Sweatless Final Exams!
ByIn our previous post about the “No Sweat’” elite final exam takers, we revealed the simple secret. Yes, in the words of Dr. Stephen Covey, author of the New York Times best seller “7 Habits of Highly Successful People” you “begin with the end in mind.”
Simple. Easy? Yes and no. To join the “No Sweat” club you need to do one core action. Just one!
Here it is: “Collect and store.” “Collect and store.” “Collect and store.” Like someone intent on making and collecting money or practicing and sharpening skills for a beloved game, sport or activity, you are ALWAYS aware when a valuable piece of information comes your way.
For some of us (I am certainly in this group) the collecting comes very naturally. It is the STORE part that is a problem. Store means to put in a safe place where it can be quickly and easily retrieved when needed. If notes are made in class they are not wadded up in the bottom of a bookbag or folded up and stuck in some book somewhere.
This requires a systematic process of collecting papers, articles and related information and placing each item in a specific physical or virtual place within a system such as the Pace-It Instant Organizer for students. The practice of collecting items and placing them carefully in a structured system for future rapid retrieval is a daily and hourly discipline.
Like many other habits which can make a success or failure of the final result the “No Sweat” approach must be a long term committment and practice to get the desired “final” result.
It really is just one simple action but it must be done over and over again! Only then do you get that winning moment when the time comes and you can say with certainty: “No sweat. I am ready!”
