Tackling exam anxiety

As an Exam Officer and a Mum, I have seen anxiety through my own children as well as RHSB students. Anxiety can come in many forms and before an exam I see the pale, quiet, looking quite nervous students alongside the louder smiley students and everyone in between.

We need some anxiety to perform at our best, with an increase in heart rate and adrenaline providing more oxygen to our brains to improve our mental dexterity. However, too much is detrimental to our mood, exam performance and well-being. The trick is to be able to recognise feelings of anxiety and manage them, something that is quite a skill even for adults.

Here at Royal High School Bath we strive to help each student through each stage of their academic journey to make them rounded individuals, ready to go onto higher education and into the workplace to put their stamp on the world.

One of my aims as an Exam Officer is to help students feel more at ease when stepping into an exam room, know what to expect, and how to manage those feelings and help make the feelings work for them. This will help them not only now but, in the future, as they go through other stressful times in their lives.

What we do at our school:

• Targeted revision in class by teaching staff with subject based revision sessions during the school day
• Assemblies and tutor time talking through what to expect in the exam situation, what to bring, how to behave and answering student questions.
• Year group assemblies about brain development to help students understand why they are feeling like this!
• Consistency through the senior school with mock assessments ensuring familiarity and security in exam processes. Future developments to link to Prep as girls progress up to the senior school.
• Motivational emails about the importance of balance between work and taking time for mindful and relaxation time.
• Tips and Techniques to use throughout the year, not just at exam times

What can you do as a parent when you can’t do anything right for doing wrong?

• Create an environment for your daughter to work effectively. A shopping trip to stock up on pens, paper and revision items before revision begins starts them on the right track.
• Take an interest and talk and although this is not always easy, persevere when talking about what they are revising and when their exams are coming up.
• When your daughter is working, I found that a cup of tea and fresh cake always went down well. It lets them know that the world is still turning outside of revision/exams and life is going on as normal
• Offer to help test them or go through key information. Admittedly my children didn’t take me up on the offer, but it was the thought that counts! It depends on how they like to learn and revise – take your cues from how they find they work best.

These suggestions are a good starting point, and whilst they may not all be applicable for every student they may help your daughter feel supported in the run up to exams.

Finally, I think that many students in general have a fear around testing and exams and think that mistakes and failures are awful things to do. Let them know that it’s okay, we have all made mistakes, and wished that we had done something different at some point in our lives. But each of us have learnt from it and next time made better choices, been more aware and made changes.

I hope that this article has been useful and given you some ideas to help with of examination anxiety. I am an advocate for making the exam process less scary using the power of knowledge and experience, so we all feel a little more relaxed when stepping into the exam room.