Carrying through yesterday’s gladiator analogy, how do you face your lesser opponents?
Do you use them as sparring partners? Or do you face them with fear, Scared that you might fall in these early battles?
If you are scared of every quiz and every test, there is no chance of walking into your PANCE with confidence. Confidence is something you have to practice. Something you have to draw up from your well of successes. If you practice being scared on these smaller test days, guess what your brain will do on the big day?
It will totally freak out.
Use quizzes and tests throughout PA school as “practice,” as “sparring partners.” Take advantage of all of these chances to perform under stress. A “little” stress on a medicine exam is NOTHING compared with PANCE day.
Use those days to grow. Use those days to show yourself that you don’t need to be afraid. Bank each success as a memory to build on.
Practice with different approaches. Evaluate how your test went and then change something you’re doing and see if the next one goes better. Stop doing MORE of the same things and start thinking about DIFFERENT approaches.
Never thought of different approaches? Never thought of different ways to go about taking tests? Like athletes choosing what to eat for dinner the night before a race. Choosing what playlist to listen to. Choosing to play deeper in the infield because the hitters are stronger or up on the grass because it’s thick and hasn’t been mowed. You need to think more.
How about honing your strategy for answering questions on these “lesser” exams? What? You can have a strategy for answering questions? I thought you just plowed through…
No NO no
Yes. If you don’t have a system for answering test questions, you’re missing out. You’re leaving points on the table and you also don’t have a system for getting better.
Not to worry.
In the June issue of Physician Assistant Exam Scholars, I’ll show you my system for answering questions. I use what I call the percent confidence score. If you’ve never considered a system for test taking, I’d snap up this issue and see what this one idea will do for your scores.
Once you know it, you can use it immediately; you’ll get even better if you’ve got more tests before your PANCE so you can practice and adjust. Practice and adjust. That’s the key to getting even better.
Join by Sunday night. These issues don’t come back too often, and this will change your test-taking forever.
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Physician Assistant Exam Scholars
Brian Wallace
