GRE panic mode

[MoreGentilythanU]

Ok I am taking the Physics GRE subject test in 4 days and I have not studied at all really for it. I have a degree in physics (06') but I am not sure how much I can recall for the test. I have basically been playing poker all day cuz that's much more profitable than studying. I'm pretty sure that my attemp to wing this is going to be a tragedy I was a average student in undergrad but i have ok test taking abilities usually.
any advice?

[David Sklansky]

If a question seems hard, immediately skip it. This insures that you will get to every question and therefore will be able to correctly answer those you do know. Then go back to the questions you missed. If it still looks hard use common sense to eliminate the answers that can't be right and guess RANDOMLY amongst the others.

[Magic_Man]

I never took the GRE Physicss test, but a trick that was useful on the AP physics test was to check units on the answers. Often you could eliminate several answers because they had the wrong units for the problem. It's easy to check and helps eliminate guesswork.

~MagicMan

[FortunaMaximus]

Thought that was how you were supposed to do everything? [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[HajiShirazu]

Go look around on the internet for the four available practice tests (google for GR9677.pdf, you should get a page with the answers), do them, then go to grephysics.net for teh answers. Memorizing how to do old problems should be worth 5-10 questions at least because they ask the same things over and over, which is good for 70-120 or so scaled score.
You could also go to the bookstore and get schaum's modern physics + schaum's college physics and memorize the equations/read the problems in both books. This should be easily doable in 4 days if you care and would be helpful.
Finally when you take the test go through and answer all the fact questions first and then do the ones that require calculation. Despite the penalty for guessing it is EV neutral to guess and eliminating answers are worth 1/16, 1/4, and 3/8 of a point in that order, and in addition, the scores are scaled so that gaining an additional point is worth more than losing 1/4 of a point, meaning variance is good for you, so basically you should guess if you don't know.
If you are quick and don't think too much on any one problem, there is barely enough time for most people to finish. gl.
Oh btw dimensional analysis, scaling, checking limits x -> 0 and infinity, order of magnitude, etc, can be used on almost all the hard problems on this test.

[Metric]

It's not necessary to panic -- a great many of the questions test your understanding of basic principles rather than calculation ability. A practice exam would probably help get you into the right frame of mind -- try to find some sample questions online, and maybe review the number of questions per topic so you know what to expect. But it's not exactly the kind of test that studying for will make a night-and-day difference -- at least, that's the idea. They're looking for stuff you should have absorbed over the last few years.