To get entry into Indian Armed forces as a commissioned officers every year candidates apply for CDS and/or AFCAT entrance exam. These exams are conducted twice in a year, a candidate can give 10-12 attempts of each of these exams in a lifetime. Even after having so many chances there are cases where candidates are not able to make the most of these opportunities, here we are going to discuss 11 Reasons for Poor Performance in AFCAT and CDS Exam.
11 Reasons of Poor Performance in AFCAT and CDS Exam
- Lack of practice
As a particularly annoying person once said, ‘Fail to prepare, prepare to fail’. Half the reason this person is so annoying is because they are, in fact, 100% right.
Past exam papers show you exactly what to expect – in some cases you may even see questions repeated from year to year – so if you go into exams without having a serious go at past papers then you almost deserve to fail.
- Test anxiety
Sometimes when the moment of truth comes students freeze due to fear or anxiety. Yes, test anxiety is very common in students. Nervousness, nausea or just uneasiness might take over once in the examination hall. At that moment no amount of hard work comes to the rescue and things eventually go down the drain. Perhaps in such cases a psychological consult to deal with such fears must be brought in the picture else their dreams and aspirations might remain unfulfilled.
- Stress
As patronising as it sounds, worrying is genuinely a waste of energy. Time spent telling everyone how screwed you are and banging your head against the nearest available brick wall isn’t going to benefit anyone.
Relax. Kick back. Go for a run. Take a (purely metaphorical) chill pill. If you take a step back and simply get down to work in a calm and measured manner you’ll reap the benefits come results day.
- Poor planning
In exams, it’s vital that you don’t jump the gun. Take the first five to 10 minutes to read through the paper and plan the questions you’re going to answer in order of how confident you feel in that subject area. Make sure you secure the marks on the questions that you find easiest to answer first, before attempting questions that are more difficult. The latter often make you lose confidence and time during exam conditions.
- Not reading the question properly
When revising, students often rehearse answers in their head. “Although we don’t deliberately intend to catch them out in exams, we do set questions that requires them to think and reflect under timed conditions. But instead students will often pick up key words in the question and write out a rehearsed response.”
This can be avoided by taking some time to reflect upon the question, rather than seeing that as wasted time and rushing to fill the pages.
- Low self confidence
We can do all the preparations and turn through every page in every book but without confidence they amount to nothing. Confidence building is very important to give a student the belief that she can get through any exam in her life. It might be fear of the subject or just lack of faith in their own abilities; but it does affect the outcome of exams inspite of the best of preparations.
- Panic and procrastination
Sometimes a task can feel so overwhelming that it’s difficult to begin. Procrastination takes over and you just can’t seem to get anything done. Try not to panic, protect and manage your preparation time, and don’t put off getting started.
- Insufficient reading around a subject
During revision time, students are too selective in what they choose to read, selecting one or two books and remembering as much from those as possible.
- Getting stuck with one question
Sometimes a student might be prepared to solve every question that appears in the paper but just then emerges one deal breaker. Yes, a question that comes into view out of the blue and just doesn’t seem to get solved. It is at such questions that students get stuck at, till it gets too late to attempt the rest of the paper well. So that one question and the time spent on that hinders the prospects of good results for students.
- Difficulty in retaining Subject Matter
All students are not the same. There are those who need less time to understand and retain the subject matter. However there are also those who inspite of putting in hard work find it difficult to recollect the same during assessments. It is actually one of the very common reasons of failure in students who even relentlessly burn the midnight oil.
- Studying Techniques
Sometimes the technique of studying might directly result in unfavorable scores. It is seen that students who depend on cramming everything in their syllabus from an early age find it increasingly difficult to attain good grades as years pass by. Cramming might be an easy option when in junior classes beyond a point it becomes useless. With increase in the complexity of course materials, understanding the concepts becomes necessary to fare well. But often letting go of the habit becomes too difficult leading to constant disappointments.
