The most helpful thing that a student can do to prepare for an exam is to organize the pertinent information in some way. Although your mind is not designed like a filing cabinet, it can function that way when appropriate. If your knowledge about a topic is arranged in your memory systematically, you can search for it efficiently. On the other hand, if your mind is like a "junk drawer" into which you have put things haphazardly, you may know that it's in there somewhere but have difficulty finding it. Any kind of orderly arrangement of the information helps remembering it.
It is easy to show the efficacy of organization for memory. Do these simple exercises: Slowly read the following list of 12 numbers once, then close your eyes, wait about 3 seconds and then try to repeat the list in order: 3-8-1-1-6-2-3-9-5-4-6-2. Try another similar list: 4-2-5-8-1-2-9-3-4-6-5-1. Very few people can repeat a list of twelve random numbers.
Next, try to repeat a 12-digit list that has a simple, irrelevant type of organization. Read the following list as 4 sets of 3 digits: 838-572-614-691. Try another: 324-549-478-821. Although you probably cannot repeat all of these group-organized lists, most people do noticeably better than with the random lists.
Because I have used digits for these exercises, a relevant type of organization would be numerical order. Next, try to repeat a list of 12 digits that is numerically organized: 1-1-2-2-3-3-4-5-6-6-8-9. Try another of this type: 1-1-2-2-3-4-4-5-5-6-8-9. You probably did much better on those lists (which, incidentally, are the same numbers as in the first two random lists, re-organized). Now, try to repeat a list that are organized both numerically and group: 112-345-667-889. Try yet one final organized list: 122-344-457-889. These last two lists are the earlier grouped lists put in numerical order, and you probably found them easiest to repeat. Organization helps.
Why does organization help memory if your mind is not really designed like a filing cabinet? Because you recall information from your memory by giving yourself îrecall cuesï. A recall cue is any stimulus that can elicit from your memory the information you are trying to remember: S (cue) - ý R (information). Most of the time, the exam item itself serves as a recall cue: S (item) -> R (answer). It is when you can't immediately think of the right answer that you have to search your memory for the desired informa tion. Rather than just sitting there hoping that it "comes to you," you can remind yourself of the way you had the information organized and search for it in a systematic way:
There are many forms of organization and I shall illustrate some of them. They all share the property of showing how main ideas are related to each other.
One familiar and versatile form of organization is an outline. A good study outline organizes information under headings and subheadings. For example, let us outline the contents of this chapter thus far: 7. Preparing for exams A. Introduction a. Positive attitude (show results of effort) b. Learning vs memory (acquiring vs recalling knowledge) B. Purpose of Exams a. Assessment (important regardless of outcome) b. Stimulator/motivator (shift from learning to memory) c. Reward (grade distribution) C. Tactics a. Organization 1. Value (when need to search memory) 2. Types (outline, ....)
Note that the study outline includes the main ideas. Hence it not only organizes the key terms, it summarizes the important nformation. If you have studied the above outline, you are prepared for questions such as, "Why is it important to have a distribution of grades?" or "When is organization of knowledge valuable?" You hould have learned the answers from the text, but the outline can help you remember them on the exam.
Graphic means of organization are especially helpful because one can usually remember pictures better than words. Diagrams, figures, charts, and graphs can be used to organize many kinds of information, especially if it has several facets. Let me give one example: If you were preparing for a final exam over the material in this book, you might combine the figure shown in chapter 3 with the one at the beginning of this chapter. The aggregate figure would look like this:
Now connect the dots and end with pointed arrows first from knowledge up to speaker-writer, then down from listening/reading to knowledge, and then up again to examination. Next, let us add memorization to the figure. Because memorization doesn't require understanding, you can draw an arrow at the verbal level directly from listening/reading to examination and label it "memorize".
Further, the chapter on information processing pointed out that interpretation of what one hears or reads depends importantly on what one already knows. Hence, you can draw a return arrow back up from understanding to listening/reading to depict this bilateral relation. Label that return arrow, "interpretation." Finally, any new knowledge has to be integrated with old knowledge, so draw a circular arrow from understanding back to itself; label that arrow "integration."
What I hope you see is how a picture can organize information by showing the relationships among many of the ideas that were presented separately in a text. It is therefore valuable to develop skill in devising graphic techniques of organization. But remember,îany kind of organization is helpfulï. Alphabetical, chronological, numerical, and hierarchical are other useful methods in the organization rubric.