05 Nov Dealing with Midterms…

At home in the UK, we don’t really have midterms, but I suppose this depends on what your degree is. For me, with English Literature and American studies, we hardly have exams halfway through the semester. These are usually saved for the end, most commonly in January. We have various essays that need to be completed, like here in the USA too. But, midterms are an alien concept! Last week, I completed two midterms within one week. This was also quite stressful as I had my family visiting during this time, and I obviously wanted to spend as much time with them as possible. Yet, I had to be revising too! It sucked! However, I made it through, and managed to spend loads of time with them, and didn’t even do too badly on the exams! Balancing the revision for your midterms is so important, as you should be doing an even amount for the subjects, even if you find one easier than others!

For some reason, my next midterm is this Thursday, and then another one next week too! In some cases, for me, my professors didn’t tell us about the midterm and their relevant revision / content until 2 days before the exam! I heard that this is quite a common thing here with some professors, so, I’d say a good and helpful thing to do is categorise your relevant revision before they tell you what the exam will be on. In my case, it’s the readings we have to do for each class every week. Sometimes, I find it hard to keep on top of all of my work, so some readings are missed out. Therefore, before the exam I will make sure I have gone through all the readings. And, most importantly, don’t panic!!!