6 JEE Main Preparation Tips to score 250+

By Ajay Singh

If your target is to achieve top marks in JEE Main and ultimately appear in JEE Advanced which will lead towards your definitive goal of getting admission in the most prestigious engineering colleges of the nation, then now is the time to act.

After determining your objective, you must make every possible effort to make it come true. You must be committed to scoring at least 250+ marks to ensure your success. To achieve this, you have to work smart along with working hard. If you have decided to prepare without coaching, then you must maintain a high level of will power all the time along with a strict daily schedule.

You must keep a few things in your mind when you preparing with devotion. But before that, I must say every individual has a distinct learning capacity, and there is no 'one-size-fits-all' approach for the preparation plan. You will have to frame your entire strategy by yourself by collecting all the necessary points and filtering out the rest. While you do so, try these tips:

Frame a personalised strategy: The first step towards the preparation is to plan how to prepare especially because you haven't joined in coaching, you have to make your schedule and plan the next two years you have, in a way you think will best suit you. The most significant advantage of preparing on your own is that you will have the liberty to choose your own tricks and plans, and take full responsibility for your success. This sense of responsibility, in a way, creates moderate stress, and that is exactly where you perform your best.

Choose the correct study material: This is the pivot around which your whole preparation revolves. It ought to be adequate and efficient. To score 250+ marks in JEE mains, NCERT is a must. You must read it thoroughly at least once, more than that also would do no harm. Then for individual subjects, apart from NCERT, you must follow decent books.

Physics: This might be one of the toughest challenges for JEE aspirants, but it is also extremely important to score good marks. You can use books like HC Verma for JEE Physics and DC Pandey for Class 11 and 12. For solving questions, you can choose books like Universal self-scorer, or Arihant physics series.

Chemistry: If you have read NCERT laboriously then stay assured of good marks in chemistry. Some questions are asked straight away from NCERT, and you need to have a good command over it.

For Organic Chemistry and Physical Chemistry, Universal self-scorer is by far the best book which I personally solved diligently. It makes your concepts rock solid, and you won't find any more twisted ways a question can be asked after solving from this. Though it's quite monotonous, it is worth giving it a try.

For Inorganic Chemistry, you need to literally cram all the facts, but if you have explicit basic knowledge, they'll automatically come to you.

Mathematics: Tata McGraw Hill and Arihant are good books for mathematics. You can also solve questions from RD Sharma objective. But keep in mind to solve each and every question of NCERT before starting any of these.

Prepare good quality notes: This indeed is a significant step towards scoring 250+ marks in JEE Main. This is because without thorough revision you won't be able to score well and for revision, you can't read again and again from the bulky books. You need to maintain concept notes prepared by yourself, and you will realise their unsurpassable importance when you'll have your exam in a few weeks. Physics, Chemistry, and mathematics are subjects comprising innumerable formulas. Learning them by heart and applying them in question-solving is indispensable in scoring the desired marks.

Solve previous year papers and give mock tests: Solving questions are not only essential to give you a crystal-clear idea of the exam pattern and type of questions, but also to boost your confidence levels. Unless you are confident in your preparation and yourself, you won't be able to perform to your optimum levels. With the introduction of numerical type questions quite recently, you should practice them with more effort because they prove to be significant rank boosters. Use standard books, like Arihant to solve questions.

While giving mock tests, you must keep in mind that you don't waste much time on a single question. All of them will fetch you equal marks and hence, give equal importance to all. Don't sacrifice the time of other questions. Plus, most importantly, don't make random guesses as the negative marking can sink your score to a great extent. Inculcate this habit right from the start.

Dedicate justifiable time to each subject: Your strengths and weaknesses are best known by none except yourself. You could be equally good at all three subjects, and you may lag in some. No one gets to decide this for you, but yourself. Considering this in mind, you must set up a timetable that devotes the time to each subject you think would be justifiable. I won't say give equal time to all because some topics may require extra time to strengthen them. Just make sure that you don't waste your time on unnecessary distractions and stay focused. Create a timetable stick to it religiously and leave no stone unturned to transform your dreams into reality.

Have faith and don't panic: I have seen many students getting disheartened and losing hope in the initial few days of preparation. This is because you may not adapt to this soon, it may take quite some time. This is also a phase, and if your confidence dwindles in this, there is a probability that you won't get the desired results. So, stay relaxed. Devote some time to extracurricular activities as well because they play a great role in replenishing you and relieving your stress. Also, moderate meditation helps you to focus better. Have healthy discussions with your peers who are also preparing. Such kind of interactions leave a great imprint on your mind and help you in memorising the formulas much easily.

Use audio-visual aids for learning: In this era of advancing technology and tech-savvy students, you can use video lectures which serve out to be a great way of learning. With plenty of apps and channels where you can find recorded video lectures that can solve all your doubts. Plus, they help you memorize things better and also teach you tricks of solving questions. But do keep in mind that you do not waste your time unnecessarily on social media and other distractions. Quitting them entirely is not the solution, but having control over their usage is the display of your will power and passion towards your goals.

To sum up, determination and consistency along with smart work are what you need to score 250+ in JEE Main.

About the Author:

Ajay Singh completed BTech in Information Technology from Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, Delhi in 2010. He began his career by coaching Class 11-12 students for Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics and Biology. He later qualified GATE in 2011 and started a career in the field of Electronics and Communication. However, his passion towards the Software industry took him to service industry and now he works as a Software Application Support Engineer (L3) at IRCTC.