Math League test taking tips

General tips

Please write your name on the test!
Do not leave any blank. Make your best educated guess.
Verify that you answered the question that was asked.
Use all your available time. If you think you’ve got them all, continue to verify by different means. Plug your answer into the question and see if it is consistent with the problem statement. Try to determine the answer using a different approach.
Don’t get stuck on a single problem. Do the easy ones first.
There is no penalty for wrong answers, so guess if you can.
Show your work so the reader (and you) can understand what you did.
Make sure your answer is clear and easy to read. Your answer may be correct, but if the teacher cannot read it, it will be marked wrong.

For a given problem, you might want to try these suggestions.

Read and understand the problem and what is asked.
Convert the problem statement into an equivalent equation or set of equations. If you have N unknowns, then you will need N linearly independent equations to solve.
Draw a picture to help visualize the problem and understand what is being asked. Drawing a chart or diagram could help in many cases.
Replace names with letters in your expressions.
Guess and check. This is not a great strategy, but can work sometimes. When checking your guess, make sure it is consistent with all parts of the problem statement.
Use algebra. Unfortunately, this implies that you know algebra. Many problems are much easier if you can apply some very basic algebraic concepts like solving an equation that has an unknown or solving N equations with N unknowns.
Don’t be sloppy when you work it out on scratch paper. Be neat and organized.
Watch out for traps. Sometimes the most obvious answer is not the right one. Recall the problem with Peter, Tommy, and Vince who did not respectively play the piano, trumpet, and violin.