How to Prepare General Knowledge for CLAT? Notes | Study Mock Test Series for CLAT - CLAT

Common Law Admission Test is a centralized national level entrance test for admissions to twenty two National Law Universities in India. Most private and self-financed law schools in India also use these scores for law admissions.

• General Knowledge is a very essential part of the CLAT exam, carrying a total weightage of 25%, which is the highest apart from Legal Aptitude. The General knowledge section of CLAT consists of 38-39 questions from Static GK and Current Affairs. 
• The importance of this section lies in the fact that it helps conserve time as it will only take 10 minutes to complete this section during the exam. In an exam like CLAT, where effective time management is the key to cracking it, these 10 minutes have the ability to change your entire career graph. 
• But, then this part requires maximum effort during the preparation. The GK section of CLAT also helps to boost the overall score as all the questions are factual and direct.

• Current Affairs will be consisting of all the things going around in mainstream media over the entire year. On the other hand, when it comes to Static GK, the CLAT exam can have questions from any sphere of life.
• You definitely cannot skip this section as it will prove to be quite scoring and time-saving if the preparation is done really smartly. 

To guide you through the preparation process for CLAT GK, here is a well-planned Strategy:1. CLAT Previous Years Question Papers

• You should go through the  CLAT previous year's question papers to check the CLAT pattern followed and the kind of questions being asked. When you prepare with CLAT previous year's question papers, you get a list of important topics related to GK & Current Affairs. This way, you'll know the areas covered and you can plan accordingly from there.
• When you get track of the questions in the past few years, prepare in line with the pattern. If questions on international relations and organizations and some particular sports are asked, there is a probability that such questions might be repeated. So, keep a track of such trends while preparing.
  CLAT Past Year Papers (2008-2021)
  (Includes 14 tests)

Step 2: Reading is Everything

• Newspapers and magazines cover all the incidents in the national and international domains. For current affairs, the habit of reading the newspaper has to be inculcated to be aware of what all is going around. Make sure to read a good newspaper such as “The Hindu” on a regular basis.
• Also, maintain a copy to write down the important news bits. Small hours dedicated to newspapers every day will give great results. Go through these notes prepared once a week or else, in the end, everything will seem new and it will be hard to cram everything in one go. 
• You must make sure to be well aware of specific topics like science, technology, legal affairs, sports, people, places, inventions, etc.
  Daily Current Affairs (State, National and International)
  (Includes 2021 docs & 356 tests) General Knowledge
  (Includes 266 tests)

Step 3: Know Your Strengths 

• The next step now is to identify the subjects or portions you are strong at or are of your interest and start preparing them first and then slowly move to the areas that might be difficult for you. 
• This will help you gain confidence in this section. This will also take away a lot of burden from you and help you prepare efficiently. 
• As mentioned earlier, the static general knowledge has been losing its value in the exam and more emphasis is being laid on current affairs now, as seen through the analysis of the previous year's papers. Always be prepared for something unexpected as nothing can be predicted before the exam.

Step 4: Watch and Learn

•  Watching National and International news regularly is another factor that will contribute to strengthening your Current Affairs Section. This will help you know about the current issues in detail. Also, make systematic notes of the news which will be of great help later.

Step 5: Practice with CLAT Mock Tests 

• Mock tests are the best sources of a variety of questions on different topics. You will get the knowledge of various questions asked on diverse topics. 
• CLAT mock tests will also give you a realistic environment to test your knowledge. This will also help you prepare several new topics/ questions, which in turn will boost your confidence.
  Mock Test Series for CLAT
  (Includes 45 tests)

CLAT Previous Year Paper Analysis:

CLAT 2020-2021 papers mark a clear-cut departure from the previous years' patterns 2008-2019. The new pattern is based on passage exercises oriented comprehension of all 5 sections of CLAT. The new changed pattern adopted in 2020-2021, is absolutely a new experiment to check the level of knowledge and understanding of candidates through comprehensions in all the five sections namely - Legal, Logical, GK, Mathematics and English language. 

The new pattern is quite lengthy and hence time-consuming. So, you have to increase your speed while preparing. You can do so by attempting mock series and making reading a habit. 

However, a detailed analysis for the years 2016-2019 for the General Knowledge section is given below for your understanding of the pattern change: 

Table 1: Previous Years Analysis: CLAT General Knowledge & Current Affairs Table 2: Area Wise Analysis: CLAT General Knowledge & Current Affairs

The three must-haves for CLAT GK and Current Affairs Preparation

• Newspaper: This is something you should be around always. Pick anyone, for example, "The Hindu" or any other you find best. The reading should be very regular. It can be boring at times, nevertheless, it is indispensable. Another thing that might help here is making notes for future revision.
• Monthly Magazine: This is the second important thing that you should own during your CLAT Preparation days. Give equal attention to this once a week and be thorough with it.
• Annual Magazine: You should definitely step in here and get hold of ‘The Hindu- Diary of Events’ which is a neat round-up of all that has happened in the preceding year. Give this some reading by allocating a few hours of your time and be aware.

All Courses for CLAT Exam

• Mock Test Series for CLAT
  (Includes 45 tests) 
  
• Legal Aptitude for CLAT
  (Includes 23 docs, 81 videos & 51 tests) 

• English for CLAT
  (Includes 10 docs & 43 tests) 
  
• Logical Reasoning for CLAT
  (Includes 16 docs & 55 tests) 

• Quantitative Aptitude for CLAT
  (Includes 21 docs & 31 tests)

• CLAT Past Year Papers (2008-2021)
  (Includes 14 tests) 

Similarly, prepare for other sections of CLAT here:

• How to prepare Reasoning for CLAT 2023?
• How to prepare Legal Aptitude for CLAT 2023?
• How to prepare Numerical Ability for CLAT 2023?
• How to prepare English for CLAT 2023?