How to prepare for CAT 2009?

To me, one should practice under exam conditions, knowing the course material is very much necessary but not sufficient to guarantee success on the exam - one should also need to be able to communicate the answers effectively under exam conditions. Practicing using sample questions in the same format as the exam and answer them in a simulated test environment. The sample questions can be sourced from old exams and assignments, which are often similar from year to year with small changes. Even though you are only practicing, it is better to write full answers to the questions so you can work through the entire thought process.

This practice session should serve as a feedback. Check the answers to the practice questions to diagnose your strengths and weaknesses. If you are weak in an area, go back and study it further to address any gaps which needs to be filled. I guess this will helps

As there is still nearly 8 months or more than that to go for CAT 2009 one has enough time to prepare for it, and there is no need to press the panic button, so if you are properly scheduling, then this will keep you in a good stead for the coming months and the final revisions which are required at the end.

I request one to schedule his/her weeks to prepare accordingly because ad-hoc and haphazard manner will waste a lot of time. If you have been preparing without any study structure then whatever you may achieve would have been increased up to or more than 50%.

Try to shuffle the subjects also, so that you'll not get bored with a single subject in hand. Even better if you make your time table daily than once a week or something on those lines. So according to me proper scheduling is required for preparation for CAT 2009.

Flashcards or index cards are a good memorization tool. This will reduce your summary notes into bullet points, keywords, lists, formulas and diagrams and place them onto a card for each topic. Some people like to use flashcards to prepare their summary notes in the first place, while others find that it leads to information overload. The items on the flashcards act as memory triggers. By memorizing the flashcards one can easily enhance their ability to recall larger bits of information referenced by the triggers. They can carry the cards with them and review them even when they have only short bursts of time available.

According to me one should go easy on themselves, they should not make a big thing of a exam, as how will they do and what will they do it'll just create panic in the first place, so go easy on yourself, and the first thing you should do is to get a good grip on fundamentals and get familiar with all chapters and problems . Do not look for speed solving or feel any sort of pressure while preparing fundamentals. Learn with your own efficiency, without getting into fundamentals properly speed solving is not useful at all. Do manage to allocate at least one hour a day for reading newspapers and magazines stuff or you'll get lost or you'll be out of sync with the normal world. Always be in touch with current affairs, if you think newspaper reading is waste of time, then subscribe a weekly magazine where you don't have to waste a lot of time.

To me, the time you finish the fundamentals before the month of august mostly, you will be having a fare idea on the SWs like area of your strengths and weakness. Categorizing your strengths and weakness is important to have a clear picture. Keep weak areas in mind and try to improve yourself by focusing a lot on them.

From the second week of August you can take section tests along with revision of topics in alternate day ,here if you think you have to allocate more time you should do.. You must start taking comprehensive tests by the beginning of September to be in a better shape.

I think most of them get low scores for mainly one sole reason, that is not having proper common sense like Exam sense in them. Things you look to learn in comprehensive tests of 2-3 hour long, is how will one manage the paper so the attitude here should be the same like a one-day batsman who wants to score as many runs as possible in the last 10 overs in onedayers. You should think of scoring as much as possible ,but most people will get emotional to have a challenging problem and stuck up solving only that problem all day, so having proper Exam sense is really important ppl.

Al the best for CAT 2009 hope this helps.