Take the test before you study
This one sounds wrong. Like really wrong. Take a test on stuff you haven't learned yet? Yep. That's exactly what we're doing — and it's one of the most powerful study tricks in the world.
What it is
Pretesting means trying a quiz before you've studied. You'll fail. That's the whole point. The questions you got wrong tell you exactly what to study.
Scientists have tested this on thousands of students. Every time, the kids who took the test before studying ended up remembering more than the kids who studied first. Even when they got every single question wrong.
When you guess at an answer, your brain cares about that question. It wants to know if it got it right. So when you later see the correct answer, your brain says "OH! That's the answer!" and locks it in.
If you'd just read the answer with no question first, your brain would barely notice. Failing first makes your brain curious. Curiosity makes things stick. That's the whole trick.
How to do it
- Find a practice quiz (BBC Bitesize, past papers, end-of-chapter questions)
- Take it cold — no studying first, no peeking
- Answer every question, even if you're guessing
- Score it honestly
- For every wrong answer, write the question and the right answer down
- Study only those topics — that's your study plan
- Take the test again a few days later
A kid using it
Meet Jamal. Year 6. He's got a spelling test on Friday with 20 words. Old Jamal would have written each word out 10 times on Thursday night and hoped for the best.
New Jamal does this instead. On Monday, he asks his mum to test him on all 20 words. Cold. No looking. He gets 8 out of 20.
He's not upset. He's just learned which 12 words he needs to focus on. Twelve, not twenty. That's already saved him time.
He practises those 12 words for a few minutes each evening. On Friday, he gets 19 out of 20. The 12 he focused on? All correct.
- Pick a school topic you've got coming up
- Ask a grown-up to make a 5-question quiz
- Take the quiz without studying first
- Mark it together. Look at which questions you got wrong.
- Study only those topics for 10 minutes
- Take the same quiz again — watch your score jump
When you guess at a question, your brain releases a tiny bit of a chemical called dopamine when you find out if you were right or wrong. Dopamine is the same chemical that makes video games feel exciting.
That's why pretesting works so well. Your brain treats studying like a game. And brains remember games way better than they remember boring stuff.
Don't try to revise a little first. "I'll just look at the topic for two minutes before the quiz." DON'T DO THIS. The whole point is the cold attempt. If you skim first, the trick stops working.
Don't feel bad about your score. Scoring 2 out of 10 on a cold quiz means nothing about how smart you are. It just means you haven't learned the topic yet. By the actual test, you'll be at 9 or 10.
Quick check
1. Why do you take the quiz before studying?
To find out exactly what you need to study, and to make your brain curious.
2. What does your brain do when you guess at an answer?
It releases dopamine and gets curious — which makes the right answer stick when you learn it.
3. What should you do with the questions you got wrong?
Study those topics — they're your study plan. Then take the test again.
Test before you study. You'll fail. That's the point. Your wrong answers tell you exactly what to learn. Don't be afraid of scoring low — the low score is your starting point, not your finish line.