Monday 8 December 2014

Fundamentals for an MCQ examination in India

As the examination patterns are changing across the globe in almost every section and level of competition, bigger question lies not only on the knowledge level of the participant but also on his speed and accuracy. One more enhancement that has led to a lot of emphasis on speed is that almost all competitive examination are turning onto an online platform and even their in the form of MCQs. So speed and accuracy is one part that one must have in his or her armoury. Its a very common phenomenon in competitive examinations like JEE, CAT and IIT that despite having a good command over the subjects even laborious students are not able to score as expected because of their knowledge level is due to lack of planning as how to divide the examination into different categories, allocate time and then assign the speed to them. Lot of time when we look back at question papers we think that oh we could have answered if little time was their or how could I miss the last page of the question paper. It’s better to get prepared than to remorse after the papers.
The most important and fundamental tip at this age of competition is -Do not chase attempts, emphasize over accuracy. This is the mantra most training institutes and mentors have been working for many years now. The relevance of this tip just shot up now. So, all of you who are preparing for examinations like CAT JEE and IIT, get into the habit of getting every attempt correct from now on. If you are not sure about your attempt, leave the question. If a question seems too easy, have go at it just to full prove your attempt. Do not have this misconception that attempting 10 questions in 20 minutes and getting 8 correct is considered better than attempting 6 and getting ALL of them correct.
 Now the big question is how to increase one's speed in examinations? In this blog we'll focus more on competitive examinations like IIT, CAT and JEE. We'll discuss about speed in board examinations in a different blog.

Get prepared for the battle 

It’s always good to be ready for the decisive days. Planning a proper travel that gives you ample time to sit and adjust at the examination centre may help you to get through certain early questions easily. Getting proper artillery for the examination is definitely required but its better and advised if we use same kind of stationary for last few weeks before examination can give us an edge at the time of “What to use when needed".

 Focus on pre requisites 

It may not look as required as it sounds but its so easy and simple that often students take this for granted. Writing name filling details may not be a tiresome job so always make a habit of filling these details before you start the actual paper so that its never in back of your mind as a burden that may create panic or writing too fast that may end up in filling of wrong information.
Habit of reading fast and reading between the lines.
 Reading too slow or trying to read and understand a lot during examination may kill a lot of time and result in a panic situation at the end. Its better to make a habit of reading and understanding questions and summarizing in some small paragraphs prior to examination. We can adopt a policy of writing gist of questions when we start preparing for the examinations.

Don’t indulge in lot of brainstorming during examination

We should have least pressure on mind at the time of executing the papers. Few tips that saves time from lot of brain storming while examinations are by taking part actively in classroom discussions and activities about the topic and keep discussing the topic with your friends once a while even on coffee tables. New ideas and innovative answers come through reading alternative books or chapters about the topic. In today’s E – Learning world watching video tapes and video compact discs about the topic help in sudden appearance of answers as videos are the best way to learn many fundamental topics. It can also be amalgamated with listening to audio tapes about the topic.

Which question to attempt and how

First of all we should try to solve the problems that save us from elimination zone if We cannot solve it, then we should try to eliminate at least two and then start solving, and then proceed with answering that question (if the negative marking is 1/4 or 1/3 of a correct answer). The chance of answering correctly now are more than negative marking scheme in which the chances of success with one choice elimination is 33.3% and two choice elimination is 50% for 4 choice exam. If all choices looks alien to you, do yourself a favour by quickly moving to next question. We often suggest students to go for theoretical questions first and then to calculative once. Our human nature is such that if we attempt a few confident questions in the beginning then we feel charged with positive energy that in turn increases our efficiency and speed for the rest of the exam.
All of this is more of less just complementary. We can never be sure of the method the top institutes is the use for getting the normalized scores for CAT. But in IIT and JEE our effort towards speed and accuracy yields a lot This is just an attempt to interpret based on evidence that we have got over the feedback provided by the students.

So all the best for your exams !!!!


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