CAHSEE Preparation Tips – Mastering Prioritization
When you’re gearing up for the CAHSEE, one of the best tips you can take into account is how to properly prioritize questions as you answer them. While some tests are structured to have the questions progress from easy to hard as the test goes on, most standardized tests are completely randomized when it comes to the level of difficulty of each questions as related to the order they appear on the test.
A key point to remember is that you get the same amount of points for correctly answering an easy question as you do for correctly answering a more difficult one. Because of this, experts recommend initially going for quantity of the questions you answer as opposed to the quality or degree of difficulty. If you can answer ten easy questions in the same amount of time it will take you to correctly deduce the answer to a more difficult question, you’re better off starting with the easy ones. There is no harm in focusing on the easy questions first, then going back to work through the more time consuming questions that present a slightly larger challenge. Just because the questions are numbered doesn’t necessarily mean you have to answer them in that specific order.
One important thing to keep in mind if you plan to skip around on the exam, however, is to make absolutely sure you are marking each answer in the correct space on the exam sheet. Nothing is worse than filling in the final answer on the exam sheet and realizing you still have five empty answer slots remaining. If you check your place on a regular basis, you can avoid having to go back and recheck your answers at the end to determine where you went wrong on the answer sheet. Also, don’t forget to go back and answer the questions you passed over initially. Believe it or not, there have been students who have forgotten to review all of their answers when they were done and failed to realize they had left questions blank that they had intended to go back and work on.
For even more tips on preparing for the CAHSEE, check out the CAHSEE blog.
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