The Last Lap - IIT-JEE 2012

With over five lakh students expected to appear for the IIT joint entrance exam this year, the competition is going to be tough. So how do you prepare yourself for a stellar performance? 

Right Revision 
Says Shubham Mehta, who secured a second rank at the IIT-JEE 2011, “Though you should try and keep in touch with every topic, the focus at this stage should be on organic and inorganic chemistry. Mathematics and physics are conceptual and devoting as less as an hour or two to these subjects every day should be fine. Make short notes and highlights of chapters, concepts and formulas.”

Mihir Patel, a fourth year electrical engineering student at IIT Bombay, adds that this is the time to revise the complete syllabus starting with concepts you understand relatively well. “Don’t leave any topic. Compile your frequent errors; understand why they occur and come up with strategies to avoid them,” he says.

Additionally, solving a few problems from your notes, study material and last year’s JEE paper will be of help. Pay equal attention to all the three subjects by devoting specific hours during the day or entire days for each of the subjects. Make mental clues of all your concepts so as to help you retrieve them quickly during the exam. You may also revise chapters from your class XI books to brush up on various concepts. 

Exam Time
IIT-JEE is a competitive exam and includes both easy and tough questions. So if you find a question difficult, remember a majority of students would feel the same. Advises Mehta, “Keep the order of the subjects you are attempting the same as the one you are used to attempting at your coaching class/practice hours. This will ensure that your mind is at ease during the exam. Don’t spend more than five minutes on any particular problem. Try to complete the chemistry section within 30-45 minutes, physics within 45 minutes to an hour and the mathematics section within an hour-and-a-half.” 

Says Tejas Shyam, a fifth year metallurgical engineering and materials science student at IIT-B, “If you feel comfortable, solve the questions that carry more marks first (even among the problems you find easy). This will maximise your attempt. Do not try too much of guesswork, lest you garner negative marks.” 

Questions with no negative marking must be attempted. Mark the answers on the OMR sheet after every four to five attempted questions. Remember, JEE is about quality and not quantity. You can make the cut by performing well in at least two subjects and securing the minimum cut-off marks in one.

Mental Make-up
You have done the best you could, now is the time to be confident and calm. Don’t stress over what you don’t know, but be sure of what you do. 

Remember to go for regular walks or get at least an hour-long exercise each day to refresh your mind. Advises Gautam Barua, director, IIT-Guwahati: “Do not listen to anybody other than your inner self. Be confident of your abilities and don’t get distracted by random advice about the pattern of questions or the likely questions. Give it your best shot and be satisfied with it.”

Practising to face questions deftly

 The month before Board examinations is usually the shortest. Not only because February has the least number of days, but also because students have enough and more to do during this time.

After a few rounds of revision and model examinations, most class XII students' study time would now go into solving question papers of previous years.

A practice endorsed by teachers across Boards, solving question papers is said to prepare students to face questions worded differently and also help them divide time wisely. Many publishers come out with question paper compilations.

The School Education Department also makes available model question papers (For details, visit: http://www.tn.gov.in/schooleducation). So does the CBSE (Visit: http://cbse.nic.in/student.htm).

Among the most popular question banks is the one brought out by the State's Parent Teacher Association. According to a former office bearer, much of the Association's funds came from sale of these question banks.

While teachers may ask students to solve as many papers as possible, understanding the concepts is crucial to this exercise too, say students. “If we have to fully solve multiple question papers in the same subjects, we must be very strong in our concepts,” says a class XII student of St. Joseph's Higher Secondary School.

In schools, taking model and revision tests based on question papers of the previous Board examinations is often seen as a practice that helps high scorers top and weak students pass. “Teachers tell us that weak students can easily pass if they try solving even some of the questions,” said a class XII student of an aided school, who uses the ‘Arivali' question paper bank for physics and chemistry. According to T.N.Venkatesh, Joint Commissioner (Education), Chennai Corporation, teachers in Chennai Schools are also training students with the help of past question papers.

“While this is the case for students of Class XII, for Class X students, who have a new syllabus, there is no model question paper as such. Nonetheless, we have prepared a special module for them with key concepts and examples of how the same concept can be tested through questions worded differently,” he said.

In addition to giving practice, question banks also indicate some “challenge areas” that students should quickly address over the next few weeks, says a physics teacher of a government school.