What To Do When You Don’t Know What To Do On a Test

We’ve all been there. Test day. Super confident, thinking you’re going to ace the exam. It’s all going smoothly until you get to one question. And then, you completely blank. You remember where it was on the study guide and what it was surrounded by in your notes, but you have no clue what the answer is. And while no amount of studying will make this nightmare fully unavoidable, there are a few ways you can help solve the issue if it comes up.

Circle and Come Back

This is pretty much out of test taking 101, but if you don’t know what the answer is to a question, don’t waste your time trying to figure it out. Circle, star, or bookmark the question so that you know to come back to it later. Not only will this save you time, but you’ll also be able to see if any other questions jog your memory. Because, chances are, at least one other question or answer choice will give you a little more information that you forgot, and could even end up triggering your brain!

Use The Test To Take The Test

This goes right along with our last tip, and is especially true if your teacher is making your tests! Oftentimes, they will (whether intentionally or not) leave clues about certain questions in other questions around the test. If you forget something, take a look around. This is frequently done in history, science, or English, but other subjects could also apply to this trick.

Look For Keywords & Clues

Even if you don’t know the exact answer to a question, certain keywords will help you with process of elimination. Often, things that are ‘always’ or ‘never’ true are overemphasized in class, so it’s less likely that you’ll forget them. By the same token, if you’re lost in the answer choices, you can probably scratch out ones that use words like these.

Think About the Relationships

If you know around half of the content and are struggling between two or three answer choices, search for phrases that would indicate opposites or direct parallels. If two answers are nearly identical (in a way that you can’t distinguish one from another), then they are probably both wrong. Relatedly, if there are two answers choices that are direct opposites, then one of them is probably right. There is always a best possible answer, so try to find the one that sticks out or makes an important distinction from the others.

Hopefully, these four tricks will help you when taking a test. But, if all else fails, there’s a 25% chance you get the answer right just by guessing! And if you liked this, be sure to check out our other blog posts below or in the Blog page.