Department of Linguistics & TESOL | The University of Texas at Arlington
Student Advising:
Common Mistakes on Exams
To find out the date when the exam will be given, go to the News page. There you'll also find details about exam informational meetings and forms that must be submitted in preparation for the exam.
Problems to Avoid
The following are common mistakes made by students taking the Diagnostic and Comprehensive Exams:
- Spending too much time on one question.
- Not allowing time for revision and editing.
- Not understanding the question or not answering the question directly.
- Providing only factual information and not demonstrating critical thinking skills.
- Preparing "canned" responses (i.e, fully written-out and memorized responses) before the test.
- Not making an alternative plan if you do not pass the exam.
- Memorizing too much factual information without synthesizing.
- Associating one course with one content area and not drawing upon knowledge ACROSS courses to answer a question.
- Solely listing information in your response.
- Solely basing your responses on personal experience without reference to some scholarly literature.
- Solely citing scholarly literature without offering how you understand or interpret such literature.
- Thinking in "black-and-white" terms without recognizing or understanding all sides of an issue.
- Providing substantially inaccurate information.