Entry Test and Time management

Students feel a lot of headache how to manage time in Entry test. Whether there will be enough time in the Entry Test to fill bubbles ,  calculate and answer. This inspired me to write about it.

Entry Test and Time management :

In Medical Entry Test students are supposed to solve 220 MCQs in 150 minutes. While in ECAT there are 100 MCQs to be solved in 80 minutes.

It clearly shows how important is the time management in order to achieve good result.

If we see, it is 40s to solve a MCQ. 

Lets first how students approach toward it. What students do
They spend a lot of time on calculations and gathering an answer and do not give time to other important things that costs them. For example I have met  2 or 3 such students who lost 100 marks in Entry Test just because "they did not spend a second to see if they are filling the bubble corresponding to the Question or not?????".

It sounds silly but it is a fact that it happens. Let's come back to the topic and let me tell you some good tips for saving time  in Entry Test

Division of Time :

                             Division of time in subjects is a good way to do a good time management. I don't say that you should actually follow that  plan but just make some targets according to your grip on subjects.
 First divide time roughly according to the MCQs in each section.
For Example in English there are 22 MCQs so it gives it roughly 15 minutes by default but if you think that you are not good at it you can give 5   minutes Extra to it. Thus you will have a basic framework in mind to approach toward test that can be made flexible a bit on test day.

Saving Time :

Calculations are the main sink of your time but they can be made much shorter with practice.

Lets see a simple example so you understand better

 1. Ans of 1/19 will be
a) 1.2              b) 0.9        c) 0.0931        d) 0.052

Option a and b are ruled out immediately as 19 is in the denominator and it is bigger than 10. So ans would be certainly 0.0 something. Then make it as 100/19 the first word on which 100 can be divided is 5. Stop here and your ans is 0.052 as third option has first  word nine.

After a good practice to do it without writing anything you will be able to do  it in 5 to 10s. And can develop a habit to solve complex calculations in seconds by finding simple correlations like this.

(I used to prefer not to write any calculation unless absolutely necessary,  just try to do everything in mind after practice it will save a lot of time on test day.)

Give Time To:

1. Understanding a big question ( in first reading).
2. Checking on every question that you are going to fill the right bubble.
3.  Fill bubbles properly in adequate time.
4. (Some students ignore it)  but always wear a watch preferably a digital watch.
5. Don't produce  hush in your mind, be patient and relaxed while doing  the test.

Hope it was helpful