CAT 2016 is only 3 days away and in view of the previous CAT toppers it is not advisable to go on taking more and more mocks without getting time to properly analyze each of them to rectify your errors. Instead you are advised by the toppers from FMS Delhi, IIM Ahmedabad, Bangalore, SPJIMR Mumbai to revise and further strengthen your strong areas and find out more strong areas from the weak ones.
Besides, you are advised to devise right testing room strategy and testing techniques to attempt the different sections in CAT 2016 smartly to maximize your score instead of going for more and more questions sets which may create more confusion bringing a downward feel.
Frequent Mock tests further can make adverse impact instead of further strengthening your candidature for IIMs.
Prof S K Agarwal, expert on Verbal Ability and mentor on CAT 2016 preparation along with the CAT toppers is of the view that you should concentrate more on your strong areas instead of taking more mocks now. CAT toppers and students at FMS Delhi, IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIFT also eco the expert view and emphasise that it is the time for introspection, analysis and revision of whatever you have prepared instead of taking more and more mocks indiscriminately.
Review all Mocks you have taken: Pranjal, IIM Ahmedabad
IIM Ahmedabad student and CAT topper with 100 percentile, Pranjal Agarwal advises CAT 2016 aspirants to “Review all the tests you have taken to identify your weaknesses. That is important so that you can work on those weaknesses specifically as in the end, you are required to perform almost equally well on all the sections. So make sure you are caught up with the latest trend and advice too.”
Post Mock analysis is the key: Saransh, FMS Delhi
CAT topper with 99.98 percentile and FMS Delhi student of MBA 2016-18 batch, Saransh Garg emphasizes that CAT 2016 aspirants should “Do post mock analysis as it is extremely important, or else you won’t improve. It’s time to realize whether to work on speed or content.”
Time to formulate D-day strategy: Mohit Sharma
Mohit Sharma who cracked CAT, NMAT and IIFT with 99.98 percentile and opted for IIFT suggests to stop taking mocks during the last days. Sharing his strategy Mohit says “I stopped giving mocks at this time and just analysed the previous mock results in which I had done pretty poorly. I started formulating my strategy for D-Day and dedicated my efforts to shortcut tricks and mathematical formulae”
Attempt all easy questions-analysis more important: Shashank Heda IIM Bangalore
IIM Bangalore student and CAT topper with 99.99 percentile Shashank Heda emphasizes on deeper analysis of mocks instead of taking them till last day of CAT 2016. Shashank advises “Analyse the mistakes in each section. Identify the gaps. Check if all ‘Easy’ and ‘Medium’ difficulty questions were attempted. There might be something wrong with time management/question selection if most of the questions that were attempted belong to ‘Difficult’ or ‘Very difficult’ section. This would imply that the time spent in solving two ‘Very Difficult’ questions could have been better utilized in solving three ‘Medium/Easy’ nature questions.
More Mocks: May create confusion now
Taking more mocks now for CAT 2016 might involve questions on some new concepts and topics which you have not prepared well and can create confusion instead of helping you. There is no time left to begin your preparation on some new topic nor it is advisable to waste time on them.
On the other hand the questions on these unprepared or weak topics may create more confusion and instead of giving your preparation a boost for the D-day, you might be getting a feeling that you know less than required. This feeling is not good and may further aggravate your confusion level creating a vicious circle.
Analyse to improve on your errors
The Mocks that you have already taken need to be analysed again for the errors and whether you have improved on those areas. For example whether you are able to read the RC passage in a flow, understand its key words and meaning of phrases in one reading or need one more speedy reading. How good it is to go through the questions before going for second reading of the RC passage? Would it help you more than visiting the questions after complete reading of the passage for 2 times? Did you make a mistake in choosing the correct answer option on explaining the phrase in the RC passage?
So instead of going for more mocks, take out all the previous mocks, and make sure that the mistakes that you made in them are not repeated.
Low score in further Mocks: More despair
This is the time to keep your spirits high, keep yourself motivated and never-ever allow your confidence level to dip even a bit. In case you score low in further mocks taken for CAT 2016 in next 3 days, despite your well groomed preparation level, you may feel your confidence level dipping down. This is not desired at this moment.
With your strong preparation level, you already have a fair amount of idea about how much ready you are with respect to each section. The best strategy would be to choose topics you are reasonably good at but where there is still room for improvement. There is no need to spend too much time on topics you have already prepared well or have not prepared at all. Be confident and try to remain calm and composed during the exam.
Just Revise & improve
The key point of success is don’t go biased or pre determine the difficulty level of CAT 2016 in your mind without attempting the question. Revise and update your preparation on the topics related to your strong areas. The strategy whether in Mocks or on the CAT 2016 D-day is to find the questions from your strong areas first and make sure that you attempt them in the first go.
If you spend time only in taking mocks now, your revision and updation in even the strongest areas will suffer. Since not much time is left for preparation, brushing up what you have already prepared and dividing your revision schedule for next 3 days is the important key to crack CAT 2016 with high score.
Don’t allow Mocks to overpower you
Don't try to think how others did and are doing in Mocks. Don’t calculate the final percentile/cut-offs in your mind based on your 'perceived' difficulty level in CAT 2016, advises Prof S K Agarwal expert on CAT 2016 Verbal Ability preparation. It all depends on actual exam and relative scores. On the contrary, divide your next 3 days schedule with a focus on all the 3 sections in which you will need good balanced percentile.
You may have stronger quant than VARC and with DILR also of moderate level, you may not feel so confident for VARC but the need is to keep a balance among all the 3 sections. There may be questions from your strong areas even in the weaker sections, make sure that you have further strengthened these topics.
In the exam, many questions would be similar to those you must have come across and solved during the course of your preparation. Try those familiar questions first they would appear easy ones than the others which you have not practiced.
Each of the 3 sections has a time limit of 60 minutes for 34 or 32 questions comprising MCQs and Non-MCQs as may be the case. So the first thing the CAT 2016 taker should do is to go for the Non-MCQs first before beginning to answer the MCQs. Then focus on such questions in the first attempt which you feel, belong to your strong areas keeping high your confidence level.
Related Article
CAT 2016: Sectional submission may result in loss of score; understand how to avoid
Stay tuned to MBAUniverse.com for more updates on CAT 2016
