I passed!
Holy hell. The 2 minutes it took for the test administrator to go in the other room and get my results were excruciating. Then he came out and when he said "Congratulations" I almost collapsed in relief.
It's a hard exam. Especially for someone like me who has zero education in fitness and human movement science. I passed the practice exam a few weeks ago but not by much, so I was not totally confident in my ability to pass the real one. Today I was sitting there feeling confident on the first few questions, but the deeper I got into the exam the more I wasn't sure about. I took my time and went back through it once before submitting to double check and to readdress the tougher questions. By the end I was really sweating bullets, not sure if I had enough of the questions right to get a passing score. They don't tell you what your score was or what questions you get wrong, which irks me a bit because I am the type who wants to know what I got wrong so I can study it more. But hey, the important thing is I passed!
My only gripe is this - I purchased E Teach which is the 8 week online course where the instructors give you study guides, instructional videos on the chapter contents as well as demonstrations of all the exercises and stretches in an actual gym. There are discussion questions and quizzes too. All of this is based around the information that will be on the exam. Certain things that are in the book are omitted from E Teach, and as you go through it they say things like "You only need to know *blank* for the exam" Well, there were definitely some questions on there that were not covered in E Teach. I glanced over the material a bit during my reading but didn't devote much time to it because it wasn't covered in E Teach, and E Teach kept saying "This is all you need to know for the exam" So - Study everything!!!
That being said - I would totally recommend E Teach for someone who is brand new to personal training. As I said I had zero experience in this field, or anything remotely related to it, so I can tell you right now there is no way I would have passed if I were just left to study the book on my own. The book is very dry and science-y. I appreciated the real instructors who explained everything in easy to understand terms. The book has pictures of all the exercises but seeing videos of them done in real time along with explanation of proper technique was so much more helpful for me. The discussion questions and quizzes kept me on point - I consistently got good grades so I knew I was headed in the right direction, versus studying all by myself and having no clue how well I am learning it all. The one thing I wish they would have added was maybe some practice on creating programs for clients.
I would say that someone who has a stronger background in this field may not need E Teach, but I sure as hell did.
Even with E Teach you still have to study your ass off. I devoted 1-2 hours every weeknight, sometimes an hour on Saturdays, and finished my assignments on Sunday.
Here are some study techniques that helped me
- They love their tables! For each area I struggled with I made copies of the tables in the book so I could have portable, easily accessible study material
- Memory techniques. Associate a key term with something that sounds like/reminds you of the words in the key term. For example..
- Abduction - To Abduct means you're taking something AWAY - Abduction is moving AWAY from the body
- Dorsiflexion - My husband is brilliant. He said "When you point your toes in the air, what does it look like? A Dorsal fin!"
- Plantarflexion - "Plant" your feet on the ground!
- Endomysium - it's the deepest layer of muscles - therefore it is the "End" of all the layers!
- Having someone quiz you. Practice assessments on them!
- When you're in the gym or even just going about your day, think about what is happening in your body during each movement.
- Flash cards
- Acting out various movements in front of a mirror (adduction, abduction, internal/external rotation, flexion, extension, etc) Quiz yourself - what muscles are shortening/lengthening when you perform each movement?
- Print out a chart of the muscles in the human body for easy reference
- For the acute variables I recognized similarities so I had to memorize less. They don't always change even when the type of training changes.
- When in doubt, just think about which answer makes the most common sense.
I took the exam in Thomson, GA at the county airport. It's a small place but apparently they offer exam services ranging from personal training to post office. The test administrator said this is one of the hardest exams they offer and he doesn't see too many people pass. So I feel pretty damn awesome to have passed it!
I'm officially a Certified Personal Trainer. Wow. Now the challenge really begins - finding a job and diving headfirst into a brand new career!
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