Plan and timetable for upsc prelims

60 Days to Crack Prelims – The Schedule- Planning your days of Preparation CivilsThere are many parts of weapons in the previous write ups and some of you may be confused how to assemble them together and put them to use. This short write-up helps you to plan your 60 Days of Preparation. As we are limiting ourselves to 60 days, there may be little over work, considering that most of the people have started the preparation months earlier.

But everything is possible with proper planning and prioritisation of topics to cover maximum syllabus in less days. That planning and prioritisation or blueprinting of your schedule of 60 days is what I intend to do here. Planning starts from classification of work at hand, identifying regular works and occasional works, identifying the importance assigned to each of these parts and scheduling them accordingly.

Civils Keep 45 minutes per day for newspaper reading Let’s begin from the routine works. There are things which are to be done everyday irrespective of importance. Numero Uno among them is Newspaper reading. So, Keep 45 minutes per day for newspaper reading. Read the first page, and look at the headings from inside pages, don’t get carried away and waste time. Take 15 minutes to catch up with what happened before you started preparing, i.e., revising through previous one year history. Read only national news and don’t read the news which you have already got a summary from newspapers. So one hour of your preparation time is over.

Let us analyze the NCERTs and list them down based on importance from the understanding in first write up. Though normally we say that books should be read from lower level to higher level, it is not applicable here as all of us are graduates and we have already studied these books sometime in the past.

But if you find something in a higher class book, difficult to understand, go back and refer from lower class books or refer internet.

Order of Importance (NCERT Books): History 1. Modern India 8th Class 2. Ancient and Medieval India Geography 1. Indian Geography 10th Class.

2. Land and People 6th, 7th, 8th classes Polity 1. Indian Constitution at Work 2. Democratic Politics I and II Economics 1. Indian Economic Development 2. Economics and Understanding Economic Development Science Too much interlinking, hence, cannot be classified.

So pick any subject out of these and choose the book or books listed as No 1 in the subject. I am expecting you to read this book for a minimum of two hours a day. More you read, the better it is for preparation. (If you are a too much slow reader, the calculation in hours will not be for you, divide 45 days by number of books and plan accordingly. If you finish a book go to another book, starting from

Number 1 book.)

Next two hours should be dedicated for CSAT Paper II. There are no priorities other than what you found out by classifying the questions. Start from most important chapters and do it for 2 hours.

For the first 5 Days This will be your schedule for first 5 days i.e. 5 hours per day for first 5 days. It’s better, if you can do more. But I give you minimum time considering you are just starting preparation and I don’t want you to get tired from the beginning.

From 6th Day onwards From 6th Day onwards, I am expecting you to work harder. Add one more hour to NCERTs. Now you have 3 hours for NCERT, but your reading would have improved and you will be able to read faster. So add one more subject. Please give 90 minutes for one subject and another 90 minutes for next subject.

You can choose any two subjects, but keep in mind that first aim is to finish the number one books first and then subsequently you can move on to 2 numbered books.

In CSAT Paper II, add half an hour time, which you shall dedicate to preparation of comprehension, to develop faster reading skills and identifying plausible questions from an essay. So, that makes two and a half hour for CSAT paper II. 6th day to 15th day The routine news reading has to continue and net time of preparation for next 10 days, i.e. 6th to 15th days will be 6 and half hour per day. So your 15 days of preparation is over and you may be more confident by now. Many NCERTs numbered one may already be over, you may be going in number two NCERTs in at least some of the subjects.

From 15th day onwards Now it is the time to add something from advanced level preparation to chart. From 15th day onwards I am expecting you to do at least one test on every alternate day. On the days when you are not doing tests, do some reading from advanced level. Reduce One hour from NCERTs and half hour from CSAT and add one hour to your schedule to cover additional level of preparation. That will be seven and half hours per day from 15th day onwards. In my opinion, this is the maximum you can stretch yourself , unless you are a prodigy.

Continue this Schedule for rest of your preparation Continue with this schedule for rest of your preparation, with slight changes, such as reducing time for basic level, shifting your focus increasingly towards advanced preparation. Depending on your comfort level, you may dedicate a few minutes to skim through the headings, revise the books which you have already read in at a quick pace, increase the number of subjects read in the same amount of time like. For example, if you are reading 2 Subjects in 2-hour session, make it 3 subjects of 40 minutes each. This is important because in the end you have to remember all subjects on a single day.

Seven days before the exam Seven days before the exam i.e. on 53rd day of your preparation, I want you to stop studying anything new. No new material will be read, no new books will be opened, and no unread pages will be touched.

This is minimum time needed to read and consolidate what you have studied so far. But you can do tests during this time also. Don’t be worried about the advanced level books you couldn’t complete them, you have option to leave few questions out and it will not hurt your prospects.

The last day before examination And on the last day before examination, you will read nothing, Have plenty of good food, sleep and relax.

Tomorrow is your D-Day and good food and sound sleep can do you wonders for you on the exam day, while tiring yourselves with hard will create your troubles.

This plan may not be applicable to everyone, as study paces and methodology may be different for

different aspirants. However, basic principles are same, consolidate basics, try to do something from advanced level, and don’t overwork from beginning and tire your selves, do practice, and take sufficient rest.