Chennai: Creating a level-playing field for state board students in preparing for National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Neet), it has now come to the light that new textbooks for class 11 have covered over 90 per cent of questions. The medical entrance test gives equal weightage to class 11 and class 12 syllabus. Totally, 180 questions from Physics, Chemistry, Botany and Zoology are being asked in the exam.
The school education department’s analysis on Neet 2018 question paper pleasantly surprised the experts as the new class 11 textbooks covered almost all the topics and concepts of the questions based on class 11 syllabus.
“We have passed our first test. Apart from Neet, the books will prepare the students for all competitive exams as the concepts and the applications were explained with simple examples,” said T. Udhayachandran, secretary (curriculum development), school education department. “The books were blended with competitive exam questions and solved problems. Objective type questions and concept based, application oriented questions are provided at the end of each lesson,” he said.
Physics, Chemistry, Maths, Biology books have solved questions from previous years’ AIPMT, AIEEE and Neet exams. The lessons and units are also arranged based on themes. The volume I of physics book was designed based on Newtonian mechanics theme which is the foundation for physics.
“From mechanics alone, 11 questions were asked in the Neet. The remaining 13 questions were covered in the topics for Volume II,” said Professor Rita John, head, department of theoretical physics, and also mentor and domain expert for physics.
“The old class 11 volume I book covers only three questions from Neet. We have included eight new topics asked in Neet,” she said. The experts’ committee analysed various syllabuses and prepared a gap analysis. Based on the gap analysis it included several topics in the new books. After analysing the previous years IIT-JEE, Neet question papers, they have also added competitive exam corner in the new textbooks. An analysis of Chemistry questions revealed that four questions from unit 1 (Basic Concepts of Chemistry and Chemical Calculations) were asked in Neet.
Of 22 questions based on class 11 syllabus, 12 were covered in volume 1 and 10 were covered in volume 2. "In each lesson, the students will be made aware of three important things - introduction, concepts development and application of the concepts. At the of the lessons they will be evaluated as well," subject experts said.
For each lesson, books will give the summary of the lesson and concept mapping as well. In Zoology, chapter number 10 - Neural control and coordination had a maximum of 4 questions and 5th and 6th chapters - Digestion and Absorption, Respiration had 3 questions each.
