About the Autor: Rahul Reddy, Director T.I.M.E, Mumbai: Rahul Reddy is a management graduate from IIM Calcutta prior to which he completed his bachelors' degree in Mechanical Engineering from Kakatiya University. He has had vast and varied experience in the corporate world working in such organisations as Lakme', Hindustan Lever and Mirc Electronics (the marketers of ONIDA brand of TVs). After a stint in teaching at T.I.M.E. Hyderabad, he set up the T.I.M.E. centre in Kolkata. He has an experience of over four years in teaching and is now one of the Directors of T.I.M.E. – Kolkata.
Introduction to Verbal Area
The 'English' section of CAT essentially comprises of questions on Reading Comprehension and Verbal ability. Over the last few years, this section has become a major cause of ulcers for CAT takers. Lets try and understand why.
Until a few years back this was a relatively high scoring section with cutoffs higher than in the QA and DI areas. Over the past few years, questions have become very subjective/inferential. The answer choices in some cases are quite close. Also, the increase in answer choices from 4 to 5 has also increased the difficulty level of students. The RC passages have also become extremely complicated both in terms of subject as well language, though passage size has come down.
For the above reasons, accuracy levels for students has come down. Also, scores have a tendency to fluctuate from AIMCAT to another. Now that we have understood the nature of the problem, let us see how we can tackle it.
While a good accuracy would be 80 per cent for QA and LDI areas, RC/VA, we should look at 55-60 per cent as a good accuracy rate. Again, for those who are shocked by the suggestion and accuse me of encouraging gambling, let me clarify. Pure guesswork would give you 20 per cent accuracy (probability). So we are looking at three times that level, which takes some knowledge and skill. At the same time a lower accuracy should be coupled with reasonably high attempts, about 18-22 questions (Assuming 25-30 Q).
Detailed strategy for RC/VA Area
Given that we are about 2 weeks away from CAT 2009, I am going to focus on last minute tips, things that can be changed in 2 weeks.
Normally RC and VA questions form a 40-60 or 50-50 split. So lets assume a 30 Q paper with 12 RC (three passages) and 18 VA questions. I am sure you guys are smart enough to make adjustments for different combinations.
RC obviously takes time to solve. So factor in about 20-25 minutes for two passages. That leaves you 15-20 minutes for VA which should be enough for about 8-12 questions. In case, you are unable to find enough questions in VA, then you will need to attempt all three passages. i.e. 3 passages in about 30 min + 6-7 VA questions in 10 minutes.
RC strategy starts with passage selection. A simple and efficient way of selecting RC passages is to start reading from second or third paragraph. You choose or reject a passage based on your comfort with the subject and complexity of language. As some passages can start simple and get complicated, it makes sense to read a few lines from second or third para before deciding on the passage.
There are two fundamental approaches to RC, Passage First and Questions First. Both methods have their pros and cons and students should use the one that works for them.
Passage First: Essentially you read the passage first and then attempt the questions. The big mistake students make here is in taking too much time to read the passage. They worry about not remembering the details and read slowly as well reread parts of the passage. However, slowly they read the passage, they cannot recall everything. In fact, they would have to refer back to the passage for all/most of the questions.
A better approach would be to acknowledge the fact that we would need to refer back to the passage anyway for the questions. Hence, the objective of reading the passage first is to get only the key points as well as sequential structure of the passage (which makes searching for answers faster). Hence passage reading should take 3-4 minutes and the remaining time should be for solving the questions. For each question go back to the passage find the lines relevant to the questions and read very carefully for the answer.
PAGE_BREAK
Questions First: Essentially, it involves reading the questions first and then going to the passage to search out the answers. The online format might make this a little tougher as we may have to click to access each question and then come back to the passage. While this process may appear painful, the actual time taken is not very long.
We start by reading the questions first. Then we scan the passage at relatively higher speed. When we come across some key word which tells us that the answer to a particular questions is present, we slow down and try to figure out the answer. If required we may have to go back and reread the question and the answer choices. Once the question is solved we continue to scan the remaining part of the passage. This process is repeated each time you identify a key word linked to a question.
Please note that some questions may be based on the total passage, for example:
'What is the tone of the article'
'Which of the following would the author agree with'
'This passage is most probably taken from...Newspaper, Magazine, Journal, Textbook etc'
Such questions should be taken up last, as you would have scanned the entire passage by then. Overall, this approach is better suited to factual questions than inferential questions.
Verbal: The verbal ability questions may be divided into three broad areas:
- Vocabulary and Grammar
- English Usage
- Verbal Reasoning
Vocabulary and Grammar: These are areas that test essentially knowledge of english. These are questions that you should always go through in a test. If you can answer else leave, the process either way will not take time. That said, pure vocabulary questions have been rare in CAT over the last few years.
English Usage: These are questions which require some knowledge of english along with some reasoning. For example, Fill in the Blanks, Multiple meanings and usage, Contextual Meanings, etc. As the name suggest it requires application of knowledge. These questions take a bit more time than the previous type. However, students can probably attempt more of these questions by using choices intelligently.
Verbal Reasoning: These are questions which are largely reasoning based and do not require knowledge of vocabulary/grammar. For example, Jumbled sentences, Para-completion, FIJ, US/DS, etc
These questions take relatively more time to solve. However, students who are not very good at Vocabulary/Grammar find these questions give them higher accuracy and better scores. For these questions knowing the right approach is critical. Other than that substantial amount of practice is required to get a high proportion of them right.
With only two weeks, left, there is no time to improve Vocabulary and Grammar if you are not too good at it. However, you may work on usage and especially the Verbal reasoning questions. Try to meet any good faculty and learn the approach rite and then practise a 15-20 questions of each type.
Additional Tips
Don't panic. If you find yourself at sea during CAT, understand that the paper is tough and others are dancing to the same music.
Do not get stuck on any question. This section with close answer choices can be a trap where students waste lots of time. Please understand last year, people debated for days after CAT on some of the questions. So if the choices appear very close, either mark one of the two or leave. I would advise that if you have brought it down to two choices take a guess, else leave it. Either way, Move On!
Don't spend too much time worrying about passage selection. Go by your level of comfort with the subject and the language complexity. In other words, read a few lines in the middle of the passage, if it makes sense, you can do the passage.
Revise AIMCAT questions from all AIMCATs, check your accuracy levels for various types of questions, so that you can have an order of priority for VA attempts. Example: First preference Para Jumbles and Summary, next FIB and Multiple meanings and so on.
All the best !
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