Question one, nothing
Leo is in Year 11 and his chemistry mock is on Thursday. On Wednesday night he did moles questions at the kitchen table with his notes shut, and got them right.
In the hall he turns the paper over. Question one is moles, and his head goes white. All he can hear is everyone else's pens.
Walking out, the method comes back to him in full. He had learned it. It was there the whole time.
The worry took the room
While you work on a question, you hold it in your head. That holding space is called working memory, and it is small.
Worry uses the same space. "What if I fail" and "everyone else has started" sit in there next to question one, and the question gets squeezed out.
Just waiting
The question gets what is left
After writing
The worries are on the page
In 2011, Gerardo Ramirez and Sian Beilock at the University of Chicago tested this with ninth graders about to sit a biology final. Just before the exam, some wrote for ten minutes about their worries. The rest spent those minutes thinking about something else.
Among the most anxious students, the ones who wrote averaged a B+. The ones who did not write averaged a B minus. Nobody learned more biology in those ten minutes. The writers just had more room to use what they knew.
The same team saw it in the lab with a maths test under pressure. Students who sat quietly first got 12% less accurate. Students who wrote first got 5% more accurate.
Ten minutes on paper
Most of us wait outside the hall trying to think about anything but the test. That is close to what the second group did. Writing the fear down helped more.
Write what you are really scared of, like "I will blank on moles again". Spelling and sense do not matter, and nobody reads it.
No paper? The notes app works, before your phone goes away.
If you have ADHD, a blank page can be its own wall. Start with "The thing I am most worried about is" and let the pen finish it.
Five minutes on Wednesday
Leo tried a practice run the night before. He set a five minute timer and wrote about Thursday. Most of the page was about blanking again.
On Thursday he wrote on the bus and folded the page into his pocket. Question one still made his stomach drop. This time the method came back before the panic did.
He did not feel calm, just clear enough to start.
Tonight, take a scrap of paper and write one line: "The thing I am most worried about is". Let it run for five minutes if it wants to, then fold it up and do one question you have done before.
Plan2Ace
The worry page is yours. Plan2Ace gives you the clock to practise against.
Exam practice runs timed questions with nothing to peek at, and marks them for you. A good place for the one question after your practice worry page. Rather use a past paper? The method is the point.
A few more questions
Was it nerves, or did I not learn it?
At home, with your notes shut, try the question that went blank. If you can do it calmly, it was nerves. If you cannot, it was not stored yet, and a recall round will help more than writing.
Will writing about my worries make me more nervous?
It can feel uncomfortable for a minute. In the study, the students who wrote did better than the ones who did not, and the most anxious gained the most.
What if I go blank halfway through the exam?
Leave that question and do one you can. Come back to the blank one at the end, when the clock has less of a grip.
Got five minutes?
One scrap of paper, one honest worry, one old question. Or practise against the clock in Plan2Ace. Free to start.
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