The Exam Study Plan

Count the reviews and the practice tests, not just the pages, finish new material two weeks out, test yourself instead of re-reading, and practice the exam itself

BulbBrain's free Study Time Calculator answers one question well: pages times minutes a page. Its own advice says testing yourself and spaced review beat re-reading, and it counts neither; the Focus Session Calculator counts the focus blocks in one sitting and never asks how many sittings stand between you and the exam. On the plan's example course, 240 pages at 5 minutes a page, the calculator says 20 hours. The Exam Study Plan joins the site's own tools into one calendar for one exam. It takes your study pace from three timed pages of your own course (the example reader does 250 words a minute on easy prose and 90 studying with notes), counts the whole job with a 25-minute self-test for every chapter at 1, 3, 7, 14 and 28 days and three practice tests (47 h 25 min, of which the first pass is 42%), and sets it against the focus minutes a real week of sittings holds. New material is finished 15 days before the exam so its two-week review still lands in time: front-loaded, the example gets 37 reviews done; spread evenly, 25, with the last chapter 1 h 30 min short on exam morning. Practice tests are sat like the exam and tracked in points against the pass mark, and a late start shows what to cut first: re-reading, never the reviews. It is not brain training and makes no claim to raise IQ, memory or general thinking ability: practice improves the practiced task, which is why it practices the exam itself. Spaced review and self-testing are well supported study methods; the intervals and minutes are rules of thumb, and every figure is computed by the site's own calculators on example numbers you replace with yours. While writing it we fixed the Brain Training Progress Tracker, which called a faster time a dip. Included: 24 printable pages with 7 steps, an hours count, a chapter tracker, a week planner and a practice test log, plus a personalised sheet worked out from the numbers you enter in the calculator you came from.

Look inside

Two full pages from the plan, exactly as printed. Click either to read it at full size before you decide.

What is in it

• Time It on the Real Pages: your study pace from three timed pages of your own course, not your reading speed
• The First Pass Is Under Half: the whole job with a self-test for every chapter and the practice tests
• Count Focus Minutes, Not Free Hours: what a real week of sittings holds, from our Focus Session Calculator
• New Material Ends Two Weeks Out: a front-loaded calendar against an even spread, chapter by chapter
• Test, Don't Re-read: a 25-minute self-test at 1, 3, 7, 14 and 28 days, and a week-by-week plan
• Practice the Exam Itself: full practice papers, tracked in points against the pass mark and in percent for the trend
• Cut Re-reading First: a four-week late start, and what to cut and add so every chapter still gets its reviews
• The hours count and the chapter tracker, printable
• The week planner and the practice test log, printable
• Focus minutes by sitting length, reviews that fit before the exam, and a one-page quickstart

The plan picks up where the free Study Time Calculator leaves off. The calculator counts one pass through the pages; the plan adds a self-test review for every chapter at 1, 3, 7, 14 and 28 days and the practice tests, sets the whole job against the focus minutes your week holds with the Focus Session Calculator, takes your study pace from the Reading Speed Calculator, and tracks practice test scores with the Brain Training Progress Tracker. It is not brain training: it makes no claim to raise IQ, memory or general thinking ability, and says plainly that practice improves the practiced task, which is why it practices the exam itself. For concentration or memory problems, see a doctor; if exam stress ever feels like too much, in the US call or text 988. The worked figures are examples; your calendar is yours to fill in.