Tests are a source of anxiety and have proved to impact the grades among students. In addition, students do not have the time to prepare for their exams. The ultimate goal of the instructor is to create and offer an environment that reduces the examination stress while maximizes learning in the little time available to the students. The demand on students’ available time is a major challenge. Although active learning has been utilized to increase student engagement and ultimately increase learning, it has never been used to reduce the test anxiety, increase learning in relation to available-student-time or attempt to increase learning with respect to available student time. Student time has been recognized as the most precious resource in learning. This paper proposes a mechanism of active learning, when employed can create an environment for less stressful exam taking while boosting and amplifying learning in a limited amount of time. Various pedagogical and psychological theories have been explored to develop this methodology that has been employed in three different semesters. The results have shown that students prefer this less stressful mechanism of testing and improved learning and students have commented that they felt they were on top of the materials being covered in class throughout the year and felt prepared for the final with little or no preparation for the final exam. In addition, students felt reduced stress during the test taking.

Active learning has warranted great promise in improving student engagement and learning. It is not a new thought and has been promoted and encouraged as early as the 1980s. Due to the many benefits of active learning it is being practiced by many faculty in their classrooms. Faculty are urged to self-reflect on their teaching styles and work on improving the pedagogies to capture and maintain student interest by increasing student engagement. Although active learning has been used as an instrument to engage students and ultimately increase learning, it has seldom been implemented to directly impact learning relative to time. This paper explores the application of active learning pedagogy to help achieve maximum learning in a limited period of time. The active learning method employed in this study is grounded in classic pedagogies that have been developed based on various psychological theories of learning, motivation and engagement. After the employment of a series of this active learning technique a survey of the students revealed an increase in student learning.