Revision: History
Preparing for history prelims
The first and most important thing I can say about Prelims is DO NOT PANIC!!!! They are not the most important thing in the world. Parry has never had anyone fail them and YOU WILL NOT BE THE FIRST TO!!! I cannot stress this point strongly enough. If you approach any second or third year stressed about prelims, I can almost certainly guarantee they will tell you that they are NOT a big deal.
HOWEVER, it is nice to prepare for Prelims. Partially because it makes the revision you have to do in second year rather easier. Also, because then you will (hopefully) feel not too stressed when it comes to the actual Prelims. Having said that, if you desire (UNRECOMMENDED), you can not prepare at all and still pass quite convincingly. This has been done by a recent second year and that person got a comfortable 2.2 (I won’t name names as I don’t want to encourage you to do this).
In terms of how much preparation to do, only you can decide. I do NOT recommend you spend the whole of your Easter holidays worrying about this. Remember, you have a whole term’s work to do after your prelims and you don’t want to burn yourselves out. I’d recommend a couple of hours a day. Nothing like the amount of work you would do here. If you’d rather work more intensively, I’d recommend 2 weeks of hard work with at least 2 weeks off. DEFINITELY ENJOY YOUR EASTER BREAK!!!
By now, you should know how you revise best. Whether it’s referring back to your essays or condensing your notes or writing practice essays, do whatever works well for you. There are copies of past papers to be found online. They can be found through the history faculty website using the following link http://www.hist.cam.ac.uk/undergraduate/exams/past_papers/prelim.html I think it’s a good idea to familiarise yourself with the set up of each of the exam papers. Pay specific attention to whether you can answer any of the questions or whether you have to answer questions from different parts of the paper.
Tips for in the exam. PLAN YOUR ESSAY!!!!! Structure is such a key thing in Prelims so make sure yours has a decent one. Even if your essay is short and you can’t think of much to say, a good structure can make an essay.
HAP! This is the exam paper that everyone seems to worry the most about and it is also the hardest to revise for. I recommend that if you haven’t before, you should read some of the general works on history such as Hobsbawm and Evans to familiarise yourself with some of the topics that could come up. Other than that, there is not that much preparation you can do. HAP is a test of how you think and how you argue. Therefore make sure you structure your essay and you’ll be fine!!!
After completing the exams, Parry usually recommends that you write a critical assessment of how you thought you did in the exams. Maybe note down which questions you answered, commenting on which questions you thought you answered well and which you didn’t. A couple of weeks after completing the exams, you get two sets of comments on each of your exams. If you can’t remember which questions you did, then it kind of makes these sheets a lot less helpful.
REMEMBER, these exams are part of the learning process. No-one comes out of the exams thinking they did a perfect job. Hopefully, from them you will have learned some lessons which you will take forward with you into the rest of your Cambridge career.
In terms of the timing of the exams, it’s really cruel. Basically the 2 days before the start of lectures will be spent doing prelims. You will have 9 hours of exams over 2 days and then still be expected to write an essay the next week. There is no time off before the start of term so it’s important to make sure you give yourself some time off during the holidays.
Good news about next term, it is the BEST TERM YOU WILL HAVE IN CAMBRIDGE SO ENJOY IT. Once Themes and Sources is out of the way, everyone else will be in exams and you just have to do a weekly essay. Students of every other subject (except English) will hate you. Embrace it and enjoy the fact that realistically, you haven’t got that much work to do. Also, you only have to do seven essays rather than eight which means you can start celebrating when everyone else finishes their exams. Make the most of the sunshine, go punting, go to Cindies when there is actually space on the dancefloor. HAVE FUN!!!
Two quick pieces of advice, DO NOT COMPLAIN ABOUT HOW STRESSED YOU ARE AT ANY POINT AFTER THE FIRST WEEK NEXT TERM (unless it is to a fellow first year historian or English student)!!!! I can GUARANTEE it will not be received well. Other people WILL be very stressed.
On that note, my final advice is to BE CONSIDERATE. With everyone else doing exams and the relative freedom you have, be nice to those who are stressed. Don’t make loud noises in your staircase late at night. Make an effort to buy a friend a chocolate bar if they seem a little down. As the lucky few who don’t have exams, you should take some responsibility to look out for those who do. If someone seems down, let me know.
If you have any other problems or want to ask me anything at any point in the holiday, you can always reach me on my Cambridge email address, rik21@cam.ac.uk