Alok Amul Parikh
Frank E. Ritter (ed., revised 23 Dec. 2000 and 2 Sept. 2006)
8 Oct 2000
Here are some tips that I feel a student should know to score more marks on his or her Homework and Exam. One important thing that a student has to keep in mind is that he (or she) has to make the job easy for himself/herself as well as the person who is going to correct the work....not forgetting the fact that he/she has to score good marks as well. I am also a student like you and here are some of the things that I do to get more marks. Also listed are some get-more-marks tips that I got from the graders who assessed my work. Some of these are oriented towards neatness and presentation,and believe me, these two aspects play a major role in the marks you are going to get.
a. Many Professors/Graders who are correcting, love to see a homework/exam that has all the answers in the same order as that of the given questions. It makes their life easy. And you get right marks for the right answer.
[not that they mark down for wrong order, it's just that their head is more in the same place as your work is. Perceptual fluency, how easy things appear to be to read, lead people to think that they understand the material that they read, and thus that the writer knows the material as well. -FER]
b.Always make sure that you put the question number before you start writing the answer for a particular question.For example. if you are answering Q3 on Pg25 and problem 4 then this is how you can put it as Pg.25 Q3. 4.( the answer starts here..)
c.It also helps the person who is correcting your work if the marker does not have to hunt for the beginning of each new answer. So you can highlight or mark the question number. What I do is that, I put a box or a circle around the question number.
Example: ______ Pg.25 | Q3. | 4. | (start your answer here) ______|
d. If you are not running short of paper then you can start every new question on a new page. Of course, if you support the cause of trees then it's up to you. But this will really make your work presentable. Example. You gotta answer Q3 problems 3, 4, 5 and Q5 problems 2, 3 this is how you can do it.
_____________ |Q3. | |3. . | | . | | . | | | |4. . | | . | | . | | | |_____________| _____________ |Q3. | |5. . | | . | | . | | . | | . | | | |_____________|
Ah Ah Ah, aren't we forgetting something..... we should put the
question numbers in boxes or circles.
e. As mentioned before, neatness plays a major role in homework/exam. My personal experience says that if your work is neat, but your answer is wrong, the professor may give you some credit for taking the pains and presenting a neat answer.
f. The same goes with handwriting.....it does not matter whether you handwriting is good or it is bad, but it should be eligible [legible-ed.]. If the marker does not understand/know what they are reading, how can he give marks for the same?
g. whenever you are required to write an answer that has many steps/points, you can underline the steps or maybe circle the point.
Example. __ Step1 or |1.| ----- -- __ Step2 |2.| ----- --
h. Do not forget to mention you Name/Section/Homework number and other such required information on the front page of you work. [And date -FER]
Well....these are some of the tips that I remember at present. I'll add in more later. It's not a hard and fast rule that you need to follow all the above. No one is going to cut marks if you do not follow them. But I am pretty sure that it will surely help you to score more and add a finishing touch to your homework/exam, if you followed the above tips. bye.