National Eligibility and Entrance Test (NEET) was conducted on May 7th, 2017. With just a few months for NEET 2018, experts have begun giving preparation pointers for subjects, chapters and overall exam and detailed analysis and assessments of previous exam papers that aids in current exam preparations.
NEET 2020 Analysis: Subject-wise Weightage
Hence, the rest of this blog will focus at NEET 2017, along the lines of chapter-wise analysis of the exam and weightage of marks distribution from the prescribed syllabus and finally, we will also try to understand what’s in store for NEET 2018 and the expected possible exam scenario for this upcoming exam.
1) NEET 2017 Analysis
Nearly 11 lakh candidates wrote the exam in 2017. It was held in 10 languages, as compared to 8 in 2016. This number was pretty huge when we look at 50,000 medical seats that was initially made available in medical colleges. Perhaps that is why, the government later on increased the seats by an extra 10,000 to meet the large demand.
The exam was divided in four major sections; Physics, Chemistry, Zoology and Botany with 45 questions each. The paper had a marking scheme of 4 marks per question and 1 mark for every wrong answer. On the whole the question paper was deemed to be tougher as compared to NEET 2016. Some students found it tough, but were satisfied with their performance in the paper.
2) Questions: Weightage and Distribution
The candidates had 3 hours to answer 180 MCQs in offline mode. It was also observed that the syllabus weightage from class 11 and class 12 was almost equal in the question distribution of the paper.
Physics
In Physics, there were about 24 questions from class 11 and 21 questions from class 12. Looking at chapter wise distribution, there were about 19 questions from Mechanics, 9 from Electrodynamics, 5 each from Thermodynamics and Kinetic Theory and Optics and Wave Optics, and 7 from Modern Physics. From this, it was also observed that the majority of the questions were asked from the topics of Mechanics and Electrodynamics.
Also, the topics of Kinematics, Motion of System of Particles and Rigid Body, Physical world and measurement, Atoms and Nuclei, Electronic Devices and Nuclear Chemistry had the most difficult questions, whereas Oscillation and Waves, Work Energy Power, Thermodynamics and Magnetism saw some simple easy questions.
Chemistry
Next, the Chemistry section was easier as compared to NEET 2016, but there were still few unexpected questions. This section included overall 21 questions from class 11 syllabus and 24 from class 12 syllabus. This was further divided into 12 questions from Physical Chemistry, 14 under Organic Chemistry, 12 under Inorganic Chemistry and 4 questions under General Chemistry. The questions from Inorganic and Physical Chemistry were easier than those from Organic Chemistry.
Now, this section also saw some good and almost equal weightage of questions from class 11 and 12 topics, especially in the case of Inorganic Chemistry as about 7 questions were asked from both standards. In case of topics from Physical Chemistry, more focus was given to class 12 syllabus.
The topics of Environmental Chemistry, Equilibrium, Basic Concepts in Chemistry, Biomolecules and Kinetic Chemistry reported few difficult questions whereas the easy questions were from Coordination Compounds, Solutions, Surface Chemistry, Chemical Bonding and Molecular Chemistry, States of Matter and Structure of Atoms.
Biology
44 questions in this section were asked from class 11 and 46 questions from class 12. This section had about 4 questions from Biotechnology, 6 from Plant Physiology, 7 each from Biology and Human Welfare, Structural Organization in Plants and Animals, and Cell Structure and Function, 11 questions each from Reproduction, and Diversity in Living Organisms, and lastly 15 questions from Genetics and Evolution.
It was noted that Zoology had more questions from class 12 syllabus than class 11 and maximum questions were asked from Human Physiology. However for Botany, there were more questions from class 11 syllabus. Also, the topics of Plant Diversity and Cell Biology assumed maximum importance for Botany as maximum questions were asked from these two topics. Other prominent topics included Biology and Human Welfare, Biotechnology and Ecology.
The difficult questions in Biology were from Diversity in Living World, Structural Organization in Plants and Animals, Biology and Human Welfare, and Genetics and Evolution. The easy ones were Human Physiology, Ecology and Environment, and Reproduction, Plant Physiology, and Cell Structure and Function had more or less medium difficult.
Questions: Difficulty Levels
The overall assessment found the paper to be moderate to difficult, and also lengthy to a certain extent. Every section of the paper had difficult as well as easy and moderate range of questions.
The Physics section was moderately difficult, bit lengthier than NEET 2016 with a lot of tricky numerical questions, making it time consuming. The Chemistry section was similarly on a moderate difficulty level, with more conceptual questions.
Lastly, the Biology section was tougher than the previous year, however pleasant than Physics and Chemistry sections for many students. It too had many conceptual based questions, similar to Chemistry section, and majority of the questions were from NCERT.
There were more than 50 questions in the easy range, more than 75 in the medium difficult range and more than 40 questions in the difficult level.
3) Expectations for NEET 2018
NEET 2018 is expected to be held on 10th May, 2018. Going with the trends of NEET Physics, lengthy and calculation-based questions can be asked from Mechanics, Thermodynamics and Electrodynamics.
For the Chemistry section, again more of conceptual questions can be expected from class 12 syllabus, especially from Organic Chemistry and Basic Concepts of Chemistry.
The difficulty level of Biology section has risen over the years, and is expected to be of medium difficulty. Much questions can be expected from Human Physiology and Plant Physiology. Overall, NEET 2018 is expected to be difficult or moderately difficult.
