NEET 2023: Tips and techniques to prepare and ace the exam

The National Testing Agency (NTA) has announced NEET 2023 date with the exam scheduled to be conducted on the 7th of May this year. As there are only 4 months remaining for the highly competitive National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET), it is time for students to gear up and push their preparations in order to ace the medical entrance exam.

It is evident from past years that around 15 lakh applicants enter for the pragmatic race for admissions into 1.5 lakh seats across various medical colleges in India. Aspirants expecting a tougher competition this year, are at a forefront in preparing a smart work plan towards success by covering the entire syllabus on time.

NEET is a national-level entrance exam for students to get admission into MBBS, BDS, AYUSH & other nursing courses provided by top medical colleges/ universities in India. Application process for this year’s exam has already started with the students required to register for the exam before the last week of January.

The highly competitive entrance exam is conducted in the pen & paper (offline) mode consisting of 4 sections (Physics, Chemistry, Botany and Zoology). Each subject will consist of 2 sections A & B with compulsory 35 questions in section A to attempt, section B in all the subjects will have an option to attempt any 10 questions out of 15, providing some sigh of relief. This make the exam a total of 180 questions combined, which need to be completed within 3 hours, the total marks being unchanged (720).

Comparatively, many aspirants last year suggested that the overall difficulty level was moderate with physics being the toughest of all sections for them with plenty of numerical and concept-based questions. In biology, Zoology was found to be easier than the botany section. Even though highly competitive scoring is necessary to get the college of choice, it is important to be prepared right from today and understand what and how to study within the given time.

• Go for NCERT text books - Choosing the best and simple study material will assist in strengthening the concepts and NCERT text books are always the first priority instead of referring to too many books. NCERT covers a huge chunk of the NEET exam and any applicant having mastered the NCERT books will easily be able to answer the majority of the exam questions without much difficulty. NCERT books help teach fundamentals of any particular topic and provide a clear idea about the specific topic.

• Proper planning is important - Learning time-management will not only help you prepare for the entrance exam but in the long run, it will help you crack and finish the exam faster. Giving ample amount of time to every topic right from the beginning helps to cover the entire course with enough time left for revisions and rectifying the errors if any.

• Review shortfalls and work on them - It is a fact that while preparing for such highly competitive exams, aspirants will sometime make mistakes but it is also important to learn from your mistakes and overcome them. If a someone is finding any topic hard, they should look out for other sources to get clarity on that particular topic, take help from your teachers or peer groups to understand and improve but never let your mistakes kill your motivation.

• Practice as many mock tests - It is important to prioritize solving mock exams and the previous year question papers because it gives an applicant the general idea about what to expect in the highly competitive medical exam along with getting a clear idea about the level of preparation needed and what topics to focus on.

• Consistent revision - Consistent revision is the key as of now, that will play a major role in deciding the performance. It is advised that aspirants must revise all the topics and chapters that they have already studied in order to remember them for a longer time. Weekly revision of all the subjects enhances the conceptual clarity thereby aiding them for a better performance and ranking.

Subject wise preparation

While effective time management and rigorous practice has always been the key aspect in cracking any competitive examination, but knowing what questions to attend first to secure and achieve the maximum number of marks is important for every applicant. Here are the important topics subject wise -

Physics – Waves & Sound, Thermodynamics, Kinematics, Gravitation, Capacitors & Electrostatics, Magnetics, Electromagnetic Induction, Fluids, Heat, Optics & Modern Physics. Since NEET syllabus for physics section has almost equal weightage from both Class XI and XII, in order to enhance the preparation outcomes, focus wisely to cover all the topics. Though mechanics seems to be a low soring topic (suggested by various experts) but carries almost a major 35% share in terms of marks allocation, and thus is a must topic. Other scoring topics include electricity & Magnetism, Optics helping in betterment of the overall scores without any difficulty.

Chemistry – Chemical & Ionic Equilibrium, Chemical thermodynamics, Electrochemistry, biomolecules and polymers along with the periodic table, Coordination Chemistry & Chemical Bonding in Inorganic Chemistry, Mole Concept in Physical Chemistry and Organic Chemistry, chemical kinetics.

Biology – Photosynthesis in Higher Plants can be of high weightage, Sexual Reproduction in Flowering Plants, Morphology of flowering plants, Biotechnology and its Applications, Biodiversity and Conservation, Cell Cycle and Cell Division, Human Reproduction,

The correct strategy and effective time management are essential for determining an aspirant's rank. The best use of time for aspirants is to revise, maintain accuracy and quality when responding to a single question, and identifying and addressing weak areas.

(Author Saurabh Kumar is Chief Academic Officer, Vidyamandir Classes. Views expressed here are personal.)