English Score Made Easy

English Score Made Easy

 

 

YOU CAN IMPROVE YOUR TEST SCORES IN ENGLISH BY EMPLOYING A FEW SHORT TERM STRATEGIES.

 

 

   The question "How can I develop my test scores in English?" is an oft-repeated question that is asked by students across the country. The question and more importantly the answer to it becomes of paramount importance in the context of the CAT being less than two months away- and most aspirants facing down the barrel when it comes to English preparations. The answer to this question differs with respect to the abilities of different levels of students and also the time available to develop their scores.
   The strategy and the recommended exercises change for students preparing in the short run as against those preparing in the long run. In today's article I would like to concentrate on short term strategies to develop one's scores especially because the CAT exam is less than two months away.
   The most commonly asked question types in the VA & RC sections can be divided into:
   
• Questions testing sentence level skills: Appropriate word usage questions, facts inference judgement questions and grammatical error questions come under this category.
   
• Questions testing paragraph level skills: Paragraph jumbles and critical reasoning (consisting of question types like strengthening and weakening arguments, concluding sentences, summaries etc) are included in this category.
   
• Questions testing passage level skills: This comprises mainly of reading comprehension.
   Each of these question types concentrates on testing the aspirant on his/her ability to understand sentences, paragraphs and passages. Needless to say, no matter how good or bad your English might be, your focus of preparation has to be on trying to improve your ability to grasp the meanings of sentences, paragraphs and passages on a variety of topics.
   Before we start to look at the specific requirements for English, we first need to understand the most basic problem for CAT aspirants in the English section. If you were to ask test takers about how they fared in English in a given test, most test takers would be unable to give you an estimate of how many questions they would have solved correctly. In fact, this lack of awareness about an error made while solving an English question often becomes the biggest hurdle for most students in order to improve their scores. Besides, it also results in the creation of huge amounts of uncertainty in the minds of test takers--- they are not able to realise whether they have done enough in this section. The carry over of this uncertainty to the other sections, results in an overall drop in confidence and ultimately in the scores.
   Any attempt at improving your scores in VA & RC has to necessarily address this issue.
   The best short term method for improving your language test scores is to become aware of the error types that occur while you solve different question types. It is only then that you will be able to identify the specific thought error that you are committing - and only after identification of the same can you work to remove it.
   The following process if adopted thoroughly has the potential to help you remove the repetitive errors that you are making and hence develop your test scores.
   
Step 1:

Solve an exercise with or without time limits. While doing this be sure to work on one type of question at a time.
   
Step 2:

Without looking at the solutions, go back to every answer that you have marked. Evaluate the logic of each answer and based on your confidence in the logic you have used in marking the answer, mark each answer as:
   a) Definitely correct
   b) Probably correct
   c) Probably wrong
   d) Definitely wrong.
   
Step 3:

Check your answers and find out your scores for each answer type as specified above.
   
Step 4:

Analyse your errors based on the following error types:
 

  Error Type 1: Definitely correct gone wrong: What was the specific logic that you missed out on while solving this question and then marking your answer as definitely correct.

   Error Type 2: Probably correct gone right: Why were you not able to eliminate the incorrect option completely?

   Error Type 3: Probably correct gone wrong: Why were you not able to spot the strength of the specific logic that supported the correct option.

   Error Type 4: Probably wrong gone right: Why were you not able to eliminate the incorrect option completely? In fact, what made you think that the incorrect option was right??

   Error Type 5: Probably wrong gone wrong: Why were you not able to spot the strength of the specific logic that supported the correct option.

   Error Type 6: Definitely wrong gone wrong: You would only mark a question as definitely wrong, if you had somehow realised that the original logic you had used was incorrect. In such a case, you need to ask yourself the question: Why were you not able to spot the correct answer while solving the question for the first time?

   Error Type 7: Definitely wrong gone right: You should have been able to identify the question as definitely right. Only goes to show that you never got a hang of the specific question (or it's options). In such a case, you need to identify the logical oversight that occurred during your analysis of the question that made you mark the answer as definitely wrong instead of definitely correct.
   In my view, in case you are unable to solve a specific question in English, it means that the level of doubt inserted inside the question is beating you. Hence, the main thrust for short term preparation for English has to involve teaching yourself how to overcome the doubts that are currently beating you.