Revision:
In all of the course materials I’ve used there is no ‘background’ information given, so if it’s in the textbook, there’s a good chance you may need to know it for the exam. Yes, even when you think it’s such nitty gritty detail that they’ll never ask for it in an exam. Case in point: the 2017 Unit C question that wanted the precise process of supplying items to market in the EU.
Do as many question papers as you can as preparation. The examiners reports on the NEBOSH website are gold in terms of understanding what is actually wanted from the question, and the more recent ones can be used as question papers.
I found my general certificate textbook to be a useful revision aid – a week or so before the exam when I couldn’t bear to write anything, I spent a long afternoon in a coffee shop reading all the relevant sections of my cert textbook. Made a good break from the hard slogging, and helped remind me of some of the core stuff that can get a bit lost when you’re focused on all the detail.
Don’t stress about how much work other people tell you they’re doing. On the forum for my distance learning course provider, it seemed like everyone was getting hours done every evening months before the exam. I couldn’t do that. I did as much as I could with my work/life balance and I still passed all my exams first time.
When studying and revising I’ve always found it helpful to keep an eye on the clock and record how many hours of actual revision I do each day – it’s very easy to feel like I’ve been working for hours unless I made a note of when I started and can prove to myself it’s only been 40mins since the last teabreak. It also means I can’t fool myself when I’ve been slacking.
I used a week of my annual leave before each exam and did a ‘cram week’ where I did nothing but NEBOSH, early nights, and eating comforting stodge food. My employer let me use the meeting rooms at work for revision whenever they were free so that gave me somewhere quiet and focused to work.
Different revision methods work for different people, but I think for most people, just passively reading the material isn’t enough to make it stick. Write it down, make notes, repeat it back to yourself without looking at the text, answer questions etc. Make sure what you do is actually helping you learn the stuff (thinking of my Uni friend who apparently modeled her exam approach on Arnold Rimmer, and gave all her revision cards pretty borders in colour-coded glitter gel pen).
Exam stuff:
Remember your photo ID, entry sheet and have a clear case (or plastic wallet, or freezer bag) for your stationery.
Take a few different types of pen and, when your hand starts to hurt, switch to a different one. The different thickness or shape will make you grip it differently and prevent fatigue.
All of the exams I’ve been in have allowed snacks provided they’re not going to distract anyone else. I get really hungry before lunch so I was always glad of a cereal bar to wolf down before the long answer questions.
There is five minutes reading time before the exam starts. You can’t write in your answer book, but you can write on the question paper, so do it! As you read each question, jot down one or two words for the obvious points that come to mind, then move onto the next question and do the same. I find, when I’m actually in the thick of answering the questions for real and I’ve just spent ten minutes writing in-depth about, say, electrical systems, it’s hard to immediately switch my brain to a completely different subject when I move onto the next question. Having these few jotted pointers act as a prompt to get my brain into the subject.
When you answer the questions, read each question properly. Under line the key words. During the long answer question, check the question again every few paragraphs and make sure you are covering everything asked and haven’t veered off topic.
Generally there isn’t time to plan an answer, but I always quickly jotted my ideas down on the question paper. So if it’s a question about designing a traffic system, I might have scribbled down: visibility, mirrors, lighting; segregation, barriers, markings, entrances; traffic control, one-way, traffic lights, speed limit... etc, and crossed them off as I used them. If something occurs to you while you’re busy writing, do take a second to note it somewhere. Nothing worse than getting to the end of your paragraph and then realising you’ve completely forgotten that brilliant idea you had.
Clearly link each point you make to the question. This is especially important when the question discusses a specific scenario. E.g.: if the question is about explosion risk in a sugar milling system, don’t just talk generally about dust explosions, talk specifically how a dust explosion could arise in THIS system. Make sure each point you make is relevant, so don’t veer off and start talking about other types of explosion. And make sure you are doing what the question asked: if you were just asked to outline the risks, don’t start talking about how you would protect against them because you won’t get any marks for doing so. Likewise, this question might make you think of the Imperial Sugar explosion in 2008, but it’s not actually about the 2008 explosion, so you won’t get marks for discussing things that occurred in that accident but aren’t part of the question scenario.
Use the NEBOSH command words and don’t get stressed about them. They’re just normal, English words that we all know the meaning of, telling you how to structure the answer and how much detail they want. The command word guide on the NEBOSH website gives full examples of each if you’re not sure. From the examiner’s report it seems like a common problem is people listing points when asked to outline them. So for the traffic question, just saying “there should be a speed limit” is still just listing the point (albeit in the form of a sentence rather than bullet points), and won’t be considered an outline. Something like: “There should be a low speed limit to maximise the time drivers have to consider their maneuvers and for other road users to safely react to them, and to minimise the force of any collisions” might do better.
And don’t panic
. You will get there.
