Choose a different strategy for competitive exams: Vepa
The strategy that is generally used for academic examinations might not work for competitive examinations, shares Vepa Academy director Dr CS Vepa on Monday.
Further explaining, Vepa said that evaluators of answer sheets of academic examinations would think in favour of the students, but the answer sheets of competitive examinations would be critically evaluated to check whether the candidate has in-depth knowledge on the topic or not. Hence, academic examinations like preparation plan would not be suitable for Group-I exams of TSPSC.
He further explained 50-5-5 formula, which would be helpful for the competitive examination aspirants. In the formula, one hour should be considered as a unit in which 50 minutes should be spent for study, five minutes for visualisation of the studied topic and five minutes for physical movement or for relief.
He further mentioned that aspirants can overcome the problem of “more content to be mastered in less time”, with a preparation plan of dividing the syllabus into units. A single subject should not be studied by a candidate throughout the day, which would result in the candidate losing interest. He suggested that two or three subjects should be selected to study on a day, for change. To memorise the content, candidates should create an image of the studied subject in their minds and link the images of newly-studied topics with them to prepare a story-like image.
Furthermore, Vepa also suggested that candidates must be more alert while writing the examination and should have the talent to convert their knowledge on the subject into marks. “According to the scientists, a person can forget 80 per cent of the content in the first 24 hours. A systematic revision is required to overcome this problem. In the first 24 hours, the candidate should revise the content studied for at least five times. This can be followed by a revision of the topic twice a day in the following week and at least once a day in the week after that.
Giving suggestions on tricks to have longer memory, Vepa taught the flash cards technique to aspirants which can be used to learn vocabulary and remember the years of the incidents, figures in the economy and persons in the history. He also suggested candidates to keep a separate notebook for each subject. Also, to instil self-confidence among the aspirants, Vepa suggested that they maintain a success diary to make a note of the activities connected with their goal as a reminder.
Explaining about four pillars of the competitive examinations, he said that skills would have 30 per cent share, physical stamina would have 10 per cent share, knowledge would have 30 per cent share and psychology would have 10 per cent share in the success of any candidate in any competitive examinations.
