How to prepare for CLAT 2019 and How to crack CLAT 2019 without coaching | CLAT 2019 Exam Preparation Strategy

How to prepare for CLAT 2019

How to prepare for CLAT 2019? This is the questions that most CLAT 2019 aspirants must be dealing with. With the change in difficulty level or the functioning of the interface, the CLAT has undergone a lot of changes in the past few years. It is expected to keep up with this trend in the foreseeable future.  This brings me to the first important point:
Expect the unexpected:In the 2018 paper, a lot of firsts were seen-

Legal Aptitude: Although this was the face saver this year, even the legal aptitude had a few surprises in its kitty. The questions based on principle- facts were time consuming and tricky. Another important change was that statement conclusion type questions were seen in this exam. Earlier, such questions formed part of the AILET only. The rest of the questions were standard.

General Knowledge and Current Affairs: This section was a bit of a shock. Unlike other years, this year the focus was more on the static part with about 30 questions from here. Topics included important organizations, dates, books and authors, geography, history etc. There has also been more focus in recent years on science and technology related current affairs. Some of the current affairs based questions were tricky and lengthy as well.

Logical Reasoning: This area was more or less on the expected lines with the only surprise being the introduction of critical reasoning questions. They have till now focused on analytical reasoning mostly but this does not mean the focus cannot change in the next year to critical reasoning etc.

English: This section had quite a few surprises. If compared to the last few years, the paper was definitely challenging. Vocabulary played an important role while one passage was tough as far as language is concerned. The most surprising element was a couple of questions on critical reasoning which have not been asked for the past 4-5 years. All of this resulted in the section being ‘difficult’ as compared to last few years.

Elementary Mathematics: This section saw a sudden increase in the level of difficulty along with new types on questions (Eg: Geometry) being asked. The usual topics like simplification, fractions were time consuming while the topics considered difficult also showed no respite and were tough.

What does the above tell us?
Firstly, it tells us that change is the only constant in this exam. It tells us we need to change our mindset and be more versatile and dynamic and mentally ready to tackle any kind of question that may come our way.

What usually happens in the exam hall?
You see a new pattern of question, you panic and then you become blank. Most of us suffer from mental block that if a question is NEW, it is bound to be DIFFICULT . This may actually be not true. True there are a few questions deliberately designed to make you get stuck and waste time, but what stops such questions from being from topics that come regularly in the exam?

How can one get rid of the mental block/panic mode?
The answer is very simple actually and has just TWO points-

Know your subject in and out: Know the entire breadth of knowledge (or at least strive to) along with the depth. The more the number of topics you cover and the more in-depth your coverage is, the more is your confidence.

Practice, practice and some more practice: It is said that to master a skill, you need to spend at least 10,000 hours on it! While we won’t ask you to do the same, we simply want to underline the passion and commitment that is needed to crack exams. You should be MAD about it. There is no other way. You should practice anything and everything that comes your way. You should practice till the time you feel no so called ‘NEW TYPE’ of question would affect you anymore. You should practice with a zeal bordering on insanity and an attitude that says the examiner may run out of ways to form a new type of question, but you won’t ever tire of solving it. Half of the battle is in your mindset. The moment you win that and get your mind and emotions under control, you’ve already won the game.

Now, the point is, if you are preparing for CLAT in year 2019 which is hardly a little more than 4 months away, you must be very good at fundamentals so that even if pattern changes in real exam, you must be able to score higher than the rest.
Now, let’s talk about the strategy part.

Step 1. Get to know where you stand at present
Have you ever observed how a team of army officers prepare themselves for a battle? They weigh every aspect of it, their strengths as well as weaknesses in terms of availability of men, weaponry, equipment or any other resource required to achieve the ultimate aim. Then, they go ahead and analyze the strengths and weaknesses of their enemies as well. Believe you me friends, a competitive exam is no less than a battle today. So, if you are really a sincere aspirant, leave everything else and check where you stand at present if you take the CLAT Full length test today.

I strongly recommend you to take the CLAT Test No. 1 at Testzonebecause of the two reasons -

First, test no. 1 is absolutely free.

Second, you will get an unmatched in-depth analysis of your test performance.

Those who want to discuss their individual Mock Test Score, can inbox me their registered email ID. I would try my level best to guide you.

Step 2. Gauge the gaps you need to cover
When you go through your test performance analysis, keep a keen eye on the gaps you need to cover. For example, in percentile section, if you achieve a percentile more than 85, you can interpret it as a fair performance and you just need to keep on attempting mocks while keeping your focus on increasing your number of accurate attempts with every test. If it is between 70–80, you really need to work on your weak areas and accuracy part. And if at all its below 70%ile, I would suggest you to strengthen your fundamentals first before you plan to attempt any exam, whatsoever. I urge all of you not to have any fancy dreams like “I will have to crack CLAT 2019, no matter what.” Believe me, this won’t help. If you have a strong base, are good at fundamentals, you’ll be through applying a right approach.” But, if you are consistently landing among 50–65%ilers, you sincerely need to work upon the basics first.

Step 3. Make a list of:
A. Topics that are of high weight-age and you are quite good at them.

For instance, let’s take Elementary mathematics into consideration. In this, Simplification/Approximation/factions are some of the topics that have high weight-age and you are also quite comfortable solving the questions from these topics.
Action to be taken: You just need to keep practicing different types/levels of these questions every day with an aim to sharpen your skills.

B. Topics that are of high weight-age and you are weak in them.

These may be ‘jumbled statements’, ‘fill in the blanks’ in etc English language, ‘analytical’ in Reasoning section and you find it really difficult to gain marks out of them.
Action to be taken:Invest at least 45 minutes every day to learn the basics of these topics and try building command over them over the time.
C. Topics that are of low weight-age and you are weak in them.

Let’s say you are not comfortable solving questions of ‘Simple and compound interest’ etc.

Action to be taken: You have time now. You should invest 30 minseveryday to practice such topics. Once your fundamentals are covered, all that is left is to practice.

Now, here are some key insights which would be beneficial for you if you understand and apply them while preparing:

Insight # 1. The actual competition lies among the top 10%. As huge as 90% candidates are the ones that fall under one of the categories mentioned below:
I. People who fill form because everyone else is doing so.
II. People who apply because their parents want them to do so.

This clearly, suggests that as a candidate you need not be a wizard of Quant, Reasoning or English language. You just need to be ‘a bit’ better than the rest. Mark my words - If you are constantly maintaining a percentile above 90 with an accuracy percentage between 85–95% in your mocks, nothing can daunt you.

Insight # 2. It’s mostly English language that makes the difference between a successful candidate and a failed one.

For past 8 years I have been observing one thing which is common among all the students who got selected in different exams is the fact they all were good at English language. If you yourself could observe, you can deduce that the most changes in pattern that happen, happen in English language section only. So, if you are ‘naturally’ good at English language, you already have an upper hand over your peers as far as Bank exams are concerned. And if you are not, two things can still save you:

I. You must be a master of the other sections that can fetch you marks to reach the overall cut off marks. And
II. You must be good enough to reach the sectional cut off marks with high level of accuracy. Suppose, you just need 6–7 marks to achieve the cut off marks. Here, I won’t ever suggest you to attempt 20–25 questions out of your guess-work. Go through all the questions with patience and choose only 8–9 questions which you can answer correctly.

Insight # 3.Accuracy is the key to success in Exams.

I have been laying stress on this aspect for past 2–3 years and those who got to understand this, have surely reaped great benefits.

Insight # 4. The tougher the exam, the easier it is for you to crack.

Yes! You read it absolutely right dear friends. Let’s understand how it goes.
In general, when you enter the exam hall, you get in with some specific goals on your mind. “I will attempt at least 30 questions in Logical Reasoning.”, “No less than 15 in “elementary mathematics” is what I am aiming at.”, “I will definitely attempt at least 20 questions in English section.” There are a few examples of these set goals. Now, guess what? The exam starts and you find an absolutely different set of questions on your computer screen. 5 min passed with 2 attempts, next 5 min passed with only 5–6 questions attempted, and now you think you almost lost your chances. Last 10 min left and you, thinking it would help you fetch at least 3–4 more marks, decide to try your luck and started marking options randomly. The result is obvious, you fail to make it through.

Let’s now discuss another scenario.

You enter the exam hall with a mindset that you will answer the easiest questions first, attempt every question on its merit and will never attempt a question if you are not sure of its answer. The exam starts and you experience a complete change in pattern but you don’t panic because you understand the fact that if the pattern has changed for you, it must have changed for others as well. You, sticking to your strategy, try to pick the easiest set of questions first, no matter in what number they are there in the paper. Then you move to the next level of questions and if you find them too difficult to solve, you just leave them un-attempted.

So, the point is - It is actually easier to reach on top (in terms of percentile) in a tough exam because when an exam gets tough, the weak panic and make mistakes and the wise make the most of such an opportunity by staying calm and playing strategically.

I think I have covered a lot of ground here. In this answer of mine, I am not going to write on how to improve English language, how to be good at Quantitative Aptitude, what sources to follow, etc. You can browse through my previously written answers on Quora.com where I have tried covering all these points in detail.

If you have anything specific to discuss, please feel free to drop a mail to info@smartkeeda.com. I will try to answer your queries to the best of my ability.
“Cracking an exam is more about ‘strategy’ than sheer ‘hard-work’.

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