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An estimated 6-minute read

CLAT - Come on Look At That!

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This is an article for all those students aspiring to get through CLAT 2011 and onwards. Of course many many many articles have already been written giving tips to all you guys out there but I’ll try to make this one different from the ones you have already read. Also I will try to make sure to provide tips that you can easily follow.

In this article let’s talk about two of the most talked about sections in this year’s paper-GK and Maths. GK because it was too random and Maths because it was too easy.


GK

As you all must have heard, read, probably seen-the type of GK questions were extremely random, like many students said, “we really didn’t see the point in such questions being asked.” Asking questions like-

 when was the first university set up in pune?

 When did Akbar die?

 When was Prophet Muhammad born?

What was the name of the group of islands that Darwin went to conduct some experiments on birds?

Like I said very random-seriously, what exactly were we being tested on?

Now since we have already attempted the CLAT, all we can do is sit and whine about it. But what the future candidates have to do is find out how to come out with flying colours despite the questions being random and ‘crappy’.

One problem with random questions is that you have no idea where to study about them from. I can’ t give you a foolproof method, but i can tell you something that i did which helped me A LOT.

I have this habit of reading stuff written like everywhere; say on the advertisement boards, on the labels of foodstuffs, in public transports, behind the buses, everywhere. I do this almost always when I’m travelling alone. I stay in Mumbai. So I travel by local trains a lot. Once I read this near the door-travelling on the footboards or roof of trains is an offence under section 156 of the railways act, 1989.

Also there’s this thing about smoking-punishable under section 167 of the railways act, 1989.

What happens with reading stuff written here and there is, you don’t have to consciously memorise all of it like you would do from a book. It gets stuck in your head and if and when you need it (during the exam) it comes to you very easily.

Now all i am saying is when you know that within a year or two you are going to appear for a national level exam which asks 95 questions (almost 50% of the paper) whose nature is “anything under the sun”, why not read anything and everything you get to read? You never know what might help you!

Whenever you see a book, read the title and its author. Just read, don’t memorise. It automatically gets set in your brain.

When you watch a movie, take a look at the director’s name and the music director’s name, along with checking out who the actors in it are.

I’m sure all of you very easily remember lyrics of various songs, why not remember the lyricist’s name too?

Whenever you go anywhere, to a movie, to a park, on the road, to a zoo, anywhere-there are always these signs warning you about various things. Take a look at what is prohibited under what act. Trust me it’s not at all difficult. I’m a person who hates memorising stuff, so i wouldn’t be giving you this advice had i not found it to be very easy myself.

Abbreviations-whenever you read some abbreviation, try to find out what it stands for. Ask people, search on the net. My easy funda - I send an sms to 9773300000(it’s google on mobile) with the abbreviation in it. I get the reply in a jiffy. Make GK a part of your everyday living. It takes no extra time, almost no extra energy. All it needs is a little bit of enthusiasm from your side, and some money to send that sms too but you can cover that by subscribing to these various free sms packs. Hell, I think you already have! J And you can literally learn a new thing everyday.

 Actually the above exercise can be used to find out the meanings of words too.

Now, people-whenever you read, see or hear about any award, or some post of some company, say chairman, always try to find out 3 things about it, actually 4-

  1. Which year did it start?
  2. Who was the first recipient? Or the position holder?
  3. Who is the latest recipient?
  4. And who is the second latest recipient?

Pay extra importance to the 4th question, because there’s this trend in CLAT-they always ask you about the second latest-almost always.

I could go on and on with these little little things that you could do, but then i also want to write about my favourite subject (seriously) –maths.


MATHS

Well maths this year in CLAT was extremely easy. Much to the delight of all the students who slogged and slogged and slogged to try and understand what this subject full of numbers is all about??!!

Still, just because it was easy this year, there’s no guarantee it will be easy next year too. So you gotta practise. A lot. There’s no short cut to that. Practise so much that no question seems new to you in the exam. This isn’t IIT, so they aren’t going to ask you new questions (thank god for that!), so practise. Not just that, if you have practised a lot, you will also take lesser time solving those sums, and as you all know-time is the essence of all competitive exams.

One very important and very easy tip i would like to give you to increase your calculation speeds-addition, division, etc.

Whenever you are on the road-look at the number plates of the vehicles in front of you. Check their numbers out. Add their digits up. Subtract them from one another. Try to see which small numbers are those big numbers divisible by. The point of all this? Nothing. It increases your calculation speed.

This is something I used to do without really being aware of it-it became a habit. And believe me; I finished the 20 maths questions in CLAT 2010 in hardly five minutes. No kidding. And once you make a habit of it, it becomes interesting too!

Another advice-

Make a list of the squares of the first 30 numbers and cubes of first 15 numbers. Hang it up in your room. Keep looking at it everyday. Eventually it will all get set in your brain. And this helps a lot too.

Be very good and precise and quick with your divisibility tests.

Befriend numbers. Whenever you see them, anywhere, add them up, multiply them, divide them, and subtract them. No, don’t use paper and pen. Use your mind. It sharpens your mind, makes it quicker and also some studies suggest that a sharp mind keeps you young.

 

So try all these strategies. If and when anything else comes to my mind, I’ll post it here. And do give me your feedback.

All the best!

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