4 Tips for Finals Week

Getting through those four days like a pro.

Originally published on May 23, 2017

(This should have published weeks before; there was a glitch that prevented it from being published until it was)

For those of you who have yet to finish your finals, here are a couple tips to help you get through to the end of the semester (and more importantly, to summer!).

1. Know when your finals are

This may seem like a given, but I can’t tell you how many people kept asking when exactly the final for the class is. It should be listed on the syllabus. Look them up, and make a schedule for your entire week. You might find out there are days where you have no finals. Taking those into account, you can create a study schedule. Figure out which finals will have the most material or will be the most difficult and set aside the most time for them.

2. Make a study guide

If the professor has not made a study guide for you, make one for yourself. Better yet, even if they are giving you a study guide, make your own as well because chances are not every single detail will be on the given study guide. With your own guide, you can focus on the topics you are less confident in and by having to go through all your notes again, you can remind yourself about certain topics you may have forgotten about. Study your old tests and quizzes as well. Many professors will re-use questions, especially if they are about main ideas. Study what you did not do well on for other exams.

3. Get plenty of sleep

You might think you have the ability to pull an all-nighter, but trust me, you don’t. Even if you could stay up late enough to get through all your notes and have it perfectly memorized and understood, by the time your final comes around you will be so tired you won’t be able to remember anything you “learned” the night before. Study early enough in the night, go to bed at a reasonable hour, and then go over the things you are least confident on one last time first thing in the morning. That way they are fresh in your head and your head, in turn, is alert and ready to take a final.

4. Don’t forget to relax

There are many stresses which occur in relation to finals week. For some of us, we just dislike taking exams, and to have a whole week dedicated to them is near torture. For others, perhaps a looming less-than-stellar grade is motivating us to try and pull through at the last minute. Having four or more big tests in four days is a stressful thing, overall. Therefore, take time to relax. Unless you have back-to-back finals, after you finish one, take a nice long break before you start worrying about the next. Take a walk, get some food, or get some sleep if you did stay up too late. Just know where the line is, and where the fun needs to stop in order to get your mind back into studying gear.

Good luck with finals, everyone! Study hard!