Showing posts with label exams. Show all posts
Showing posts with label exams. Show all posts

Sunday, 22 December 2013

In Hope, we dwell.... We, the students!

Hope, they say, is a rope that swings you through life. Hope can make wonders happen. "Ummeed pe duniya kaayam hai" has become the order of the day. But sans any intention of delving into the philosophical depths and viewing hope from an emotional tangent, we provide to you the practical functions that hope performs in a student's life, leading him/her to say each second:


So, here's a glimpse of the extent to which a student's life is replete with hope.


Beginning of the session:

The session begins with much pomp and show. Okay, not really but then that is what each student would like to believe: that his/her life is a movie (or worthy of one based on it). Reality, as it happens to be, is quite different. Almost contradicting. No one gives a damn whether its your first day in a new session, if you have promised to re-invent yourself or if you are trying to get out of a cocoon or you are stepping out of your comfort zone. Hope, my dear friend is all you have. Also, you harbour hope of making new and true friends, of becoming the apple of your teachers' eyes, of becoming popular, of being conferred a position in the school Prefectorial board/college union.
With bucket loads of hope, and truckloads of regret manifesting itself in motivation, a student is all set to take on the new semester. Alas, the renewed hope and zeal die an early death, for the student had never perceived the difficulties that would come his way. Hope becomes a fodder for your existence and endeavours. Facing the trials and tribulations of settling in new environs is a daunting task and it is hope that keeps you going. HOPE is the word



During the session:

When troubles come into sight, all hopes are abandoned for the pursuit of comfort is much more tempting. With all hope of burning the midnight oil and studying meticulously gone, the student embraces his old ways.
Such is the sad but true story of the gain and loss of hope.
Still, somewhere in your heart, it is hope which makes it possible for you to believe that you will be able to emerge victorious over the enemies of laziness, tardiness and foolishness

The shy student, who isn't much of a verbose, imagines being more forthcoming, making new friends. He lingers on to the hope of metamorphosing n becoming popular. He extends his hand four beginning a camaraderie, but after that finds himself at a loss of words. Unaware of the right thing to say or the right joke to crack, he reverts to his old ways


Hope of being noticed by your crush:

This crush of yours you can't just get over. But sadly, you are just another member of the crowd to him. You want to catch his eye, you want him to recognize you and you do all within your power to achieve it. Right from sending a request on Facebook, to liking all his display pics, to coming up with excuses to go to his class, to stealing glances while walking down the corridor, you don't leave any stone unturned. Yet when he doesn't poke you back on Facebook, when that love meter software just shows your love percentage at a meagre 35 percent, and when he doesn't' even bother to nod at you to acknowledge your presence, all hope, like your heart, lies broken in fragments.


Exam times:

So, exams time is called the testing time. True to the status it has been accorded, it does test everything from one's caliber to our friendships to our consistency in collection of notes. This is perhaps that time where we cling to hope the most. We begin by hoping that we get enough time and concentration and mental abilities and resources to study well.  Talking of resources, one also hopes to amass all the notes, photocopies and scribbled sheets of paper (amass, because it is no less than wealth, right) and then one hopes, direly so, that our friends be in the same boat as us.
As pointed out before, it is a testing time for friendships too and many friendships fall out due to conflict of priorities among friends. One just hopes that either his friend has also studied only as much, or if he has studied complete then the friendship which always attracted abhorrence of teacher will accrue its benefits in the form of the learned friend prompting all answers.


Results:

Results, the most dreaded part of this examination system, the culmination of it all. While a majority of hopes are not difficult to decipher: they are simple hopes to "pass" the exam, there are others who hope for miracles to happen. Ridicule commits suicide when a student who attempted the paper for 50 marks HOPES to score a 70. And hope is a big word, mind that. The scholar is hoping for a century in all subjects, while surreptitiously an average student hopes to have broken his own record, and many a times, that of the scholar too. In the aftermath of results, marked by an incessant shower of consolations and congratulations, hope becomes the most instrumental weapon.


The anticipation of the sudden appearance of Santa in times of need is pretty ludicrous, for you have to wage your own battles.
To quote a line from The Fault in Our Stars, "The world is not a wish granting factory."

P.S. The writers here HOPE that you liked reading the article. We also HOPE that you will leave comments in the section below.

Friday, 3 May 2013

Delhi University's FYUP (four-year undergraduate programme)


I recently attended a workshop on DU’s undergraduate programme. Owing to the reforms that the university is planning from  this year onwards, for the batch that’s always been the harbinger of reforms and the “gold” on which all acid tests are done, the brouhaha over its pros and cons was only obvious. Considering that It can even prove career-altering for many, its justibiable too.
Here's everything everyone wanted to know about it.

The new programme is divided into 4 broad categories of subjects, viz., Major, Minor, Foundation, Applied.
As  the Vice Chancellor stated in his bilingual speech  aimed at decluttering the confusion that he claimed is being created by media. While our major subject is going a transmutation itself, including a research in the fourth year. The second discipline provides us scope to broaden our field of work by increasing our knowledge base.
The applied courses aim at increasing our employability or facilitaing/imparting entrepreneurial abilities. The foundation courses, although adding too much weight to the curriculum, would develop the basic skills.

there's a catch for all those opposing it: free laptops loaded with lectures and notes will be provided. 
Last word:I must say that he succeeded in convincing us but ultimately our destiny would be determined by the success of its implementation. Despite a great intention, action is everything after all....


Leave your views as comments below…….

Thursday, 11 April 2013

Who said its OK?



The months of January and February were perhaps the toughest time of my life till now- mentally draining, emotionally debilitating, physically strenuous. I will make a frank, honest confession- I badly wanted it all to end.

In the escapade that unfolded, I found out that things are not all as they seem to be.
Five things about Boards et al that I failed to understand.
Five myths about B-O-A-R-D-S busted...

MYTH 1) Boards are just like any other exam.
Come on, we all know they aren’t .the terminals never judges us for life! They were never the parameter to decide what path our careers and our life at large would take, they never evaluated us in totality, and they never made us shriek with paralyzing fear that a single mistake was capable of changing the entire, mind it , entire course of action that our lives are to follow.

MYTH 2) Score well in Boards once and for all, and your struggle will be soon over.

This, you are told in a didactic demeanor by the very person who would, a year from now, be saying the same about college/ graduation. They themselves know that life is a struggle and can never be over but still, obstinately keep on pestering you with highly unwanted advices, and unbelievable, limitless, inexplicable expectations.

In the long run, it would hardly be a matter of prestige if one could score an immaculate 100 in maths or an astonishing 98 in English, what’s really going to matter is the knowledge we accumulated that remains with us for ever.

MYTH 3) Its all hard work.
I am not implying that hard work is useless. No. never. But it can alone never guarantee success. So, when people chide you to study hard and harder from day 1,  surreptitiously, deep within, even they know the role that luck plays here. The mood of the examiner, the length of the paper, the on-the-spot time management etc etc.

MYTH 4) NCERT is enough.
If I be given the liberty and authority, I‘d have given the award of the “FATAL ADVICE OF THE CENTURY” to this one. Teachers, tutors, pass-outs and classmates may consistently and intently explain you how NCERT is “more than sufficient”, but mark my words, they are never enough. Not for economics, not for Maths, not for Physics. Not for practice. Not for Tests. Not for pre-boards. Never for boards. NCERT is essential, indispensable, extremely so, but never ENOUGH. Neither is reference book. Nor are notes. For the Big Day, nothing seems to suffice.


MYTH 5) The sample papers give an insight into the real question paper.
Bah! Humbug! Forget about getting some ditto questions, you might end up answering twisted questions on topics that you considered trivial. Perhaps, the topic is taking revenge on you for having deemed it unimportant.!!!!

Friday, 1 March 2013

MY TRYST WITH BOARD EXAMS


MY TRYST WITH BOARD EXAMS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(this is an exerpt from my dairy entry for THE day)

1st March 2013........the much awaited day! why? for the simple reason that it was our first tryst with the hitherto dreaded Board examinations. it is only natural that a 17-year-old gets butterflies in the stomach as the moment gets close. but our case was different. too diferent. not because we didnt have any prior experience of  boards i.e. giving exam in some other school, but because ours is the first batch to have a first experience of boards in 12th standard........
so, today we had this.our FIRST BOARD EXAM. english core- it sounds rather difficult, was our launch vehicle into this inevitable journey, an epiphany (pardon me for using that word, but i told u na, it was my english exam?). here's an account (just an excerpt) of my day-
the day began off well, just like any other day, just i woke up at 5.30, half an hour earlier than usual. there was so much tumult going on in my mind.....ah!those silly, usual thoughts..... if they ask this, i shall write this, if possible i shall write a quotation in this question, if there's an option between notice and formal invitaion, i shall attempt invitation which i had prepared so well, and so on an so forth. there was also some stretegising over how to use those additional, precious 15 minutes being awarded to us. 
amidst all these messed-up, chaotic smorsgabord of thoughts, there were certain goosebumps moments as well. I READ THE NEWSPAPER AND LEARNT THAT NINE LAKH STUDENTS WERE in the same boat as me, and these were the statistics for delhi alone. All-India figure stood at almost 30 lakh. i was utterly shocked and flabberghasted. nevertheless, I prepared myself for the day ahead.
and moms will be moms. I still can't believe she told me, the eternal skeptic and rationalist, to keep my right foot out first, because customarily its deemed auspicious!!!  I did not mind it when she thrust two spoonfuls of sweet curd in my mouth, because I like curd. Honestly, with English being the first ever Board exam, the feeling did'nt quite sink in.
how my exam went is another story, but I didnt find anything so distinct about them, and yet the hype about them never lets me treat them like any other exam...

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/cbse-board-exams-english-paper-proves-a-good-start-for-many/1082030/

http://www.hindustantimes.com/HTNext/Education/A-smooth-start-to-board-exams/Article1-1019764.aspx

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-03-02/board-exams/37389832_1_english-teacher-high-marks-lakh-students