You’re sitting in the exam hall, waiting impatiently for the invigilator to say those magic words; “You may now open your question paper”.

How can you get the most of the next 20 minutes? Here are my tips:

Read the question requirement first
The longer scenario questions can take ages to read, so save time by reading the question requirement first. Once you know what the examiner is asking for, you can then read through the scenario, highlighting the information that will be relevant to your answer.

Look out for hidden extras
Sometimes, a one-sentence question can be hiding more than one requirement. Here’s an example from P2 in May:

‘Explain how JYT could use target costing and Kaizen costing to improve its future performance.’

This required two explanations, one for target and one for Kaizen. Don’t get caught out! Draw a big circle around the ‘and’, so you don’t forget when you look at the question again. Commas and semi-colons are also good indicators of a multiple-requirement answer. Don’t forget the verb requirement – see our verbs article for more details.

Plan your answers
Although you can’t write in your answer book, there are usually a few blank areas of the question paper you can use to draw up plans. Think about how you’ll structure your answer – for clues look at the topic, the verb, and the marks allocated. You can then plan your content, always remembering to relate it back to the scenario. The PERT technique is useful here – see this recent article from BPP.

Know your plan of attack
You can try different approaches during your mock exams, but here are some suggestions to start you off.

Firstly, have a quick read through the exam paper. Then;

  E1, F1, P1 – get through as many of the section A questions as you can. If  you can't complete them without a calculator, start planning your section C answers.
  E2, F2, P2 – plan your section B answers.
  E3, P3. F3 – choose your section B questions, and plan your answers.
  T4 – read carefully through the unseen material, making notes.

A tutor once told me that it's possible to pass or fail an exam in the reading time. Make sure you use yours wisely!

See more exam tips in the video below: