A Plan of action for CAT exam preparation: *Some candidates will be fine-tuning their preparation for CAT exam right now, while others will be looking to somehow thrust the inertia out of the system and starting their preparations in right intense. *We provide a plan of action for the latter group. *Do not tell yourself it is too late to start now. Do not listen to anyone who says that there isn’t enough time for preparation. *The basic syllabus for this CAT exam roughly corresponds to Maths and English taught in class VI- IX. *So, if the fundamentals are reasonably strong, a student should require only 200-300 hours of preparation for this exam. *What should be the plan of action? Divide your preparation into three phases. Do the grind-Phase 1; In Phase I, one should cover the basics for all the topics in quants. This is the phase where one builds on first principles and gets the mind ready for the tougher battles ahead. So, solve as many questions as possible. Set aside two hours every day to reading, for the verbal section. Read lots of stuff and with as much variety as possible. The topic, style, subject and size do not matter (Fiction, non-fiction, sports, politics, economics, science, anything goes). Just build the reading habit and get the mind ready to receive written content. This phase is similar to an Olympic wrestler/badminton player spending hours in the gym. This phase should go on for about six weeks. Stay focused-Phase 2; In Phase II, start building concentration. Take section-wise tests, set yourself targets for sets of 15, 20 or 30 minutes. Start practicing for Data Interpretation and Logical Reasoning. Increase the intensity steadily by mixing up topics and setting varying time targets. This is the phase where you should select 1 Data Interpretation bunch, 1 Logical Reasoning puzzle, 2 passages in Reading and 8 questions in Number Theory and set yourself 50 minutes of high intensity preparation. This is probably the part of CAT preparation that is heavily underestimated. People who are used to spending 10 hours in office or eight hours in college think that writing a 2 hour 20 minute-exam cannot be that taxing. Taking a test for 140 minutes without concentration is quiet challenging and will not come without getting the mind ready for it. The better you do this the less tired you will get handling regular questions in CAT and more energy you will have for handling tougher ones. This should go on for about a week. Fine tune your preparation-Phase 3; Phase III is simple. Take various mock exams. Analyze the vigorously. Identify your gaps; correct it by revisiting Phase I or Phase II. And when you analyze a paper, you should focus on what kind of questions you have gotten wrong, which ones you should have attempted but have skipped, which ones took time without giving you much in return, which questions should you have skipped straightaway, etc. Do not waste time on studying percentile patterns and such. Most mock CAT percentile scores are nothing more than a distraction. This should ideally go on for about five weeks. Phase I, II and III could overlap. If you plan well and are willing to throw in lots of time toward preparation, this can be done in 10 weeks. The students with intense shorter-term preparation have seen better results than those who enroll into long-term courses but do not do justice to them. For those who have been preparing for a while, the simple strategy is to skip Phase I. Start your preparation now and focus on building intensity.
Posted on: Wed, 25 Sep 2013 05:04:03 +0000
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