Strategies to Help You Pass Aptitude Tests

Taking any form of exam is stressful and challenging, but the end goal is always the same; to pass and do well in order to move forward in your education. Any kind of exam requires revision and preparation, which you may want to begin early on to ensure you can stay up to date with your course material.

Being organised and focused could be the key to passing your exams with flying colours, but sometimes it isn’t that easy. If you aren’t feeling too confident when it comes to preparing yourself effectively for your exams, then there are a few straightforward strategies you can follow!

Exams can cover any number of topics, usually involving academic material. However, if you are studying medicine, there are some tests which are slightly different. Designed not to test your scientific knowledge, but instead assess your skills and abilities, these tests are sometimes used in the admissions process for university. This type of exam can be more difficult to prepare for as you don’t have specific course material to learn in a certain amount of time. The UKCAT is one such example of this.

UKCAT Assessment

The UK Clinical Aptitude Test (UKCAT) includes different formats, including the likes of verbal reasoning and other seemingly straightforward assessments. As it doesn’t test what you haven’t learnt in class, it can be more difficult to revise for.

Aptitude tests are put in place to ensure universities or colleges are accepting students that will succeed; making sure that everyone has a fair chance in their applications. The UKCAT itself includes the likes of verbal reasoning, decision making and situational judgement; skills that will not only help you in medical school but also in other areas of education.

Skills of this kind can be applied to any course or career path, so it’s important that you find the best strategy to do as well as you can.

How do you prepare for aptitude tests?

Tests such as verbal reasoning exams are carried out across a number of courses, and are often full of unfamiliar content. Any existing knowledge you have from your chosen course is unlikely to be helpful, so it’s important to just focus on the question in hand. While it’s great that you may have a wealth of knowledge about medicine, law or other course, it won’t be relevant in a verbal reasoning test.

With this in mind, you will probably want to get your hands on practice exams in order to familiarise yourself with the types of questions and content you could be faced with.

Multiple choice questions should be approached with the concept of process of elimination. They will probably include answers that are wrong, but almost right. While this isn’t out to trick you, you should remember that only one answer is correct, unless the question states otherwise.

Likewise, you will never have points deducted for a wrong answer so don’t leave anything blank! You may gain a few extra points from an educated guess.

The UKCAT itself might include sections that require a refresh on your maths skills. Quantitative reasoning tests may require you to understand percentages, averages and fractions.

When it comes to preparing for your next test, whether it is an aptitude test or an academic exam, equip yourself with the best possible resources. Contact Pastest for your online revision guide today.