NEET 2018 Exam – Biology Section – Mapping to NCERT Textbooks

Dear Aspirants of NEET 2019, NEET 2020,

NEET 2018 Examination has come and gone. Results are also declared and all the Medical college admissions are happening as I write this post.

If your target is to score above 560 marks overall, needless to say that, you need to score near 300 marks in Biology Section. This means 75 questions right off the 90 questions in the Biology Section with no wrong answers.  

Last year I had taken the NEET 2017 question paper and mapped the Biology section questions to the NCERT text books. For that mapping exercise I had taken the Code – Y question paper of NEET 2017 for the mapping exercise. {Credit and Thanks to SriChaitanya Institute for this question paper} The same can be accessed for your reference from the following link —> NEET – 2017 : Code Y Question Paper

One can see this mapping in my earlier post at the following link ==>

NEET 2017 Question Paper – Biology Section – Mapping to NCERT Textbooks

This year I have taken the Code – PP question paper of NEET 2018 for the mapping exercise. {Credit and Thanks to Allen Career Institute for this question paper} The Biology Section of the Question Paper can be accessed from the following link —> NEET 2018 – Code PP – Biology Section

The Biology section questions mapping to the NCERT textbooks of Class XI and XII is shown in the following tables. 84 of the 90 questions are directly in the textbooks. (Last year it was 76 questions) The remaining 6 questions (Blank remarks column in the tables below) need a little extra studies beyond the NCERT textbooks. Just like last year, this year too there were multiple questions from the same chapter, sometimes same page too!!

So Dear Aspirants please ensure that the NCERT Biology text books of classes XI and XII and Exemplar books are your true companion in your pursuit of NEET Examination Success! 75 questions out of 90 questions target can be achieved by just these books. After reading NCERT textbooks, you should definitely go for higher (college level) books or your coaching institute material.

Best Wishes to all of you

VRN Rao

Food for Thought 4 – NEET 2017: 30% – 50% – 75 % of 40,000 Ranks Shared by…

Dear Aspirants of Medical Studies in India,

The results of NEET 2017 were released by CBSE on June 23rd 2017. Except for Tamilnadu, all the states have brought out their respective State Merit Lists.

An analysis of the top 40,000 ranks show some interesting insight. Let me show you the data first.

• Nearly 30% of the 40,000 ranks went to the 2 States ! of UP and Kerala.
• Nearly 50% of the 40,000 ranks went to 4 States !
• Nearly 75% of the 40,000 ranks went to 8 States !

All of us know that we have 29 States and 7 Union Territories (36 entities in total). So with 8 states capturing 75% of the top 40,000 ranks, the remaining 28 get 25% of the top 40,000 ranks. So much for the skew of the talent, competitiveness, coaching facilities, good education infrastructure, or whatever the factors are, to produce such results.

So as parents living in these 8 states, we should worry about the amount of competition that exists for our children and the subsequent pressure that gets created on them to secure a Medical College Admission! Let us be mindful of the same and nurture our children appropriately.                        

Best Wishes

VRN Rao

Food for Thought 3: NEET 2017 – State Ranks

Updated on 25th July:  Telangana and Maharashtra have published revised state merit lists. So updated the tables below for these 2 states.

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Dear Aspirants of NEET 2018; 2019 and beyond,

The results of NEET 2017 were released by CBSE on June 23rd. Subsequent to that, various states have started releasing their State Merit Lists. Counseling for Medical College Admissions has begun in almost all the states. Counseling is underway for the 15% All India Quota seats as well.

For all of you who are preparing for NEET 2018, 2019, one data point which would be of interest is the Marks vs State Rank from NEET 2017 results.

I have collated data from 12 different states now and summarized the Marks vs AIR vs State Rank in the tables given below. As you can see there is wide difference between states. In some states like Kerala, Rajasthan, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh it has been very competitive and in some states like Gujarat, Punjab, Himachal it has been a lot easier.

It is also interesting to see the Head to Head fight between Kerala and Rajasthan. Kerala had the upper hand until 950 rank or so and thereafter Rajasthan has taken over. I am sure the Kota Coaching Industry would have realised by now that Kerala is a Golden business opportunity for them!

Referring to the data below, one can create a Target (marks to be scored) for themselves. Based on that target, the study strategy and planning has to be re-aligned.

{Legend for State Names:  RJ = Rajasthan;  WB  =  West Bengal;  UP  =  Uttar Pradesh;  DL  =  Delhi;      MH = Maharashtra; AP = Andhra Pradesh;  KA = Karnataka;  HP = Himachal Pradesh;  GJ  =  Gujarat}

         

                               

 

Best Wishes

VRN Rao

NEET 2017 Question Paper – Biology Section – Mapping to NCERT Textbooks

Dear Aspirants of NEET 2018, 2019,

NEET 2017 is behind us now. I presume all of you have seen the question paper and most of you would have analysed the same as well.

Until last year (2016), there used to be some 300 students scoring above 600 marks (out of 720). This year (2017) with almost 3000 students scoring above 600 marks, I started wondering about the difficulty level of the exam. Though I am not a Biology student (studied Biology till Class 10th), I wanted to check the Biology section of the question paper.

As all of you know, Biology would have 90 questions and if someone has to cross 600 marks, they need at least 300 marks in this section, after being, very very strong in Physics and Chemistry. 75 questions all correct out of total 90 Biology questions, and leaving 15 questions without answering!!, would fetch the required 300 marks.

I have taken the Code – Y question paper of NEET 2017 for the mapping exercise. {Credit and Thanks to SriChaitanya Institute for this question paper} The same can be accessed for your reference from the following link —> NEET – 2017 : Code Y Question Paper

My first stop to check the difficulty level of the questions was naturally the NCERT Class XI and Class XII Biology textbooks and NCERT Exemplar books. Out of the 90 questions; 76 questions are straightforward mapped to the NCERT textbooks/exemplar content; Some 8 questions would require, an advanced College Biology textbook; 2 questions are basic science questions of IX and X class level; and 4 questions can be traced to older versions (pre-2010) of NCERT textbooks. {The mapping is shown in the tables given at the end of this post}

This year I have noticed that many coaching institutes have done the mapping of all the questions to their course materials and announced that 176 of 180 questions are from their material; 90% of the questions from their material; etc. Some of them took pain to map the questions to a page number in the NCERT textbooks. However, they mapped only 50% of the questions to the NCERT textbooks. Needless to say, why so?

In my mapping exercise, not only did I find 76 questions directly from NCERT textbooks/exemplar, but I also found that most of them were simple and straightforward questions. Also, there were some pages of NCERT textbooks on which you will find 2 questions on the same page! So, if someone has meticulously read the NCERT textbooks; made some good crisp notes; revised over and over again, scoring 300 marks would have been easy. And this year results prove that point.

So Dear Aspirants please ensure that the NCERT Biology text books of classes XI and XII and Exemplar books are your true companion in your pursuit of NEET Examination Success! After reading NCERT textbooks, you should definitely go for higher (college level) books or your coaching institute material.

{Please excuse if I have made an error inadvertently (not being a Biology student). In case, you find any, please let me know the correct source or page number}

Best Wishes to all of you

VRN Rao