Study7 min read
How to predict exam questions from past papers, with evidence
The Draimo team
Also in Português, Bahasa Indonesia
Short answer
Collect the last few past papers, your class tests and the lecture slides for one course, and look for topics that come back sitting after sitting. Draimo's ExamPredictor does this across up to ten files at once: it ranks likely topics, shows how often each appeared and roughly how many marks it carried, and quotes your files as evidence.
Try it in Draimo
Start your revision plan in Draimo
- I have four past papers for one course. How should I use them to decide what to revise first?
- Quiz me with five exam-style questions on the topic I am revising, then mark my answers.
- ExamPredictor
- Ranks likely exam topics from up to ten past papers, CATs and slides, with quotes from your files.
- Kadogo Plus in Kenya; a Day or Week Pass where sold, or Draimo Lite elsewhere
- Files
- Attach a PDF, Word file, slides or a photo and ask about it.
- One file per message on every plan; several at once on paid plans
- Echo
- Records a lecture, meeting or info session, then gives you a transcript and a summary you can ask about.
- Five minutes to try; unlimited on monthly plans
Why past papers predict exams at all
Most courses are examined by the same people, against the same outline, year after year. Topics that carry the course come back, often in the same format and for similar marks. Reading five papers side by side shows the pattern; reading them one at a time usually does not.
Where to find past papers
For a university course, the department, the library, your student association or the students a year ahead of you usually keep the papers. For national exams, the boards publish them:
- United Kingdom: AQA, Pearson Edexcel and OCR publish past GCSE and A-level papers with mark schemes. The most recent series may be kept for teachers only.
- United States: AP Central publishes past written exam questions, with scoring guidelines, for every AP subject.
- Sweden: UHR publishes past högskoleprov tests with their answer keys on Studera.nu.
- India: CBSE publishes sample question papers and marking schemes each year.
- Brazil: INEP publishes past ENEM tests and answer keys.
- Kenya and Indonesia: past university papers, CATs and soal UTS and UAS usually come from the department, the library or senior students.
Doing it by hand, step by step
It is worth doing once by hand, so you know what a good prediction looks like.
- Gather at least three past papers for the same course, plus your class tests and the course outline.
- List every question's topic, the marks it carried and its format: essay, calculation, short answer.
- Count how many sittings each topic appeared in. Two or more is a pattern.
- Check each recurring topic against this year's slides. A topic dropped from teaching is unlikely to be examined.
- Revise the recurring, still-taught topics first, in the format they are usually asked.
What ExamPredictor does in minutes
ExamPredictor, Draimo's exam predictor, does the counting across up to ten files in one go and gives you an Exam Radar: a ranked list of topics with a likelihood for each, how many past sittings it appeared in, the marks it usually carries and the format it tends to take.
Every topic comes with quotes from your uploads. Those quotes are checked against your files, and a topic whose quotes cannot be found is marked and ranked lower. The likelihoods are computed from the evidence, so the report cannot claim more than your papers support.
- Up to ten files at once: past papers, class tests, slides, notes
- A ranked Exam Radar with likelihoods, recurrence and typical marks
- Evidence quoted from your own files, checked before it is shown
- A share link for your study group, valid for 48 hours
Honest limits
A prediction is a revision plan, not a leaked paper. Lecturers change, outlines change, and a topic that has never been asked can still appear. Use the ranking to decide what to revise first, not what to skip entirely.
Cost and plans
ExamPredictor is included from Draimo Kadogo Plus in Kenya, and with a Day or Week Pass where one is sold, or Draimo Lite and above everywhere else. One prediction uses 120 credits. See plans and prices for your country, and the exam-by-exam guides for AP, A-levels, GCSE, IB, KCSE and university exams.
Questions people ask
- Can AI predict exam questions?
- It can rank likely topics from patterns in past papers, which is what a good student does by hand, only faster. It cannot know the actual paper, so treat a prediction as a revision order rather than a guarantee.
- How many past papers do I need?
- At least three for the same course. ExamPredictor accepts up to ten files at once, and more sittings give a clearer pattern.
- Is ExamPredictor free?
- No. It is included from Draimo Kadogo Plus in Kenya, and with a Day or Week Pass where one is sold, or Draimo Lite elsewhere. One prediction uses 120 credits.
Plan your revision with Draimo, then run a full prediction when you are ready.
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