Midterm and Final Exam Examples

Exams are a great way to reinforce and evaluate students' understanding of the course
content and main ideas. There are several different ways to approach exams including an
in-class essay, short essays, multiple choice, short answer, fill in the blank, matching,
quote/passage identification, character identification, etc. with plenty of flexibility for
what an instructor deems important. Most instructors that choose to assign exams give
both a midterm and final, though some just choose a comprehensive final. Of those who
do give both, the midterm and final exam often look similar in style and content so
students can expect consistency in the testing methods. Many instructors choose to test
the first half of the course's information in the middle of the semester through a midterm
and the rest of the semester at the final. In other words, the course's information is not
cumulative and lets students focus on the most current concepts so they do not need to
remember trivial details such as minor characters from the first text at the end of the
semester.

Midterm Exams: Midterm exams often come at the midpoint in the semester. As stated
previously in the overview, instructors sometimes divide the class into two sections so
that the course's information is not cumulative. This strategy emphasizes making the
overall picture or most recent concepts most important instead of testing on characters
or plot lines from the first text of the semester.