Statistics

[ssanders80]

I am taking my last prerequisite course, Statistics. When I study, I do well on the assignments, I understand the steps and I can identify if I've done something wrong. When it comes to test, I bomb, badly!

Has/does anyone else have this problem with stats or any other course. What did you do? I have A's and B's in all my other prereq's and I don't want to do bad in the course.

Steph

[Music in My Heart]

No, I don't have that problem but perhaps I could help anyway.

When you bomb, why is that? Do you fail to recognize what the problem is asking and hence use the wrong equations? Or do you make mistakes in applying the equations? Or do you not remember the equations?

How do you study? Do you do problems from scratch, all the way through and without looking in the book, and then verify that you've got the correct answer?

[ssanders80]

I study by reading each of the sections, practicing the example problems, working the problems my teach gives me. Finally I do the review at the end of each section. Everytime I begin to study, I always re-read my notes and the section(s) prior to learning a new one. My problem is I expect the problems on the test to be worded like the problems in the book. When they aren't, I get "tripped up." So I need to focus on realizing that just because the problems are worded differently doesn't make them any different. Does that make sense?

[natrgrrl]

Does your book have a chapter review and a chapter test? If so,

1. Read the whole chapter and work out all the examples.

2. Do the chapter review and remember which questions you got wrong or had to look up the formula for.

3. Go back to the explanation and examples to study the problems you missed.

4. Do the practice test without looking anything up in your book or notes. That is the only way to practice for the real test, IMHO.

This usually took me 3 days to go through the chapter and a few hours for the review and tests. Also, if you have to memorize the formulas, write out the formula for EVERY practice question you do. I hope this helps you a little. This is how I studied and I got an A.

***When you are studying your formulas, figure out WHY you use that formula and why you can't use a different formula. Then you will be able to understand the questions when they are worded differently than the ones from the text.

Good luck on the rest of your class.

[ssanders80]

This is really good advice! Thanks so much for this!