Exam anxiety

[Champagnecharleyismyname]

My DD has extreme anxiety about her exams next week. It's so unexpected because she sailed through her A Levels with high grades.

She has just completed her first term and her first two modules and has two exams next week. She has worked so hard over Christmas and this week as it is a study week.

She is really tearful and absolutely convinced she is going to fail. She spoke to her tutor today who has tried to reassure her and told her she has options even if she falls both but nothing is getting through.

Any advice of what to say or do? I'm struggling here and very worried.

It's very unlike her as she is usually very resilient.

@Majaso12 not great, she doesn't think she has done enough to pass. She thinks that she doesn't have the depth of understanding. She was very low when I spoke to her. She did at least manage to sit it.

How is your DD feeling about tomorrow?

Really not sure how to get her out of feeling so anxious.

She has one more exam on Wednesday and then a waiting game I guess. She starts her next modules on Monday, it feels a bit relentless.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. Sorry to hear that. Expect she’s done better than she thinks. If she’s anything like my dd, she focuses on all the negatives rather than the positives.

She’s feeling very nervous. Said late last night she’d forgotten things she’d revised well. She’s worried they’ll mix up the order of the questions to how they are in the practice papers. In the one tomorrow, it’s multiple choice and then they pick one essay from one section and 2 essays from the next section. She has decided what topics to do the essays on and that’s where she’s focused her revision on and extra reading. If she can’t choose those ones and has to do ones she’s not revised that much or in enough detail, then it won’t be good. She said she has to remember every tiny detail from the lectures and has 90 pages of notes for each topic!

@Majaso12 our DDs are so similar! I think she is trying to learn everything in depth and I'm not sure that's possible. I do think she needs some help with revision strategies, what worked for A Levels is not working for her now.

I think I need to encourage her to get more help but I feel out of my depth as well.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. My dd has had to teach herself a lot of some topics she’s said, where her lecturers are more interested in their own research than teaching. It’s worried me, she’s missed some topics out, definitely for the exam on Thursday she has. Just hope it works for her and she can do the questions on the topics she’s done in enough detail. She said it’s impossible to revise in that much detail on every topic with the extra reading expected this year as well.

@Majaso12 I hope your DD is ok tomorrow. It worked for her last year so it sounds like a good strategy.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. Thanks. It’s just I remember her saying over Christmas, that she can’t do that this year with these exams so I’m a bit confused why she thinks she can now. Don’t feel I can question her now or it will make her more anxious.

Good luck to your dd for Wednesday. Dd also starts her next module Monday and today had a 2 hour introduction to an extra module they have to do this year, which was bad timing with an exam the next day.

@Majaso12 have you heard from your DD how it went today?

I will be so relieved when tomorrow is over.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. She said the multiple choice was so much harder than the 2 practice papers and had to leave a couple out, cos they’re negatively marked. She said it was like they were trying to catch them out. The essays weren’t too bad she didn’t think. She got a different answer to the calculation one than her friend, but didn’t sound worried about that and some weird questions in that question as well. Overall don’t think it was too bad, but said she’s annoyed how much harder the multiple choice was. Said it’s hard to know how she’s done really cos of have they mark it as well.

She’s more worried about the exam Thursday and that one is where they need all the extra reading.

Good luck to your dd tomorrows

@Majaso12 yes the negative marking is awful. So they use the same format then, that's not great. So hard to even have any idea how they've done.

I'll be very glad to see tomorrow out of the way.

Just dealing with the anxiety of waiting for results then. Also need to consider anxiety coping strategies for both of us!

@Champagnecharleyismyname. I know, I’ve been nervous all day! The exam wasn’t until 2 pm and I didn’t hear from her until 5.30 pm.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. How did your dd get on today?

My dd isn’t feeling good about tomorrow.

@Majaso12 in her words there is zero chance she has passed that exam.

I'm so worried she has failed them both and I'm not sure where we go from here. She's so able and a very hard worker so I don't know what's gone wrong. It seems to be her depth of understanding. Maybe it's just not the right environment for her.

Hope your DD is ok tomorrow.

How long is the wait for results do you know?

@Champagnecharleyismyname. I’m sorry to hear that. Hopefully she’s just being hard on herself and it’s after finding A levels straightforward as these are so much harder. Dd also found A levels so much easier. I don’t think she got her results until about March last year.

Dd was texting me late last night worried about mistakes she’d just realised she’d made in the multiple choice, said she was so nervous during the exam. Not looking forward to tomorrow!

@Majaso12 oh goodness really March! That seems such a long time. I might encourage her to go and chat to her tutor and see what he suggests. I don't think it's just a crisis of confidence but that she really has struggled with the volume of work.

She's in no state of mind to start the next two modules on Monday.

Hope your dd is ok tomorrow.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. I’ll ask dd tomorrow when she got them, but I think it was March.

How has your DD’s coursework type work gone so far if she’s had any? I can’t remember now what dd did in her first term now, but I’m sure she did some coursework and other things before her January exams.

Thank you.

@Majaso12 she's done well in the course work I think but she says they have to get 40 percent in the exams anyway and it's not a combined score.

I'm not sure if I can manage her anxiety if she has to wait until March.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. That’s good she’s done well in the coursework. My dd did better in coursework and the exams brought her percentage down a bit.

Somehow she needs to try and forget about it for a bit, which isn’t easy. My dd is one for going over her exam once she’s done it.

@Majaso12 how did your DD get on today?

@Champagnecharleyismyname . She said it was awful. Multiple choice was ok this time but all essay questions were really awful. She said it was all on the last 10 pages of her 90 pages of notes and at least one essay question she did, wasn’t a question on lecture content, was extra reading which she hadn’t done for that bit so had to try and make things up. She said everyone she heard talking about the exam after said they were all awful questions. She said she forgot things and knows she got things wrong. Really worried now.

@Majaso12 oh no that's horrible and now a big wait until the results. I do hope she's ok, hopefully if everyone found it hard, that may help in some way. I don't know what they're trying to achieve by choosing areas that have not been covered so well.

I haven't really spoken to my DD today, think she's avoiding me! I think she's going to struggle to move on and focus on the next two modules.

@Champagnecharleyismyname. she has an offer for a placement year with GSK and is worried about that now. Needs at least a 2.1, which she thought wouldn’t be a problem, but worried now after that exam. Now saying she’s worried she’s failed it.

@Majaso12 well after all that angst she passed both exams, feedback was her answers were a bit waffly but she's passed. She seems more settled this term. Next set of exams in May and now needs to find somewhere to live for year 2.

How did your DD do?

@Champagnecharleyismyname. That’s good news! I was wondering how your dd did. Is she happy with her results?

DD got her marks today. The exam she thought was awful, she ended up doing well in and did better in than the one she thought went well. She didn’t do as well in that one as she hoped. It was down to 2 essays with the same lecturer, she thinks it’s was marked very harshly and the 3rd essay on that paper with a different lecturer she did really well in, but the mark was brought down by the other 2. You can private message me if you like.