagels - good carbs for thinking during the Regents.
I'll answer ANY and ALL questions that you have about Chem or test-taking!
For each of the past four Regents, I posted this timely advice; as I scrutinized the Regents exams then, I could see that the advice was taken to heart and spectacular results ensued. So, let's do the same this year:
Most students are not as good test-takers as they could be. When they get through a test, they just sit and squirm or stare at the ceiling and do nothing until time is called. Here's what you can do instead:
Here are some tips on how you can thoroughly check your Regents exam if you finish before our classes' 2.5 hour minimum test time (though I encourage you to go the distance and put in an "A-game" 3-hour effort.
1. After you SLOWLY and carefully re-read a given question, carefully read your response and make sure that it contains the KEYWORDS from the question and, most importantly, that your response ANSWERS the question. You can always add clarifying details to your answer. Do not let space be a concern. You may write outside the boxes as long as you draw an arrow showing the continuation of your answer.
2. Make sure that your answer is EASILY readable/legible. PRINT BLOCK CAPITAL LETTERS IF YOU HAVE TO. Carefully cross out anything that you are editing out and clearly write in what you are correcting.
3. DRAW PICTURES/DRAW DIAGRAMS/ DRAW PICTURES/DRAW DIAGRAMS!!! to enhance your explanations EVEN/ESPECIALLY if you did not initially do so!. This may be the single best tip that I can give you. A clearly drawn and LABELED picture can organize your thoughts and it also paints a thousand words.
4. Plug your numbers back into the question to make sure that they produce the correct total. Check all values that you (mis)READ off of the Reference Tables.
5. Add SPECIFIC EXAMPLES of anything that you are writing about in general.
6. Directly above your solved quantitative answer, write the GENERAL EQUATION for the specific calculation that you did and make sure that you placed the numbers AND UNITS (that you correctly labeled from the question) in the correct location in the equation and that you didn't leave out any part of the equation.
If you follow these tips thoroughly, you WILL improve your test score ; also, performing these steps will keep you engaged and productive for the entire allotted Regents time.
A lot is riding on your performance. I will see and check everyone's complete test including scrapwork. You should display/demonstrate every sound test-taking technique that you now know.
My classes over the past few years certainly followed this advice and we lived happily ever after with 21 perfect scores, fifty-four 99's or 98's and a 95 class average, too.
Good luck to Cicale's 2007-2008 Chem classes tomorrow! Win like Curlin did on Saturday!
# posted by C @ 2:50 PM 
