Burnout Before Test Day

cheyennetlewis

Hey guys,

I’ve been drilling pretty hard for Saturday’s exam. I started feeling burnout on Monday and have been taking a break from the material. Would it still be a good idea to do a RC passage and logic game Friday? Is there anything I can do to shorten having burnout?

Quick Silver

in my experience, it's super important to take it easy the day/night before the test.

If you want to do a PT Thursday, fine. But I would focus on your review sheet Friday. I suppose you could get away with a timed section or two but I really would avoid that if possible. I think your time is spent reviewing strategies, going over lessons where you have blindspots and BRing any remaining Qs from your most recent PT.

There are few things you can control/learn the day before, so taking care of yourself is the top priority. That means getting an IDEAL amount of sleep (not getting by, but a full nights sleep - get to bed early). Your brain needs sleep to perform at peak levels.

One of the toughest things you need to do the day before the test is stop studying. At some point you need to put the books aside, have a nice dinner and relax. Make sure your go-bag is ready with snacks and materials for test day, then chill.

I tell my students to watch a favorite funny movie. Napoleon Dynamite gets almost magically calms my nerves and gets me laughing the night before a big exam

cheyennetlewis

@"Quick Silver" Thank you so much! I'll definitely take it easy tomorrow.

KlaraHenry

my plan is to just do super light review tomorrow--whatever that means for you (for example, I'll just review some lists of flaws that might pop up on LR), and then one or two games I've already done before the morning of the exam/maybe reading a New Yorker article before I walk to the test center, literally just something to get your brain in the right mindset that it's time for an intellectually stimulating day. you should not be actually learning anything new at this point! it's too late to be absorbing new information so all you should be doing on Friday or Saturday morning is just keeping up the routine so it's fresh and you're in the headspace to take a tough exam. best of luck!!