Final Revision: Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension | Verbal Ability (VA) & Reading Comprehension (RC) - CAT PDF Download

Preparing for the VARC (Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension) section of the CAT exam can be a challenging but rewarding experience. This section is crucial as it tests your ability to understand and analyze written material, which is a valuable skill in business and management.

Detailed Tips for Final Revision 

Final revision for the VARC (Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension) section of the CAT exam is crucial to ensure that you have a firm grasp of the material and can perform well under exam conditions. Here are detailed tips to help you with your final revision:

1. Create a Revision Schedule:

• Plan Your Time: Allocate specific time slots each day dedicated to different types of VARC questions. Ensure you cover all question types and focus more on your weaker areas.
• Balanced Approach: Combine practice, reading, and revision in your schedule to keep the preparation holistic.

2. Practice with Mock Tests:

• Simulate Exam Conditions: Take full-length mock tests in a timed environment to get used to the pressure and pacing of the actual exam.
• Review Performance: Analyze your performance in each mock test. Identify patterns in mistakes and areas that need more focus.

3. Review Mistakes and Weak Areas:

• Error Log: Maintain a log of mistakes you make during practice. Review this log regularly to avoid repeating the same errors.
• Focused Revision: Spend extra time on topics or question types where you frequently make mistakes. For example, if you struggle with jumbled paragraphs, dedicate additional practice time to this area.

4. Refine Reading Skills:

• Daily Reading Habit: Continue reading a variety of materials daily, including newspapers, magazines, and academic articles. This helps improve comprehension and speed.
• Summarize Articles: Practice summarizing articles and passages to enhance your ability to identify main ideas and key points quickly.

5. Vocabulary and Grammar Review:

• Flashcards: Use flashcards to review vocabulary regularly. 
• Grammar Drills: Revisit grammar rules and solve exercises. Focus on common errors and tricky grammar points.

6. Timed Practice:

• Sectional Timing: Practice each VARC question type within a set time limit to improve your speed and efficiency.
• Time Management: Develop strategies for managing time effectively during the exam, such as deciding how much time to spend on each question type.

7. Enhance Comprehension Skills:

• Active Reading: While reading passages, practice active reading techniques such as highlighting key points and summarizing paragraphs.
• Inference Practice: Work on questions that require drawing inferences from the text to improve your analytical skills.

8. Review Key Concepts and Strategies:

• Revision Notes: Go through your revision notes and key concepts regularly. Focus on high-yield topics and frequently tested areas.
• Strategy Refinement: Refine your strategies for tackling different question types. For example, for reading comprehension, practice skimming techniques and question prioritization.

9. Stay Updated with Current Affairs:

• Read News: Stay updated with current events and trending topics, as passages in the exam may be based on recent developments.
• Diverse Topics: Read articles from various fields such as economics, politics, science, and technology to broaden your knowledge base.

10. Relax and Stay Positive:

• Healthy Routine: Maintain a healthy routine with adequate sleep, proper diet, and regular exercise to keep your mind sharp.
• Positive Mindset: Stay positive and confident about your preparation. Visualization and relaxation techniques can help manage exam stress.

Final Week Strategy:

• Light Revision: In the final week, focus on light revision and avoid starting new topics. This is the time to consolidate what you have already learned.
• Mock Test Analysis: Take a couple of mock tests and spend ample time analyzing them rather than taking too many.
• Rest and Relaxation: Ensure you get plenty of rest before the exam day. A relaxed mind performs better.

By following these tips, you can maximize your efficiency and performance in the VARC section of the CAT exam, ensuring you are well-prepared and confident on exam day.

How to Study RC and VA?

There are two types of questions asked in the VARC section of the CAT exam:

• MCQs (Multiple-Choice Questions)
• Non-MCQs / TITA (Type-In The Answer)

(A) Strategies to Score High in RC Passage

• Reading: Read Newspaper Editorials and Articles regularly.
• Time Management: Monitor your time to attempt the CAT RC passages. One RC passage followed by 5-6 questions should not take more than 15 minutes to answer.
• Practice RC: Choose an English RC passage source like RC course on EduRev that contains a variety of English Reading Comprehension passages with questions and answers and practice on a variety of questions.
• Review Answers: After going through the English Reading Comprehension passage with questions visualize the answers.
• Central Idea of the Passage: Draw inferences from the RC passage about its contents and understand and identify the Central Idea (main thought) of the RC passage. Most RCs reveal their central theme within the first two paragraphs. So, you shouldn't distribute your time uniformly across all the paragraphs of the passage, instead of when you start reading a passage try slow-reading to get the theme of the passage as quickly as possible. Once you get the theme, pace up the reading of the subsequent paragraphs.
• Analyse already given answers in passage: Understand the Questions based on the RC passage and recognize the directly or indirectly used answer in the RC Passage after identifying the Tone, situations mood, Purpose of the Reading Comprehension Passage.
• Words like 'always, never, definitely' are extremes and are often cues to a wrong option. Always look out for such words to improve your accuracy rate.

To practice effectively for the RC section, click here.

(B) Strategies to Solve Questions in Verbal Ability

• Forming a link of two sentences helps in odd one out questions and then, it is a matter of checking for 4 combinations (say AB is the link that you know of, the order could either be CAB, ABC, DAB, ABD).
• Data and logic Section is very important section if anyone scores good in this then it is good for his score. 
• Paragraph jumble, paragraph summary and odd one out are very important.
• For Paragraph Summary questions, a couple of options will contradict the paragraph in a few cases. It will help if you try to figure out what one statement has that the other doesn’t.
• The best way to go about these questions is to simply mark the order you think makes the most sense and move ahead without spending a lot of time on each question (1.5 to 2 minutes is sufficient in most cases).

Verbal Ability Strategies

Verbal ability is another crucial part of the CAT VARC section, which tests the candidate’s ability to analyze and interpret language and structure-based questions. Here are some effective strategies to improve verbal ability skills:

• Paraphrasing: To improve para summary and para jumble questions, try to paraphrase the sentences in your own words to understand the meaning and structure better.
• Logical Connectors: Use logical connectors such as ‘however’, ‘moreover’, ‘therefore’, ‘nevertheless’ to link sentences and paragraphs and create a logical flow of ideas.
• Contextual Clues: Pay attention to contextual clues such as tone, language, and style to understand the meaning and intent of the passage. Context clues can also help you understand the meaning of unfamiliar words.

Revision Strategies for Each Type of Question

Here are some revision strategies and tips for each type of question you'll encounter in the VARC section:

1. English Usage or Grammar:

• Brush up on basic grammar rules, especially subject-verb agreement, tenses, and sentence structure.
• Solve practice exercises and take online quizzes to identify and correct grammatical errors.

2. Vocabulary Based (Synonyms/ Antonyms):

• Expand your vocabulary by reading books, newspapers, and articles regularly.
• Use flashcards to learn new words and their meanings.
• Practice synonyms and antonyms by solving exercises.

3. Fill in the Blanks:

• Focus on contextual understanding. Read the entire sentence to determine the most appropriate word or phrase to fill in the blank.
• Pay attention to the tone and logic of the passage to make the right choice.

4. Sentence Correction:

• Work on identifying common grammatical errors such as subject-verb disagreement, pronoun-antecedent agreement, and parallelism.
• Proofread your own writing to improve your error-detection skills.

5. Cloze Passage:

• Practice reading comprehension passages with missing words and try to predict the missing words based on the context.
• Develop the ability to grasp the overall theme of the passage.

6. Jumbled Paragraph:

• Look for clues within the sentences that indicate their logical order.
• Start with a sentence that provides an introduction or context, and then build the sequence from there.

7. Meaning-Usage Match:

• Understand the meaning of words in context rather than just their dictionary definitions.
• Pay attention to how words are used in the passage to match them correctly.

8. Analogies or Reverse Analogies:

• Practice these types of questions by identifying relationships between words and applying them logically.
• Use analogy examples from various sources to hone your skills.

9. Summary Questions:

• Read the passage carefully and focus on the main idea and supporting points.
• Practice summarizing passages in your own words to improve your summarization skills.

10. Verbal Reasoning: - Develop critical thinking skills to analyze arguments and draw logical conclusions. - Practice with argument analysis questions from reputable sources.

11. Facts-Inferences-Judgments: - Distinguish between factual information, inferences (conclusions drawn based on evidence), and judgments (personal opinions). - Pay attention to qualifying words like "might," "probably," and "definitely" to make the right distinctions.

12. Reading Comprehension: - Read a variety of texts, including newspapers, magazines, and academic articles, to improve your comprehension skills. - Practice summarizing and discussing the main points of the passages you read.

Remember, consistent practice is key to improving your VARC skills. Allocate sufficient time for each type of question, and take regular mock tests to assess your progress. Don't forget to manage your time effectively during the actual CAT exam to attempt all the questions. Good luck with your CAT preparation, and stay motivated!