There are only a couple of weeks left for the MAT exam. In order to excel in this test which is divided into five sections one must score the maximum in language comprehension in the shortest time, says Dr Reema Chaudhury
Management Aptitude Test (MAT) is an entry test carried out by All India Management Association for admission to MBA and allied programmes in diverse B-schools. The main objective of this exam is to evaluate the general awareness, alertness and capability of a person. A good MAT score opens numerous doors whatever may be your area for specialization later. It is the largest test of its kind and is the gateway to innumerable B-schools across India.
The test is divided into five sections — language Comprehension, Data Analysis and Sufficiency, Mathematical Skills, Intelligence and Critical Reasoning and Indian & Global Environment. Each section contains 40 questions of objective multiple choice. The total duration of the exam is 150 minutes. If we see in totality, then there are 200 questions to be attempted in 150 minutes. Hence, one needs to form a winning strategy to crack all these five sections in order to achieve optimal result. The language comprehension part is pure reading comprehensions and can be considered to be one of the most important sections. The candidate may start attempting with these questions in order to score a substantial portion of marks in short period of time.
In order to excel in this section, one needs to be a voracious reader. This section is focused chiefly to evaluate whether the candidate is able to comprehend what the writer is trying to express or not. For this reason, the questions are aimed to assess candidates’ understanding of the topic and to know his assumptions/conclusions. This test comprises of questions on antonyms, synonyms, analogies, fill in the gaps ranging from easy to moderate difficulty level. It is more predominantly a vocabulary section and to score well in this section, a student must develop a good grasp over words, must have sufficient knowledge of word roots, prefixes and suffixes. With less than two weeks, the aspirants must be burning thei mid night lamp to obtain a good score. Here are few habits one needs to form before the test.
•Inculcate reading habit, read everything (newspapers, magazines to novels) which comes in front of you.
•Attempt to know the meaning of each and every new word you come across. Underline the words you are not able to comprehend, make use of a dictionary or the internet to find their meaning. This exercise will not only help you in improving your vocabulary but also it will help you to analysis the underlying point and ideas hidden within.
•Practice solving online exam question paper for improving your reading speed and answering questions based on that.
•At the time of working on the reading comprehension section, the candidate must read cautiously and try to determine the purpose of the author.
Here are some tips one may keep in mind.
•Seek to spot out words, which are basically related to the extension of an idea. For example — furthermore, likewise and in addition; or any other contrast words like nevertheless, while, however; or conclusion words such as consequently, therefore and hence — to extract the accurate connotation of the sentence.
•One needs to comprehend what the main idea or concept the writer wants to communicate. In short, if the gist gets clear then higher becomes the chance to select the correct response.
•There is always a logical connection between sentences in a paragraph. The candidate must read the paragraph cautiously and try to gauge the consistency of the point of view. The meaning becomes clearer after reading every paragraph and then by establishing the link which draws the conclusion.
•One must learn the trick of time management. The reading speed must neither be too fast nor too slow. One may consider developing an average reading speed of 250 words per minute for optimum result.
(The writer is assistant professor (Business Communication) at Asia-Pacific Institute of Management)