Hello everyone first post to this forum. After lurking on this site for a little while I need some help. A week or two ago I saw a thread directing newbies to start here (there?) on that thread a post clued newbies into which study guides were the best to get/use. My problem is I cannot find that thread/post. Anyone recall seeing such a thread? If so please remind me where it is. I will be starting my journey to my degrees with some CLEP exams soon.
What exams do you want to take? Try this site: Free Clep Prep.com. For many exams, it is everything you need to know, and it will direct you to other resources. For others, there are a couple of other free things you can do. For my CLEPs, I have borrowed the appropriate textbook from the library- except for the Spanish CLEP, for which I used the REA book (bought used) and the French CLEP for which I used about.com. Another idea is to look at the CLEP content guides and plug them into different internet resources like about.com, encyclopedias (please don't use Wikipedia! I use them as a quick general reference, but never for CLEP- this is supposed to be college-level work, you know!), Lexis Nexis, etc, etc, etc.
Somehow I knew Mr. Craniac would be the one to respond, as I was writing my post you came to mind. I nearly asked you directly but thought that wouldn't be cool seeing as how you don't know me from a jar of jellybeans. Anyways thank you for replying. I will do just as you suggested. "What exams do you want to take?" Actually I am going to try and test out of my associate level work altogether. I guess I just should have said that I was starting from scratch. I will most likely start at Excelsior College at least for my associates and then I'll see from there.
Just to throw my hat in the ring: REA for any subjects possible. They are excellent, concise (for the most part), can be had on the cheap if you look hard enough, and keep you from reading 600-page textbooks. Welcome to the boards, and good luck!
Does that mean you will blame me if you fail? A few things I want to add. The link that I gave you will show you where you can take free practice tests for your CLEP exams. The tests are not entirely similar to the real thing, but they are comparable enough to make them excellent practice- especially since they are free! Before you start studying, read the exam descriptions CLEP: Exam Descriptions and download the free study guides. Some people may try to convince you to buy the exam guide book, but, trust me on this one, the book is word-for-word the exact same information that you can find on the CLEP website for free (it cost me $10 on half.com to learn what I just told you at. The study guides will help you to make sure that if you find textbooks at the library, that the chapters you focus on are the ones directly related to the test. Lastly, if you have never taken a CLEP exam before... on the website, you can download a small piece of software that gets you familiar with the layout of the test. For my first CLEP, it thought it was invaluable. For me, any honest advantage that I can give myself is worth taking. If you know what the test and all of the buttons look like, then that is one less thing to get in your way from succeeding. I started right out of the gate knowing exactly what to do, which incidentally saved me a lot of time from having to go through all of their pretest tutorials . That is about the extent of the advice that I have for studying for the test. If you need any advice on actually taking the test, I can post some tips later.
Thank you all so much for the help and advice. I am gearing up to take my first tests in or around The end of February or the beginning of March depending on the scheduled day of the test. And no Maniac I will not blame you if I fail. It's all on me.
