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It’s rare to find a student paying for tuition who is just doing the learning for fun. Usually, there’s a goal—an exam, or a series of exams, and ultimately, a qualification. That qualification might be the end goal or a stepping stone to the next qualification, but one thing remains universal: all tutees want to do as well as they can.
If there’s one phrase I hear most often as a tutor, it’s: “I understand the subject, but I don’t know how to answer the exam questions”. While gentle questioning often reveals the odd gap in subject knowledge, another near-universal truth is that schools and colleges don’t always have time to cover both exam technique and all of the subject content.
As tutors, we are uniquely positioned to reinforce subject knowledge and provide solid exam preparation. By incorporating exam questions into our sessions, we can test knowledge, reassure students, and provide a grounding in the techniques needed to gain the maximum possible marks.
Why learning how to answer exam questions is important
Common pitfalls
1. Failing to address the question
Having marked papers for two exam boards over the past few years, the saddest thing to see is the empty answer line. The second saddest, however, is the answer that is full of correct information but that in no way answers the question asked.
Example:
An exam question asks students to compare and contrast two features: A and B.
The student writes completely factually correct information, one paragraph about A and one paragraph about B. The student scores no marks, however, because they haven’t answered the question as it is set.
A comparison needs to describe the similarities and differences between A and B; to contrast, they also need to explicitly state what A has that B doesn’t have, and vice versa. What the student has done in their answer is describe A and then describe B. The information is buried in there, but it’s not the job of the examiner to piece it together and assume what the student means.
2. Dropping marks in extended response exam questions
Lack of exam practice can also drop students’ marks. Some exams now include levelled response questions worth 6-9 marks, and some exams include level-graded essays.
Including irrelevant or incorrect information limits the grades that can be achieved.
Example:
This 2022 OCR (A) A Level Biology question is a good example.
To score beyond level 1 (maximum two marks), students must refer to the quoted Figure 16.3. To achieve a maximum of six marks, they need to talk about the correct type of mutation, refer to the figure, and include more than one level of protein structure.
What many students do when faced with a question like this is see the word mutation and immediately start writing everything they know about mutations. This costs them marks because, as well as writing about the correct sort, they will include mutations that can result in vastly altered proteins—which is the opposite of the question asked.
This volume of incorrect information drops them down within the level they achieve. For example, if they are level 1, instead of the two marks available at this level, they lost the communication mark and now have only one mark. It has also probably cost them valuable exam time.
Another thing students often do is miss the nuances within the question-wording. “Use Fig. 16.3” is in bold, and that’s designed to direct the student’s attention to the importance of using the figure. When asking for protein structure, the plural “levels” is used—signalling that more than one level must be discussed.
Students frequently say they don’t know what the question wants. By spending time teaching them how to read the question, how to answer concisely, and how to interpret the command words properly, we can vastly increase their confidence and capacity to do well.
When to introduce exam questions
When to introduce exam questions depends entirely on your student. There are arguments for each of the following.
1. At the start of a new topic
If your student has indicated that they are good with the subject knowledge, then starting with some exam questions is a good method to gauge how comfortable they are and whether they need a quick review of the content before introducing further questions.
It’s also a useful way to identify any gaps and misconceptions, allowing you to target specific areas and make the most of your session time. Larger, multi-part exam questions are particularly useful here, as they help pinpoint the areas that need more work.
2. After teaching each section
If the subject at hand easily chunks down into smaller subtopics, it makes sense to bring up questions at the end of each section. This reinforces the content while it’s still fresh and can give students a confidence boost. Simpler recall questions such as “describe”, “state”, “name”, etc., are useful for this. It helps students become familiar with different question types without breaking the flow of the lesson, especially if you have a lot to cover.
3. Once the topic is well understood
Once you’re confident with the student’s progress on a particular topic or their general confidence level, it’s a good time to bring in the more challenging, applied questions. These are often more holistic, bringing in more parts of the specification than the simpler questions, and can ask the student to apply their subject knowledge to new contexts or data.
These questions can be really challenging and often can’t be rushed, but generally, students feel like they’ve earned their marks on these ones.
Ways to incorporate exam questions into lessons
Obviously, we can just drop exam questions in as we go along; uploading them via PDF or screenshot to the lesson space is very straightforward.
Some other techniques for incorporating exam questions into lessons include:
1. By stealth
This works especially well for anxious or low-confidence students. If a question is high-scoring and fits the content well, using a graphic organiser that demonstrates the structure of a question with students can have them answering the question before they’ve had sight of it.
For example: “Compare and Contrast A and B.”
Once the student is happy with the ideas surrounding A and B, present them with a Venn diagram: one sphere for A, one for B, and the overlap for both. Once they’ve completed the Venn diagram, show them the exam question and how they have already answered it.
Different visual tools can reinforce this technique:
- Tables for “describe and explain” questions
- Weighing scales for “evaluate” questions
- Labelled diagrams to label that match one from an existing question
It’s much harder for a student to believe they can’t answer a question when you have just shown them they did!
2. Flipped learning
Flipped learning requires the students to review the subject content independently before they see you, and come prepared to answer questions during the tutoring session. It works best for very confident and able students who can cope with and take on board live feedback.
3. Gamification
This takes more effort but is more fun. There are plenty of good websites where you can gamify questions. Educaplay and Triptico are two examples. Flashcard generators such as Quizlet can also be used. These tend to be the more simple sorts of questions, but are engaging and a nice way to break up a lot of content.
A quiz on transcription and translation created using Educaplay.
Adapting for different students
Flexibility in lesson structuring and delivery is key to meeting the diverse needs of students. By tailoring strategies to each student, we can help them develop both subject knowledge and exam technique in a way that feels manageable and effective.
Building slowly
For students who are struggling—start low stakes. Let them know they can begin with an open book policy; it’s better to refer to notes to answer than stall or get stuck. Gradually building complexity from the bottom up is the best approach here.
- Start with ‘gap-fill’ questions, where they choose the best word to add. Make sure they read through the entire paragraph before starting.
- ‘Label the diagram’ questions are also low stakes. Start with familiar diagrams from textbooks or the notes you’ve developed with them. Then, provide them with unfamiliar diagrams and ask them to transfer the information over—this is the start of application instead of recall.
- From here, ‘state and give’ type questions are the next step. These are short and require specific recall but not specific language. If they can’t remember the specific term, describing or defining it might still work and provides a chance to build keyword knowledge.
- Finally, introduce ‘name’ questions. These require specific keywords, but you’ve just done a pile of those, so the student is feeling more equipped.
As the complexity builds, so do the foundations and, hopefully, the confidence and ability of the student.
Frameworking
An empty page can be very daunting, so providing a framework to work within gives students a place to start.
Example:
A question asks the student to evaluate a conclusion based on several sets of data.
This can feel pretty overwhelming as there’s a lot of information to take in. However, if the student knows to add two headings to the side of their answer line first: “Agree with conclusion” and “Disagree with conclusion”, the blank page has been broken, and they have a place to start.
If there are two sets of data, figure 1 and figure 2, they can add those as subheadings underneath the “Agree” and “Disagree” headings. Now, they don’t have to suddenly understand everything the data is telling them; they just have to look for parts that agree with the conclusion or disagree with the conclusion, which is a lot more manageable.
Using the mark schemes and examiners’ reports
For some reason, students think using the mark scheme is cheating, but it’s an excellent way to learn what the exam board wants.
The questions by topic packs on Physics & Maths Tutor are so useful for this. Students can look through a topic pack mark scheme, see what keywords come up most often, make sure they’re familiar with them, and use them in questions about that topic.
I often tell students that if they’re answering an enzyme question and haven’t mentioned “Enzyme Substrate Complexes”, they should go back and check their answer!
For complex processes, the mark scheme will neatly outline the steps for you, so use them in your notes. For big questions, the mark scheme will be structured, and this is a framework students can use in their answers going forward.
Students also often believe they’re not allowed to use tables, bullet points or headings. Examiners’ reports will contradict that belief. For example, when the examiner says: “the best answers used a table”, that should give the students the confidence to use one.
Not answering questions (yet)
If a student is too nervous to answer questions in the session, time spent annotating the question and decoding what information is needed is just as valuable. The student can take that question away and try it in their own time, with their own resources, and with the confidence that they know what the question means.
Highlighting command terms by annotating the information needed to achieve it, pointing out the bold words, deciphering the nuance, and then identifying the content is a skill that takes practice and is as useful as coming up with answers.
The most able student may be able to perfectly recall all of the content yet still trip up on exam technique. Answering questions well is a learned skill and one that with time and the right toolset, all students can learn.
By integrating exam questions into tutoring sessions, we can help students learn how to read, interpret, and respond to the nuances of exam questions effectively.
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