I realized I need to be sincere if I want to do this. So when I decided to attempt CAT’19, I knew I will have to put a lot of extra effort into VARC. Thanks to my teacher Krishna Sir who was always there for my complete preparation journey. He always had one word to tell me “READ”. I was scolded from time to time by him to read 15 articles a day i.e. approximately 10,000 words. I will transfer that suggestion to you. If you are someone who is scared of VARC, go and “READ”. It will not just help you increase your reading speed but will also help understand RCs better.
After reading, the next most important thing for VARC was to give mocks and analyze them properly. It is very important that you give a lot of time to analyze what is going wrong. After attempting mocks, I used to set the timer and solve unsolved questions during analysis. It is also very important to know which type of questions you are getting wrong. Set the right approach for them. Reach out to teachers, check webinars, and find out which approach suits best for you. If you are struggling to remember the content of RC, try paragraph to question approach where you read 1 or 2 paragraphs and then solve questions related to that and so on. But all these need time so if your weak point is VARC, there is no time to waste.
Next comes LRDI where I scored my highest percentile i.e. 99.81. But if you ask me how? I will give the usual answer i.e. “Practice”. Solve 3 to 4 sets regularly.
Don’t think you always need new sets to solve. Because even after solving the same set before, you might not be able to solve it next time or end up wasting a
lot of time. Do observe the method of writing the data, it makes a hell lot of difference. Focus more on the sets given in mocks. I solved them multiple times.
For Quant, I would say find out the topics which don’t fetch you marks. Practice their questions. Focus on important topics like Geometry. A little theory and practice will definitely set the right path for you.
To give you the most effective suggestion in one line “Analyse as many mocks as possible”. I have written analyze because that’s where you learn the most after attempting mocks. I gave around 60 mocks and not missed analyzing even a single mock. Give at least 1 mock every week and you can gradually increase the frequency as you come closer to the D-day.
I would also suggest you have a go-to person for every section if possible. I had one for each section and it helped me a lot.
Also, never get disappointed when mocks don’t go well. Go out, have some nice food and enjoy it. After that start fresh and give your best. Even I struggled with
first 40 mocks to clear the cut-off in VARC but still, I never gave up.
For XAT specifically, I just solved some previous year papers and mainly focused on Decision making. I researched a lot of tricks and tips for it. I tried implementing those in past year papers. Rest it was all the preparation of CAT which helped me.
I got calls from IIMC, IIML, IIMI, IIMK, XLRI, FMS, MDI, and all new and baby IIMs. I’m joining IIML, popularly known as “HelL”.
Don’t be Serious, Be Sincere, and Enjoy this process of learning.
Wish You All the best!!
You can always reach out to me via LinkedIn.
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Comments
Jyoti Shete
Really great...it motivating me.. because I am also coming from a small town... thanks ??
31 Jul 2020, 06.56 AM
Pooja Pangavhane
Hii Nishi, Congratulations! A very inspiring journey! Could you please suggest what were you referring to for reading? Regards, Pooja
2 Aug 2020, 12.13 AM
+Read Replies (2)
Nishi Agrawal
Nishi Agrawal is a first-year student PGP student at IIM Lucknow. She is an engineering graduate from Malaviya National Institute of Technology, Jaipur. She has worked in Deloitte as a Business Technology Analyst for close to 2 years before joining IIM Lucknow. She loves to explore different types of food. She is also very passionate about cooking and baking. She has recently started her food blog on Instagram by the name "tasty_hideout".
Hi Pooja, you can read from Aeon, nytimes, bbc, guardian, livemint, the economist etc. Just try to find good articles and read.
5 Aug 2020, 01.51 AM |
Pooja Pangavhane
Thank you!
6 Aug 2020, 08.12 PM |