Test preparation is an individual matter.  What works best for one person may not work best for another. But my general recommendations are as follows:

1.  Attend class and read the assigned material (if possible, before it is discussed in class).  Exams will cover material from the lectures (whether or not it was mentioned in the readings) and from the readings (whether or not it was mentioned in the lectures).  There will be questions on every lecture and every reading.  If you miss a class, make sure to review the notes on the Sakai website.  If you skip a reading or miss a class without getting the notes, this is very likely to lower your grade. If you have questions out a lecture or a reading, please don't hesitate to ask me.

2.  Take good notes when attending class and doing the readings. Taking notes transforms you from a passive recipient to an active learner.  If you take notes with the goal of understanding what you are hearing and reading, it will also help you to better remember the material. 

a. At the beginning of each class, I will put on the screen the most important questions that we aregoing to answer in that unit.  In your class notes, make sure you write down the answers to each of those questions, as best you understand them from the lecture material.  If you are not sure what the answer to a question was, you should ask (you can ask me, in class and outside of class, as well as comparing notes with other students in the course). 

b. You should also take notes when you are doing the assigned readings.  Please be aware that   highlighting and underlining are NOT recommended as methods of taking notes.  They don't require you to understand what you are reading, and are not very likely to help you remember things well.  Instead you should use a more active approach, such as the SQ4R method described in a handout from the Rutgers Learning Center, which is available by clicking this link: taking notes when reading.  It suggests taking notes by writing down the questions that the author is trying to answer in each section of a chapter or article, reading to answer these questions, reciting and then writing down the answers to these questions, and studying by testing whether you know the answers to the questions without looking at your notes.

3.  In preparing for tests, spend most time studying what is most important.  Exams in this course will emphasize knowledge of important concepts and important studies.  A good guide to what is important is how much coverage an idea or study gets in class or in the readings.  The more time     spent on a concept or a study (in the lectures or the readings), the more likely it is to turn up on the exam.  

Exams will not require that you know dates. 

Names of theorists or researchers are somewhat more important than dates because they can help you remember the material and allow you to follow up on someone's work if you are interested.   Questions may ask you about someone's theory or research (e.g., about Lazarus' appraisal theory).