I wrote this article for Publication to Various Newspapers on Jan 21, 2015

Effective Planning for Boards and IIT JEE

- Ambarish Srivastava

The boards are around the corner and soon after the Boards in the month of March, many of

the students of Class XII will be taking up the JEE Main Examination on 4th of April 2015.

At this stage, many students are anxious about simultaneously balancing the Boards along

with their IIT JEE preparation. I have been training the students for these examinations for past 10

years and accordingly, I would like to share some of the things I feel would help the students

optimize their performance in both the examinations:

1. Prepare without losing Tempo: While the students are preparing for two distinct

examinations, the good thing is that the syllabi and the paper setting authorities are

common. The JEE main examination paper as well as the CBSE Board paper both are set by

the CBSE. Sometimes considering the proximity of the Boards, students tend to exclusively

focus on the board type questions and start losing touch with the IIT JEE type questions.

However, one must understand that if one is preparing for IIT JEE, one is automatically

preparing for the Boards. The focus should be on understanding the concepts rather than

mugging them up. The Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics remain the same, if one has a

thorough understanding of the subject, one should be comfortably able to answer the

questions in both types of examinations. One should continue to take JEE type mock tests

even during this period. In fact I am aware of some students who were taking JEE type tests

even during the preparatory holidays between the two Board Exams and they did

exceedingly well in both the exams.

2. Attempt a lot of Mock Tests and Clarify all Doubts: I remember having read some author

who said that “if you want to succeed, double your failure rate”. The essence of the

statement in the context of exams is that the students should not be scared of trying new

problems. The more problems we are exposed to before the actual exam, the more is the

likelihood that we would get it right if a similar problem were asked in the actual exam.

Sometimes, students are scared of taking mock tests thinking that they might not do well

and may start feeling less confident due to a low score in the mock test. However, it is

important to understand that not taking the mock tests test is not the solution. A test only

exposes our weak points. Rather than avoiding the mock tests, it is important to ensure that

if we don’t get a certain problem right in a mock test; we must clarify it as soon as possible.

A mock test is the compass which tells us exactly what we need to focus on.

3. Give special emphasis to the exclusive Board type questions: There are certain sub-topics in

various subjects which generally get more weightage in the Boards because the questions

are subjective type. There are also some topics which are part of JEE Main but not part of

the Advance exam which some students tend to ignore during their preparation. For

example in physics the chapters on Semiconductor Devices, Communications Systems and

Electromagnetic Waves are parts of JEE Main and the Board exam but not part of the

Advance Exam. Students should carefully study these chapters along with the Questions

from the Sample papers so that they can comfortably handle descriptive questions from

I wrote this article for Publication to Various Newspapers on Jan 21, 2015

these chapters. A good source to prepare these chapters would be an Archive of JEE Main/

AIEEE questions of the previous years, along with a good collection of Sample Papers.

4. Communicate clearly in the Board Type Exams: While the Board exam as well as the JEE

Main paper, both are set by CBSE, the approach required for attempting the exams is

entirely different. A JEE exam is an objective type exam where it is not important to go

through the steps of calculation, one may do all the calculations in one’s head or just some

rough scribbling in the question paper. All that matters is that you tick the right option. It

does not matter, whether you do it by elimination of other options, or use any other trick.

However, in Boards there is step marking and your working out of the intermediate steps is

as important as getting the final answer correct. In my experience I have repeatedly seen

that some extremely bright students tend to lose the marks in Board type examinations not

because of their lack of knowledge, but only because of their poor presentation and skipping

the steps/ doing the intermediate steps in their head or just scribbling around in the

margins.

5. Learn from the writing style of the toppers: Previous years’ toppers answer sheets can be

found on the internet for all the subjects by simply googling “best answer sheets”. In fact

being a physics coach, I have tried to analyse some of the best evaluated answer sheets in

physics and what I found was that it is not that the student who secured the best marks

displayed an extraordinary understanding of the subject. What is important is to write to the

point and do a neat and clean work. Try to visualize or put yourself in the position of a

teacher who is assigned with the task of evaluating hundreds of answer scripts. What

happens when such a teacher comes across an answer script which has a neat and clean

work? The first impression is that this must be a good student and accordingly it does in a

way influence the examiner’s evaluation of the answer script. Contrast this with the

situation when the examiner comes across a shabbily written answer script with calculations

scribbled all along the margins, inaccurate free hand diagrams made with a pen, and he has

to search for the final answer amidst all the scribbling. It does put a negative impression on

the evaluator.

In fact I was really impressed by one of the best evaluated answer sheets and my

observations were that:

1. The answer script was written with double spacing between the lines

2. The final answer to all the Numerical Questions was put in a rectangular box (so that

evaluator may not have to search for it).

3. Units were clearly mentioned along with any numerical physical data.

4. All the diagrams were made with a sharp pencil, using a scale and compass.

5. Wherever algebraic symbols were used they were explained.

6. Wherever there was an error it was neatly crossed with two lines without any ambiguity.

6. The Good , The Bad , The Ugly – The Examination Temperament: For the JEE Examination,

what really matters in not how much we know, rather what matters is that how much are we

able to deliver in those three hours of the examination. Many students make the mistake of

attempting the questions sequentially and finding that there is not enough time left to attempt

the questions that they otherwise knew how to do. One must remember that JEE is a low

I wrote this article for Publication to Various Newspapers on Jan 21, 2015

scoring exam. Scoring even as low as 60% marks will get a student an excellent rank. Rather

than aiming at solving all the questions, the aim should be to attempt all the questions that you

are confident of doing correctly. The best way to do this is to scan the entire question paper

and classify the questions in to three categories. The questions that you are sure of doing

correctly, you may call them “Good questions” and the questions which seem too difficult/

confusing may be marked as “Ugly Questions”. There may still be some questions left over,

about which you may not be sure, these questions may be called “Bad Questions”. Now plan to

attempt only the “Good Question”. This will take the time pressure off and you will be able to

secure better marks despite attempting fewer questions. If you are able to finish these “Good

Questions” well within time, you might like to try out some “Bad Questions” or maybe you

would prefer to recheck your calculations for the “Good Questions”.

7. Stay Cool: It is important not to panic. Worry and Brooding have a negative effect on our

ability to study and our test performance. The test should be written without any kind of

tension or worry. Write the test like a “Buddha”, without any thought about past or future. As if

the only thing that is present is the question, the answer and you!

8. Manage your time well: Time Management Strategy can differ from individual to individual

however on an average, the effective attention span of a JEE aspirant is about 2 hours, so it is a

good idea to take a small break after every two hours of continuous study session. Smaller

study sessions should be avoided because every study session means about 10 minutes being

spent as warm up time and about 10 minutes as cool down time. One must be selective about

the problems one solves during the self study sessions. Do not spend too much time on solving

same types of problems. Identify the problems that you intend to solve at the beginning of your

session. Also make sure that you memorize all the important results so that you don’t waste the

examination time in trying to derive these results. For the descriptive type of questions in

Boards, the theory should be memorized as per the standard Sample Papers/ Test Books.