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What is the ideal expected month of completion of preparation and how to revise after completion of syllabus ?

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9 votes

There is nothing as ideal month of completion of syllabus, but there is surely a safe deadline within which one should complete their syllabus so that one gets enough time for practicing previous year papers and test series. When I was preparing for GATE, I had informally completed my syllabus by the end of June and had practiced the previous year’s papers once. While doing so, I came across a lot of concepts that were important and new to me. So one advice for all the future aspirants is - practice the previous year papers religiously. Understand the nitty-gritty of each and every concept that are behind the previous year GATE questions since nowadays most of the concepts are repeated though the question data might be changed. Get a grip over these concepts first. Next I had purchased test series which were divided into 3 parts: Topic-wise tests, Subject-wise tests and Full length tests. I started with topic-wise tests. For each subject, I would prepare a topic and give the exam that was scheduled for that topic. This actually helps one in gaining clarity regarding one’s weaknesses that need more attention and one’s strengths. After completing the topic-wise tests for a particular subject, I would appear in its subject-wise test with much more enhanced clarity of concepts in my weak areas. This schedule continued till mid-November. Till end-December, I had my semester exams. Till then, I wasn't able to touch the full length tests. In the month of January, I started giving the full length tests. The first FLT was a disaster; I scored only 54 marks. This lowered my confidence a lot. I felt like it was a shot in the dark. But somehow I managed to gather myself up and I tried to analyze where I had gone wrong. Finally, I drew the following conclusions:

1. I wasn't revising enough to be able to remember all the concepts that I had studied. So I decided to give more hours to revision. I would revise nearly 6-7 hours a day and the remaining time would be devoted to giving tests and analyzing mistakes.

Wake up->Revise->Eat->Give test->Analyze mistakes->Sleep - This had become my daily routine in the month of January.

2. I realized that most of the mistakes that I was committing now were calculation mistakes and silly mistakes rather than conceptual mistakes. So I had decided to be more serious and attentive while attempting any test. I would re-check the answer that I would enter in the numerical box thrice before moving over to the next question. Also while entering figures in the calculator, I used to re-check the figures twice. This way most of my calculation mistakes got reduced to a great extent.

Now the question arises, how should one revise?

For revising any topic, I followed a very simple rule: short notes in the end, long notes in the beginning!   I had made short, precise notes of each and every subject which contained only the most important points that I generally tend to forget. I also had a separate formula list for revising all the formulas at once. I used to go through this list daily till I had all the formulas on my fingertips. Now I would use the long notes copy, i.e. the copy that contained the detailed explanation of every concept, in order to revise on a daily basis. By mid-January, I was well versed with my long notes copy of all the subjects. Then came the role of my short notes copy in the week just before the D-day. I used this to copy to just skim through the important points of each subject without needing to open the long notes copy even once. This helped me to revise and go through all the subjects in the last few days before the exam.

One last advice for all the future GATE aspirants: Don’t follow the strategy of any topper blindly. Read a lot and find out what suits you the best!

AIR 116 GATE CS 2019

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Their is no ideal month for completion because remember their are those students also who may have taken 1 year drop may have every theory and concepts prepared and they just need to practice so sooner u complete better it is.

I personally finished my syllabus before october 2018 and then started giving tests.

Regarding Revison, you can make short notes,highlight important things in your notes or books,star marks or bookmarks questions from previous years.

Again what i did was i used to revise important and little hard subject like co,cn discrete etc every week(small small portions) and used to revise concepts(if any) which i was not able to solve during tests or which i felt that i m forgetting them, so at the end my syllabus which i wanted was completed with this strategy.Also i would say don't leave any topic or dont' just stick to some standard questions becoz this year they asked very different question rather then standard which were very much expected to come, So prepare every topic very thoroughly.

 All the best.

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