One of the biggest obstacles that prospective business school students have to overcome is the CAT examination, which is the entrance exam conducted by the Indian Institutes of Management to determine who can gain entry into highly exclusive management programs. The two-and-a-half hour test can unsurprisingly be daunting for some students, but with the employment of certain study techniques (and avoiding others!) you can be assured of CAT success.
Begin studying well ahead of time. Studying for the CAT is just like studying for another examination. It needs to be done at a steady pace so that you can truly absorb and comprehend the materials. You can begin studying for the CAT months before you take it in order to prepare, though several weeks should be sufficient as well. Though the CAT mainly covers concepts that you are already familiar with, it is beneficial to relearn these concepts so that you truly master them.
In addition, studying well ahead of time helps your brain to store the information you are learning as “long-term memories,” whereas studying materials in a limited time span will only store that information as “short-term memories.” Long-term memories are more easily recalled and less liable to become confused or muddled, which is the type of memory you want to store your CAT testing information in. On the other hand, short-term memory is unreliable. It may only last for a few hours or days, and can disappear with the onslaught of stress. That is something no test-taker wants, because taking the CAT is stressful, so having your studying efforts disappear due to anxiety is never a good thing. For these reasons, strive to begin studying for the exam well ahead of time.
Although studying is important, be sure to still get plenty of sleep. It may be tempting to stay up late and study for the CAT instead of going to sleep, but this will actually prevent you from properly learning. Every day, your brain processes numerous tidbits of information from the moment you wake up until you go to sleep. Like a computer, your brain must “clear its cache” each night in order to allow more information to be absorbed the next day. It does so while you are sleeping, which is why getting a full seven to eight hours of sleep each night is imperative for academic success. While you sleep, your mind will sift through the information it acquired during the day and toss out irrelevant information and file away relevant information, just like emptying your computer’s recycle bin and defragging the hard drive. It also mulls over the problems you faced during the day, matching up correlating pieces of information. This is why sometimes you can suddenly find a solution to a problem that had perplexed you the day before. Without adequate sleep, your brain can become too bogged down with the day’s data and work slower. New information is also less likely to stick. Therefore, it is better to get plenty of rest than to attempt to trudge through sleepless nights of studying.
Finally, eat healthy and get your exercise. Having a healthy body means having a healthy mind. When you are feeling well, you are more likely to have successful study sessions than if you are feeling sick. In addition, eating healthy and partaking in regular physical activity will also lower your chances of falling ill around examination time, as well as lower your stress levels so that you can concentrate better.
These small things can all add up to make your CAT studying experience much more effective. And when it comes to doing well on the examination so that you may have a fighting chance to enter into a prestigious management program, every bit of effort counts.
About the author
This guest post is contributed by Lauren Bailey, who writes on the topics of online colleges. She welcomes your comments at her email Id: blauren99 @gmail.com.
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