In this lesson we're going to cover some exam tips.
Now before we dive into the content
for the Comp TIA Security Plus certification exam
in this course, I think it's important for us
to quickly discuss some exam tips and tricks.
This will help you better study for the exam
as you're going through this course
and also help you focus your study efforts
to get the most out of this material.
Now, the most important thing to remember
when you're taking the exam, is that there's not going to be
any trick questions on exam day.
Every question is precisely worded
to match the material you've been studying
and if you need to, take the time to read each question
multiple times to ensure you understand exactly
what the question is asking you and that you're answering
the question that's actually being asked of you.
As you're read each of the questions and answers,
always be on the lookout for any distractors
or red herrings.
Generally, there's at least one of the four answers
that are listed that are actually written
to try and distract you from the correct answer.
If you could start to identify which one that is
and eliminate it as a possibility,
you're exponentially going to increase your chances
of guessing the correct answer.
Another thing to remember is that if you see a word
in a question that's in bold, italics,
or written in all upper case,
you need to pay very close attention to that word
because the test writers decided those words
were really important for you to consider.
It's also important for you to remember
that you must answer the questions based
on your CompTIA Security Plus knowledge and studies
from this course or the official CompTIA Security Plus
student textbook,
not from your personal workplace experience.
Now, your workplace may use different terminology
for assessing and responding to security threats
or they use different terms
for a specific type of assessment.
Either way, you should always select the book answer
when you're answering a question on a certification exam
because that's what the test writers are also using
when they write their exam questions.
On exam day, you should always select the best answer.
Now, each question may have several right answers
but one is going to be most right, most of the time
and in the most cases.
In cybersecurity, there's rarely a time where
there's a hundred percent correct answer for everything
and so everything becomes situational.
Now, for the exam, you're going to have to select
just one answer.
So, if you're in doubt, choose the answer that's correct
in the highest number of situations
and don't try to talk yourself
into one of the lower answers.
This will help you eliminate some of those doubts you have
when you're trying to read those questions
and the answer choices you have.
Also, whenever you're taking a practice exam
or the real certification exam,
you should try not to fight the exam or the test questions.
Instead, I want you to try to understand
what is the key concept they're asking you about
in that question whenever you're reading a test question
for the exam.
This will really help you increase your score,
I guarantee it.
Also, as you're going through the course,
there's going to be times when I give you study hints
or things that you should definitely remember.
For example, anytime you hear me say something
like confidentiality in Security Plus,
you should always be thinking about encryption.
Anytime you hear the word integrity,
I want you to think about hashing.
Anytime you hear the word availability,
you should be thinking about redundancy and resiliency.
Now, don't write too much about those three terms just yet
but you get the idea here.
I promise I will repeat them again and again
as we go through the specific lessons
where you need to remember these kind of things.
But I want you to make a note of those keywords
'cause they will help you out on the exam.
Now, when it comes to certification exams,
I also want you to remember that you don't need to memorize
the terms from this course or the textbook word for word.
Instead, you have to be able to recognize them
from the answer choices given in the questions.
There are no fill in the blank questions on this exam.
It's all either multiple choice or multiple selection.
Now, for the Security Plus exam,
you are not expected to know how to use any specific tools
or pieces of software.
Everything is going to be vendor neutral and generic
if they ask you to perform an action
like configuring a firewall or mitigating a vulnerability
within a certain control that you're going to select.
So, if you're ever asked about a tool,
what you really need to know about that tool
is what it's used for and not the syntax
or how to actually operate that tool.
Basically, if you can define the tool
and what it's going to be used for, you have the right level
of knowledge for this exam 99% of the time.
So if they ask you about Nmap, yes, you should be able
to pick the correct answer because you know that Nmap
is the network mapping tool and it's used to conduct
reconnaissance during a vulnerability assessment
or penetration test.
But you should not have to know the specific command
to issue an order to perform a SYN scan across
a given subnet like entering in: nmap -sS -T5 192.168.1.0/26
or something like that.
Now remember, during the certification exam,
you're going to be choosing answers
from a multiple choice style question most of the time,
and there is no fill in the blank or essay questions.
This is an essential difference in this certification
versus the test you may have taken
back in high school or college.
In the certification world, you just need to be able
to recognize and not regurgitate the information
you've been learning.
Now, if you remember these exam tips,
it's really going to help you get a higher score on the exam
and lead to a lot less frustration as you're preparing
to take that exam by watching the lessons in this course,
taking the quizzes in this course,
or using our practice exams as you're studying
for your certification.
One last thing before we finish this lesson.
I want you to set a target date for your exam
that you want to earn your certification by.
Do you want to get in the next 30 days,
the next 60 days, or the next 90 days?
I don't recommend going further than 90 days out
and the reason is I want you to look at the calendar today
and choose the date that you plan
to earn your certification by.
Those who go longer than 60 days tend to forget information
they learned at the beginning of their studying.
Now, once you pick out your date,
I want you to start working backward on the calendar
and plan out how many lessons or sections you need
to complete each day to stay on target.
For example, if I know I want to take my exam in 30 days
from today and there are 300 lessons that I need to finish,
that would be approximately 10 lessons per day
to be able to finish in 30 days.
But I also need to give myself a little bit of time
for practice exams, so,
maybe I'll plan to do 12 or 14 lessons per day
and that way I have enough time to give myself one
or two days for practice exams before taking the real exam.
That's the way we plan these things out.
Now, on the other hand, you can plan it where you say,
"I'm going to do two sections per day every day
"for the next two weeks, and then I'm going to learn
"all the content needed for the exam.
"Now I can spend the next week taking all the practice exams
"and the final fourth week gives me a couple of days
"for final review for anything I missed
"before I take the real exam.
"And again, I finished the whole thing in 30 days that way."
Most of my students who have a part-time job or less
will usually complete this course and their certification
in the next 30 days.
If you're working a full-time job or you're married
and have a family, you should probably plan
on taking the exam within the next 60 days
because you have a lot going on in your life.
Basically, if you can dedicate one to two hours a day
to studying, you're going to be able to get certified
in the next 30 days.
If you can only dedicate a half hour or an hour per day
to studying, then you can get certified in the next 60 days
if you do it consistently each and every day.
Now, in lesson two of the course, we have provided you
with both a 30-day and 60-day study plan
you can download as a PDF.
I'd recommend that you download it, set your goal date,
and then do some backward planning to ensure you
hit your target date and start checking off the items
in your study plan until you're certified.
I can tell you from experience that students
who use our study plans pass the certification exams
at a much faster rate than those who try to study
without a plan.
I know it all can seem very daunting right now
because there are so many lessons
but I guarantee you can do it.
Basically, you just need to plan to study for about 40 hours
in total to be ready to pass your exam
and the more concentrated you're studying,
the faster you're going to get certified.
Don't make the mistake of trying to study
over a six or 12-month period either
because you'll start to forget the key information
from earlier lessons by the time you get
to the end of your study plan.
So instead, I want you to carve out a few hours a day
for the next few weeks and let's go ahead
and get you certified.