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PracBee senior teacher, Ms Neha Mishra, has a 1:1 conversation with Raksha Raj Prakash, a top ranker and sincere student of grade 10 of CBSE board from Chennai. The conversation covers her studying method, her routine, her revision schedule, her preparation for CBSE Board exams of grade 10 and concludes with her future plans.
They also discussed the subjects she faces problems with, her strategies to overcome difficult topics and how Personalized 1:1 tutoring for CBSE at Pracbee is helping her become better at her subjects. Raksha also shared her experience of handling schoolwork, revision and practice at home and books/resources to use.
Raksha discusses how her board exams are the most important priority right now. Her school syllabus is not yet completed. However, most of her syllabus is completed in Pracbee where she is doing 1:1 tutoring. Revision has started, which means she has enough time to focus on practice, especially past year papers of CBSE board and sample papers for 2024.
Raksha does not follow a sequence with the chapters but tries to keep a balance between revision and her ongoing chapters at school. This ensures she neither forgets the previous chapters nor misses on the new chapters getting covered in her school.
Raksha enjoys all subjects but finds some topics challenging at times. In Math she is still to master Geometry while in Physics some Numerical questions trouble her. However, she does not let that get into the way of her studies. She ensures enough practice to become better at these topics. She believes the more you practice the better you get and tries to follow it sincerely.
When it comes to theory in Physics or even theoretical subjects like Biology, Raksha has a clear-cut strategy. She tries to associate with the various concepts and the formulae and equations associated Physics theory and in Biology she focuses on the memorizing of facts as well as diagrams. Also, she uses an interesting memory aid to learn and remember facts – Flash cards. She writes down important points from any chapter on the cards and revises them before any test or exams to ensure she can use and apply those as per need.
While 1:1 tutors at Pracbee teach her Math and the three Science subjects, she takes help in English and Social Science from her parents. To manage these and all subjects, she keeps aside two hours for revision every day. Also, she spends one hour of that on two different subjects. And next day she picks up two other subjects. So alternately she is able to handle four subjects in two days. Interestingly, Raksha does not set a fixed time for her study but studies as and when she feels like in the day. She does this to ensure she doesn’t get bored by the routine. She has been applying that in her non-academic activities as well.
This is a new dimension coming from a sincere and topper student. Other students may take a clue from it that consistency in studies is more important than specific timings. However, in the experience of teachers, it is better to maintain a fixed time as most students find it easier to manage a routine to stay consistent and disciplined.
When it comes to studying resources and notes, Raksha mainly utilises the notes provided by her teachers at Pracbee 1:1 classes. The teachers at Pracbee use structure PPTs to teach. These PPTs also contain various examples and illustrations. Then they write on these PPTs or solve questions on these in the class. The same are then automatically uploaded as notes for the students. It really helps students revise better and more comprehensively.
Also the teachers at Pracbee share with Raksha the Mindmaps of every chapter. These help her not only understand the various topics and sub-topics in the chapter, but also understand the links between those. Raksha also revisits the video recordings of the classes or the summary text of the classes created by AI bot of Pracbee. These ensure she can revise quickly and efficiently.
She also studies from textbooks that her school uses, but she loves the compendium (concise notes) of every chapter that Pracbee tutors provide her before the exams. Even when she was not well before her term exams, the notes helped her score well due to quick revision. Raksha also uses previous years’ question papers and sample papers to ensure she is thorough with her preparation in all chapters. She does not want o miss any type of questions for the Board exam.
The most unique strategy Raksha uses to practice is making her own questions. She reads NCERT and from each paragraph she tries to make one or more questions, which she then tries to answer. This helps her not only revise and practice but also become a master of the topic. She even makes case studies as per need and topic in consideration.
For the Board exam practice, Raksha uses a simple formula of spending close to 2 minutes for a 1 mark question. And 4 minutes for 2 marks question and so on. This ensures she is able to manage her time in the exam. Also it leaves some time for her for rechecking the questions and their answers.
Throughout all this preparation, Raksha manages her stress very well. She knows she gets stressed when the exam is close by. Since it means a lot to her so it is natural to get stressed out. However, she tries to build it in her routine to not get flustered or irritated by her subjects or topics. She does not try to be too hard on herself, despite making consistent efforts in her studies.
In her own words, “Because 10th is a very important year and I feel like everyone will be too hard on themselves, so I should I feel like to deal with the stress you have to realize how much it means to you and how much it means to others. There's a very big difference, so you can't let others influence your behaviour. It's very important, you have to focus, you have to be sincere but in the end it's your life and what you want to do. So, if you want to focus so much on a particular subject it also depends on like you know what you're going to do in the future so but I feel like there should be a benchmark, say for 100 it can be 80 for some people or it can be 90-95 plus but the main goal is to not let that seep into your head. Your self-image, how you think about yourself, this is what you want you're going to set the Benchmark. Nobody else is going to tell you what to do. You have to cut out the external things.”
Raksha also believes, “Pracbee is a larger family for her. All the teachers are very friendly and they are considerate. They ask you about like how you're doing right now, they ask you about your situation and customize the teaching to how your circumstances and environment are. And they will help you in the best way possible, especially since it is 1:1 tutoring and not a batch like most other institutes.”
Raksha also enjoys the fact that classes are of one hour every day. She doesn’t enjoy lengthier classes since it becomes tough to concentrate and grasp everything. Also, whenever one is absent, it becomes tough to catch up the next day and the backlogs keep increasing. In 1:1 tutoring, the teachers are very accommodative. The course is customized for every student how they are and how they like to learn.
The teachers are very friendly and helpful. This ensures that the classes are very enjoyable for Raksha. He can ask doubts, have a detailed discussion, ask for more examples etc without hesitation. Most often teachers at Pracbee try to sync the classes with the topics going on in her school.
Raksha has also enjoyed the testing portal at Pracbee. It has provided her clear insights into her strong and weak areas for each subject and topic. The analysis and bookmarking feature helps her pinpoint her revision areas.
In 1:1 tutoring Raksha realized how fun math could be. The teacher’s PPTs and illustrations have really helped her grasp the concepts and understand various question types. In Chemistry and Biology, Pracbee tutors have helped her understand better how to draw diagrams and also shown her experiment videos. She often uses Pracbee notes to also do her assignments in school, like she did for nephron diagram in Biology. The concise notes really help her cover the chapters much more efficiently.
When it comes to her 1:1 class at Pracbee, Raksha especially likes the fact that she can discuss her doubts at any point of time. The teachers not only help clear her doubts instantly but also help her with any doubts from her school. This has helped her build her self-confidence and self-image.
Raksha is set to decide between two options for her career. Most likely, she will study Computer Science Engineering like her elder brother did (IIT Bombay, JEE rank 36) . Raksha also likes digital drawing and animation, but is not sure if she can make a career in those fields. The other option she feels is keeping Math and Bio both subjects in her grade 11th and then decide later.
Since she has taken Olympiad exams earlier and scored well in some of them, she knows how competitive exams like JEE can be. She is ready to work hard for those, but without taking undue stress. She always believes in herself and this is the advice she wants to share with all her peers and juniors. Just like she was able to improve massively with 1:1 tutoring by building excellent rapport with her teachers, she suggests everyone does that and improve their learning as well as results.
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