Cracking the Civil Services Examination is not everyone’s cup of tea. To make it through this examination, one needs immense hard work, perseverance, and efforts in the right direction. Along with hard work, smart work is a must to ace the civil services examination. A step towards clearing this examination is the proper utilization of the UPSC Question Paper. Once a student completes the syllabus of the UPSC examination, he must move towards solving UPSC question papers of previous years. Solving UPSC Question Paper has immense benefits. In this article, we will discuss in brief, some benefits of solving UPSC Question Paper, but before that let us understand the different types of UPSC question papers.
The Pattern of UPSC Prelims Question Paper and UPSC Mains Question Paper
We can divide UPSC Question Papers into two parts, the first being UPSC Prelims Question Paper and the second being UPSC Mains Question Paper. In the first step of the examination (UPSC Prelims), we get two papers, namely General Studies I and General Studies II. Both the UPSC Prelims Question Paper consists of 200 marks each. These are objective-type questions. There are numerous previous year UPSC Prelims Question Paper that can be solved by students including mock papers provided by Byju’s Exam Prep.
UPSC Mains examination (second stage) consists of 9 papers together in which the first two papers consist of 300 marks each while the other papers comprise 250 marks each. Previous year question papers of each subject should be solved by the students to get a strong grip and confidence. Unlike the Prelims stage, Mains is subjective and thus demands the writing skills of the students which can be enhanced only through practice.
The mock papers provided by BYJU’s Exam Prep are made by subject experts who have decades of experience. Thus, solving mock UPSC Prelims Question Paper and UPSC Mains Question Paper can also help you a lot.
Benefits of Solving UPSC Question Paper
Often, we come to hear that everything under the sun is the syllabus of the UPSC examination. Some agree with this phrase while others do not. However, we can’t agree less with the fact that the syllabus of the UPSC examination is very vast. UPSC Question Paper of previous years here acts as a boon for the aspirants. Let us check out some of the benefits of solving previous year’s question papers.
1) Helps in Self-Assessment
When a student solves the previous year’s questions, he gets a very good idea about the pattern of questions that comes in the examination. Questions from a specific topic are repeated frequently. Without solving these papers, one can get an idea of the pattern of questions that appear in the exam.
2) Helps in Time Management
If you solve previous year’s papers using a timer and stick to it, you can learn to manage your time effectively and efficiently in the examination. When you solve previous year’s papers using a timer, you get a feel of the examinations. If practiced 10-15 times, you will get a very good idea of how many minutes a particular question is taking and you can act accordingly to improve it further.
3) Helps in Revision
We know very well that practice makes a man perfect. When we sit to solve the previous year’s questions, a prior revision is done to answer the questions of the paper efficiently. Thus, revision is encouraged. At times, we find difficult or confusing questions in the previous year’s papers. We can refer to these questions later and improve our weaknesses. Knowingly or unknowingly, we hone our clear topics and improve those which we find tough or confusing.
