Year 2019. Maliha Rahman (pseudonym) always wanted to prepare for 'D' Unit exam in admission test with the dream of studying at Dhaka University. Her father, however, told her either to be a doctor or an engineer. "You don't even have a strong base of GK (general knowledge)," her brother raised concern.
Under pressure, she continued preparing for science faculties. However, to check her luck, she sat for the D Unit examination with light preparation of a week. And when the result was published, she was surprised that she scored the highest in GK compared to other subjects. Although her position was on the waiting list, Maliha couldn't help but admit that if she had been serious for a few months, the result would have been different.
This year, GK is not just in MCQ form-- which could have been memorised earlier; there are analytical questions, for which students have to know the whole concept, as it is not about eliminating wrong answers. With no specific syllabus, this becomes even harder for many. Nevertheless, the topics can be categorised separately to make the reading pattern easier, without a syllabus. "The most effective tip is to analyse the questions of the past years and note the possible questions by identifying those topics," suggested Tariq Ul-Islam, a journalism graduate from Dhaka University.
There are a vast amount of questions in the guidebooks. It is not possible to memorise every single thing in detail, nor is it necessary. Tariq advised to find out which questions can be skipped and which ones to memorise. He shared a few more suggestions to the aspiring candidates from his own experience.
a. Read the questions already noted, also the relevant ones, try to solve the model questions and go through other related questions, not by going through the pages of the book but by going through the topics.
b. When solving the question, look carefully at the options. Find out information about each option with Google search. For example, in the question "who is the Prime Minister of India?" there will be names of three to four presidents or prime ministers of other states. If you Google all the options, you will gain some additional knowledge. For example, if you read the constitution, you have to read its date or section-amendment, etc. in the form of a flow-chart to get it well. In the case of different wars or geographical places, you have to sit with the map and mark that to remember.
c. If possible, one can learn from the videos of various edutainment genres on YouTube. There, learning is not monotonous, and photographic memory is much more active.
d. Current Affairs of the last four to five months is enough to know all the recent events.
Keep repeating the lessons, especially the important years-dates or days, day or night with someone at home or in front of friends.
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