It\u2019s not exactly a secret: when presented with the choice, students overwhelmingly avoid testing and exams like the plague. It\u2019s not something we all met up and agreed upon; but rather a fundamental truth that we feel in hearts, bodies, minds and souls: we would rather get gingivitis than study for and take an exam. I\u2019m sure many professors can begrudgingly attest to this.<\/p>\n
However, like children that don\u2019t want to eat their vegetables, we students can\u2019t deny the overwhelming research that has shown that testing is, in fact, one of the best approaches to boosting memory. Unlike<\/i> children that don\u2019t want to eat their vegetables, though, I will not make you sit at the dinner table until you agree that you love taking tests. I will, however, provide you with several reasons why you should learn to love them (or even just kind of tolerate them), extracted from recent findings by Dunlosky et al (2013).<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/b>1)\u00a0\u00a0 It\u2019s all-inclusive!<\/strong><\/p>\n Testing effects are not just characteristic of frantic undergraduate students. It has been found to be beneficial to all ages- children to elders alike (Dunlosky et al. 2013). So, thank your elementary and high school teachers for testing you and providing you with your basis of current knowledge, and look forward to all you will know as an adult thanks to your tests in college.<\/p>\n 2)\u00a0\u00a0 <\/b>Even if you have no idea what the test will be like, it\u2019s bound to help you!<\/b><\/p>\n If you test yourself on material, you will be encoding some sort of information in your brain that is going to help you. Studies have shown that even if the practice test is multiple choice and the actual test is short answer, the practice test still helps more than just studying (Dunlosky et al. 2013). So, even if the practice test is totally different from the actual test, you will still see improvement in memory and understanding.<\/p>\n 3)\u00a0\u00a0 <\/b>Testing helps all sorts of learning!<\/b><\/p>\n It seems pretty intuitive that if you practice-test yourself on explicit information or facts, you\u2019re going to remember them better down the line. However, studies have shown that practice testing also helps improve conceptual understanding of material (Dunlosky et al. 2013). So, testing helps on both deep<\/i> levels of comprehension, and shallow<\/i> levels of just memorization.<\/p>\n 4)\u00a0\u00a0 <\/b>A practice test will be relevant no matter what you learned or how you learned it!<\/b><\/p>\n It\u2019s true. Research has shown that testing effects are present in a wide variety of situations. As predicted, it is beneficial when you are trying to encode factual information, general knowledge, vocabulary, etc. However it is also beneficial when you are trying to remember information that you once read in a book or a journal. It\u2019s even beneficial when you\u2019re trying to remember something about a movie you watched one time. It\u2019s also been shown to be helpful in basically almost every category of information under the sun; psychology, history, science, language, bat echolocation, the big bang theory, shoe tying, arctic exploration, toucans, etc. (Dunlosky et al. 2013). No matter how you learned it, why you learned it, or what you learned, a practice test will help you.<\/p>\n I know by now you must be sold on this idea and are asking yourself aloud \u201cWow, how can I best use this amazing tool!?\u201d Ignoring the fact that talking to yourself is generally frowned upon by society, I will tell you.\u00a0 The first way to maximize the benefits is to make your practice test difficult. Utilizing free recall, for example, will work better than fill in the blank because it creates a desired level of difficulty that promotes effortful retrievable, which becomes more salient in memory. Another way to improve is to repeat your practice tests.\u00a0 As you might suspect, you are more likely to remember something the more times you practice remembering it, and especially the more times you remember it correctly<\/i>. Groundbreaking information, I know. Finally, space your tests apart. You are better off to do several short practice tests spaced out over the course of a week before the exam than to do one giant practice test session the night before the exam. Again, spacing tests creates a desired level of difficulty, as you tend to experience forgetting in between sessions. So, you must put forth extra effort in order to retrieve the information, which again makes it more salient in memory (Dunlosky et al. 2013).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I\u2019m not saying you should jump up and down for joy the next time your professor announces an exam, or become the person that asks your professor if you can have more exams and practice quizzes for homework (in fact, don\u2019t ever be that person..ever). However, hopefully your animosity towards testing has been subsequently reduced by these pearls of wisdom. Sometimes, you have to learn to love what\u2019s good for you. No matter how much more appealing gum inflammation sounds.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Literature Cited:<\/p>\n Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D.T. (2013) Improving students\u2019 learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14, 4-58. pdf<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s not exactly a secret: when presented with the choice, students overwhelmingly avoid testing and exams like the plague. It\u2019s not something we all met up and agreed upon; but rather a fundamental truth that we feel in hearts, bodies, minds and souls: we would rather get gingivitis than study for and take an exam. 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