Mistakes are often a point of frustration for many students and teachers alike. It’s terrible to lose marks because you don’t understand something, but even worse when you lose them because you’ve stumbled upon easily avoidable pitfalls. But there’s no point crying over spilt milk. While these errors can feel like the end of the world, there are ways you can bridge these gaps in your understanding.

Through this article, students will learn how to navigate this complex subject and accurately translate their impressive understanding of the syllabus into the impeccable grades they deserve. Here are the best ways to avoid common mistakes in your economics papers.

1. Inability to manage your time effectively 

Students are often inundated by questions when doing an economics exam. This predicament tends to worsen the more intensive the lessons are. For many students, running out of time when taking an exam is one of their biggest nightmares. These IB students tend to have significant difficulties in this area, which negatively impacts their performance.

Everyone requires good time management skills, but it’s especially important during exam season. Adequate time management reduces the need to rush around at the last minute. Hence, students should allocate sufficient time for each question to prevent this. You can accomplish by reviewing the prior exam or extending revision time.

Learning about exam formats is one of the most crucial steps to achieving efficient time management capabilities, providing students with a clear image of what they should be doing and when.

Additionally, while writing tests, proofreading is essential. However, many of us neglect to do it. Editing blatant errors with proofreading is helpful in doing so. We frequently make careless mistakes when writing. Sometimes, even an absence of revision results in this occurring more frequently. Being proactive and revising more is one of the simplest ways to handle this situation.

2. Drawing messy diagrams 

Most people would say they’re not artists – especially during an Economics paper! But this shouldn’t hinder us from creating a clean diagram.

Diagrams and graphs are critical to getting good grades on tests and are also one of the easiest ways to do it. Unfortunately, many students make mistakes because they lack practice or are in a rush.

Students must first carefully examine each graph and figure in this scenario. Second, they should concentrate on reviewing the diagrams five or six times prior to the exam, and third, they should always remember to bring a ruler, a pencil, and an eraser. This way, drawing a neat and serviceable diagram that can aid them in scoring marks is much easier.

3. Abstaining from using the DEED method

“DEED” is an acronym for Definitions Explanations Example Diagram. It is an approach that must be used in the HL and SL IB Economics exams. Despite its undeniable important, a lot of students forget to do this when attempting the exam, which leads to poor grades.

Students need to understand how DEED applies in every exam situation. This strategy makes it much simpler for students to craft their responses no matter the circumstance. They should primarily organise each solution in accordance with the marking schemes. Students will be able to compose a proper response during the exam as a result, which will help them save a lot of time.

4. Inability to concentrate

One of the skills that students are unanimously expected to have is the ability to concentrate during the exam. Many students frequently forget that ability when taking the exam, which might result in unnecessary hardships and uncertainty. Students also don’t read questions correctly, which leads to inaccurate answers.

There are always some cryptic or distressing words or sentences in the questions. Students must pay attention to the questions and provide appropriate responses. Often, students fail to accomplish this and, so, must make use of this opportunity to read question papers in order to resolve this problem. They should be capable of distributing and answering questions correctly by doing this.

Conclusion

IB economics can be an intimidating subject. It’s also very easy to slip up and make mistakes. As such, exams can be a challenging time for many. Fortunately, with some effort and intelligent study methods, you could be well on your way to getting the quality grades you’ve been working towards. And if you need additional help, IB Super is an IB Math tuition centre that is fully equipped to help you unlock your fullest potential. Contact us today to learn more!