07-13-2015, 11:37 AM
Hello All!
This past Friday I took and passed my second CLEP exam. I'd previously passed the chemistry CLEP and moved immediately into math: first Algebra, next Precalculus.
I passed Chemistry with a 53 (by the skin of my teeth) and got the credit I needed for that. I passed Algebra with a 58. Less close, but still not extremely impressive - but hey, a pass is a pass at this point given the reasons I am having to CLEP all this stuff.
Resources I used:
Khan Academy (Free - Algebra I & Algebra II sections)
Mr. Tarrou's Chalk Talk (Also free on YouTube)
Peterson's Practice Tests
CLEP Official Practice Exam (Used less due to time constraints.)
I still love Khan Academy, especially because I can kind of pick what I really need to watch in order to get the general idea of a topic, but for the purposes of CLEP prep (I am now starting to see) is that you do not just pick one subject and go through all the videos. You WILL waste a lot of time this way. I spent days in Pre-algebra thinking it would be good to get a foundation formed first, but I ended up putting myself in more of a stress/time crunch than anything. If you start into something like algebra 1, there will be practice quizzes often and you can see exactly how the problems are worked out. There are pros and cons to this with Khan: I realized that in some sections, the problems were very clearly broken down and easy to follow and in others, it just seems to lack a lot of explanation. My only logical reasoning to this is that they expect you to have more of a grasp of what you are doing than I did (I am terrible at math concepts for the most part but fantastic at breaking things down and identifying patterns that help me understand material). So if you already have a little bit of comfort in the subject, Khan would probably be even that much more beneficial for you. If you have time, by all means, start where you can lay a foundation so you don't have to worry with running into that problem. Also, it's FREE and offers review over many different subjects, even precal, cal, trig, and geometry!
I first ran into Mr. Tarrou's Chalk Talk series when I was trying desperately to get a better handle on sequences. To be honest, I was getting really frustrated with a lack of explanation in the Khan Academy videos around this section. For some reason, it just wasn't clicking after reviewing over and over. I went to Tarrou on YouTube and found the sequences video, and no lie - in less than 3 minutes, he just explained it in a way that made more sense to me. It seemed more straightforward. I found this to be the case with many sections as well, such as graphic transformations. Free videos on YouTube covering many areas just like Khan - algebra I & II, precal, cal, geometry, etc. It is worth checking out!!
Peterson's CLEP Practice Tests - I thought I was really happy with this review. My scores of the three attempts were 57, 68, and 85 (had to double check this because I think I posted the wrong scores in a reply earlier.. :S). Well, needless to say, after my third practice, getting the 85 had me feeling pretty confident. I was able to identify what I needed to do and I was finishing with plenty of time, maybe 10-15 minutes to go back and review things and work out lengthier problems I saved for last...
THIS WAS NOT AN ACCURATE REFLECTION OF THE CLEP EXAM! ... I went into Chemistry expecting that it was going to be harder than the practice so maybe I was just prepared for that... I didn't expect algebra to be as difficult as it was, especially with how I was doing on the practice exams. They were not (and neither was the Official CLEP practice) an accurate reflection of the real exam. My best advice to you is make sure you have the appropriate amount of time to study. I studied a LOT for this because I know I suck at math. I took 4 weeks and studied many days, for as much as 12 hours (with small breaks obviously)... You just, really have to know the concepts. I do not know math concepts, like I said, so it was a lot harder for me. You identify the patterns and logical steps of how to start solving the problems in the practice exams but then you go to take the real CLEP and they are taking things you thought you knew how to do well and asking for the reverse..
My main tip! If you think you have a handle on how to solve things, next go and make sure you know how to do the reverse of what you just did using all the potential methods that can be used. There may be types of problems you're usually used to seeing with addition and subtraction that they decide to implement multiplication and division in. You just really need to understand how the numbers are handled in different scenarios and not just be able to pass the practice tests. I so wish I would have known to expect that more, but I did finish and I did pass. My last CLEP will likely be my next one: Precalc. I fear this one more than either of the others, but I plan to go into it with smart preparation now that I have gotten a handle on the types of curveballs to expect.
WISH ME LUCK! :S
This past Friday I took and passed my second CLEP exam. I'd previously passed the chemistry CLEP and moved immediately into math: first Algebra, next Precalculus.
I passed Chemistry with a 53 (by the skin of my teeth) and got the credit I needed for that. I passed Algebra with a 58. Less close, but still not extremely impressive - but hey, a pass is a pass at this point given the reasons I am having to CLEP all this stuff.
Resources I used:
Khan Academy (Free - Algebra I & Algebra II sections)
Mr. Tarrou's Chalk Talk (Also free on YouTube)
Peterson's Practice Tests
CLEP Official Practice Exam (Used less due to time constraints.)
I still love Khan Academy, especially because I can kind of pick what I really need to watch in order to get the general idea of a topic, but for the purposes of CLEP prep (I am now starting to see) is that you do not just pick one subject and go through all the videos. You WILL waste a lot of time this way. I spent days in Pre-algebra thinking it would be good to get a foundation formed first, but I ended up putting myself in more of a stress/time crunch than anything. If you start into something like algebra 1, there will be practice quizzes often and you can see exactly how the problems are worked out. There are pros and cons to this with Khan: I realized that in some sections, the problems were very clearly broken down and easy to follow and in others, it just seems to lack a lot of explanation. My only logical reasoning to this is that they expect you to have more of a grasp of what you are doing than I did (I am terrible at math concepts for the most part but fantastic at breaking things down and identifying patterns that help me understand material). So if you already have a little bit of comfort in the subject, Khan would probably be even that much more beneficial for you. If you have time, by all means, start where you can lay a foundation so you don't have to worry with running into that problem. Also, it's FREE and offers review over many different subjects, even precal, cal, trig, and geometry!
I first ran into Mr. Tarrou's Chalk Talk series when I was trying desperately to get a better handle on sequences. To be honest, I was getting really frustrated with a lack of explanation in the Khan Academy videos around this section. For some reason, it just wasn't clicking after reviewing over and over. I went to Tarrou on YouTube and found the sequences video, and no lie - in less than 3 minutes, he just explained it in a way that made more sense to me. It seemed more straightforward. I found this to be the case with many sections as well, such as graphic transformations. Free videos on YouTube covering many areas just like Khan - algebra I & II, precal, cal, geometry, etc. It is worth checking out!!
Peterson's CLEP Practice Tests - I thought I was really happy with this review. My scores of the three attempts were 57, 68, and 85 (had to double check this because I think I posted the wrong scores in a reply earlier.. :S). Well, needless to say, after my third practice, getting the 85 had me feeling pretty confident. I was able to identify what I needed to do and I was finishing with plenty of time, maybe 10-15 minutes to go back and review things and work out lengthier problems I saved for last...
THIS WAS NOT AN ACCURATE REFLECTION OF THE CLEP EXAM! ... I went into Chemistry expecting that it was going to be harder than the practice so maybe I was just prepared for that... I didn't expect algebra to be as difficult as it was, especially with how I was doing on the practice exams. They were not (and neither was the Official CLEP practice) an accurate reflection of the real exam. My best advice to you is make sure you have the appropriate amount of time to study. I studied a LOT for this because I know I suck at math. I took 4 weeks and studied many days, for as much as 12 hours (with small breaks obviously)... You just, really have to know the concepts. I do not know math concepts, like I said, so it was a lot harder for me. You identify the patterns and logical steps of how to start solving the problems in the practice exams but then you go to take the real CLEP and they are taking things you thought you knew how to do well and asking for the reverse..
My main tip! If you think you have a handle on how to solve things, next go and make sure you know how to do the reverse of what you just did using all the potential methods that can be used. There may be types of problems you're usually used to seeing with addition and subtraction that they decide to implement multiplication and division in. You just really need to understand how the numbers are handled in different scenarios and not just be able to pass the practice tests. I so wish I would have known to expect that more, but I did finish and I did pass. My last CLEP will likely be my next one: Precalc. I fear this one more than either of the others, but I plan to go into it with smart preparation now that I have gotten a handle on the types of curveballs to expect.
WISH ME LUCK! :S
![[-]](https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/images/collapse.png)