ANSWER WRITING SKILLS

 Answer Writing Skills

Every examination has different expectations as they are designed to test you differently. Here I would like to concentrate on the school level examinations. Any school level examination is used to test the recollection, understanding and application of the knowledge that you have. Unlike the traditional approach to examinations as a scary event it should be an exciting event. For making this an exciting event we need to know how to present ourselves so that we are able to show what we know.

You would have heard the dialogues

“In class he/she is very good but I don’t know why he/she does not write proper answers”

“I can explain you orally but I can not write”

“I was expecting at least 90 marks but got only 75.”

These result from not having proper answer writing skills. Whatever may be the level of knowledge the answer writing skills can be developed.

Some of the non-academic areas to master while preparing to write good answers are

Language skills : 

Whatever the subject area of examination, the language is going to be the presenter. If the language is not clear, lucid, and grammatically correct your subject knowledge will not reach the examiner.  So what can be done to have good language skills.

First and the most important is having a good command over spellings. Some of the methods to improve the spelling is 

• To learn phonetics. 

• Writing them often is also a way of remembering spellings. 

• It also pays well to learn certain rules followed in every language. For languages like Hindi which are strongly phonetic in writing it helps to understand correct pronunciations. 

• Daily writing at least one page in every language can help. 

• Listen to good language from different sources.

Second part of language skills is grammar. Reading is the best way of improving grammar. There are also many websites that can help in the efforts.

Handwriting skills : 

Your handwriting is how an examiner will see you. There are many misconceptions and jokes around handwriting. The Doctor's handwriting is the source of many jokes. Also there is a myth that intelligent people tend to have bad handwriting.

If the handwriting is not legible it is very uninteresting for an examiner to look at the answers. A losing interest in your answers will adversely affect the amount of answers actually read by an examiner. So invest in good handwriting.

Even though it is understood that not too much can be changed in handwriting after a certain age, it is still possible to make it legible.

• Write with proper spacing between words. 

• Increase the size of letters. 

• If you are not comfortable with cursive it is perfectly okay to write normally.

• Take up regular exercises to improve handwriting. 

Other than above non-academic areas there are some main academic areas that we need to pay attention to.

In-depth study : 

Often we come across students who are studying for 12-14 hours a day and we may be wondering what they are studying for so long. It is not possible for every student to undertake such lengthy study and it may not be required for each one also. But the idea that once homework is done, what is more to do, is a big mistake that most students make. Homework or assignments are only to give you basic understanding. Further from there you are expected to read your textbook in detail. A textbook of any subject must be read word by word at least 3 times before going for examination. Make your own notes while reading. The first reading notes may be a little lengthy but by the time you reach the third reading the note should become compact. That means from around 2-3 pages notes of first reading they should become less than one page. This happens because you have grasped the remaining concepts well and internalised them. Any word not understood or any sentence not clear should be noted down. These can further be clarified from teachers, books or even the internet. Do not stop until you get a satisfactory answer.

To do this kind of study you will have to work everyday. A last minute study or study from someone else’s notes is not going to take you anywhere.

Understand the question : 

The questions are framed for various purposes – from testing your knowledge to checking your application skill. You need to understand what is actually expected of the question.

For each type of question a different approach needs to be taken. 

Often the answer for the question is given in one sentence like if the question is “Why did Gandhiji undertake the Salt March?”. The answer given is “Because it was a reflection of British rule.” This is not an answer that can give you good marks even though it is correct. There needs to be a detailed description about the preceding events. This description you will know only if you have taken up the previous step of detailed study. It is very important to give the answer to the question by understanding what is exactly expected. The better answer for the same question can be seen here.

The marks given for the question also can act as an indicator about what to write and how much to write.

Also keep your answer relevant to the question asked. Do not deviate from the topic or write everything you know about the topic. The answer must be logically framed and factually correct. This can come during the examination only if there has been ample practice to solve questions during the preparation time. 

Solve as many old question papers as you can. You can get sample papers from teachers, friends or the internet. Get them checked if possible from teachers.

Presentation of answer : 

If you have done in-depth study and you have understood what is exactly expected as an answer you have won 90% of the battle. The last 10% is for presentation. Some points to remember for this are

• Use a good bright inked pen and pencil. Use the pen that is smudge free. If you are using an ink pen make sure that there are no leaks that can spoil the answer sheets.

• Use a pencil or pen to underline important words. Remember the examiner on an average reads your answer sheet only for around 2-3 minutes. If you do not highlight what is important in your answer then it may get missed out. 

• Present the compare / difference answers in two columns making the reading easy.

• Use diagrams, maps, graphs whenever possible. It may not be explicitly mentioned in the question but it can enhance the presentation and also make the examiner's work easier.

• Give examples wherever possible. Examples make the answer complete. Even if the language of your answer is not understood by the examiner, the example can help them understand what you want to convey.

• Give enough spaces in between the points of answer. This will make it easy for the examiners to pick up every important point that you have written. 

So these are some of the points that can make you achieve the best from examinations. At this point I would also like to emphasize that no examination is final and fatel. But if prepared well we can get the best from each examination. If you are not able to achieve in one examination then learn where it went wrong and move ahead with it. 

Hope you will direct your examination preparations in this direction and achieve your dreams. All the best!

Note : All the sample answers are taken from CBSE Model answer papers. https://www.cbse.gov.in/cbsenew/model-answer.html