Panic

Binderbear

I am sitting my MAC exam on Monday and am starting to think that everything in my brain is going to vanish at the point that i open the paper.
Does anyone have any good tips on how to remain calm during this last week, how to remember everything i have read and practiced and how not to fall apart?

tattookitten

Hey,

Just stay calm and take deep breathes. I kind of do a relaxed meditation thing when I go in and sit at my desk. I also take either a couple of kalms or a paracetamol to stop myself from feeling anxious.
Also another weird thing I do is spray a little bit of my bf aftershave on my jumper, this means I can smell it in the exam and it makes me feel more comfortable because my brain thinks that he's about.

Umm the only other things I can recommend are, get a good nights sleep, get there early, make sure you use the reading time as reading time so you suck it all in.

Try and find something that normally relaxes you - listening to music, having a cry (yup it works because it gets rid of the tension), have a scream (lol not in the exam room!), do other adult things that relax you if you know what I mean

Good luck!!!

tattookitten

Sorry that was all for the day of the exam.

For the rest of the week I'd say, revise a little bit but don't drown yourself in it too much. Get some sunshine and try to be positive!

Binderbear

Thankyou. The smell of my husband on my jumper may be the thing to keep me calm. Never thought of that.
Good luck to you for any exams you are sitting.

Barbara Knight

Hi There
This is probably not what everyone recommends, but I always start a paper by reading the first set of questions only. If I can do that then I start it straight away. I don't look at anything else on the paper as I may not know how to do it and then I will flap like mad, get stressed and make mistakes. Once I have done the first question, that is OK so I feel OK then I look at the second and so on. If I meet something hideous that I can't see how to do, I just leave it for now and go onto the next question. Then by the time I have done evyrthing I can, I am calmer as most of the paper is done and I know how much time I have left just to concentrate on the stuff I can't do so well and as the brain ticks away in the background whilst you are doing other questions, sometimes the answer comes to you by the time you go back to the hideous queation anyway... and if it doesn't you know that you have done most of the paper and not wasted so much time on the hard bit that you end up not doing loads of the paper - and what you have done may just be enough to get you through anyway....... I know this is not what examiners recommend - they say to use the 15 minutes to read through the whole paper - I did that with the first AAT exam I took and it all just seemed so daunting, question after question aftern question....but there is 3 hours to do it all so why scare yourself to death at the start? Call me a coward but it works for me!!!!

Alternatively if you find the section 2 questions easier than section 1 then start with section 2 and then takle the hard stuff once you feel more confident have done a section already.

Doing MAC on Monday which is dead scarey, will start at 1.1 and work my way through to the end...................and then go down the pub!

Good luck

Barbara :thumbup1:

lorraine

That is what i normally do, because you feel better after each question completed without frightening yourself to death and i dont think you need to read the whole paper, just the information to do with that question and the question/s before. and i like the fact section 1 and 2 are separate as its like a clean start so to speak and you can put the other section behind you. I remember in the PEV exam in december i had not completed section one fully and so looked at the clock and thought god i better get on with section 2 thank god i did that. I know that i did second part of section one wrong but i still passed. not sure how though, i guess as long as you show competence and have done enough questions right you will pass - goodluck everyone - now im worried about pcr i dont like the revised budget questions!!!