CBSE Class 10th, 12th exams 2021: From datesheet to revised paper pattern, here’s all you need to know

IN VIDEO | CBSE Board Exam: May 4- June 10 

Practical exams: The practical exams for board aspirants will commence from March 1. Earlier the minister had announced that there will be an alternative to practical exams if schools continued to remain shut. However, now several states have reopened their schools and students from classes 9 to 12 have started to attend the classes physically as well.

Exam pattern: Even as the exams will be held in the offline mode, as usual, the type of questions that will be asked have been tweaked. As reported by the indianexpress.com earlier, there will be more application-based questions in the board exams this year. There will be more case-study-based questions wherein a paragraph will be given to students and they will have to answer questions after reading the paragraph. This will assess students on their reading, understanding, interpretation, and answer writing abilities. The revised sample papers of both classes 10, 12 exams have been released at the official website- cbse.nic.in.

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Syllabus cut: Due to the pandemic, the classes have been held online for the ongoing academic year. This has resulted in unequal opportunities for students, especially those who belong to economically weaker sections of society. To compensate for the loss of academic hours, 30 per cent of the total syllabus has been cut. Further, there will be 33 per cent internal choices.

Mask and COVID-19 precautions: This year too, candidates will have to appear in the exams amid strict precautions related to COVID-19 pandemic. Wearing masks will be a must and social distancing will be maintained. Last year, several papers were cancelled following the pandemic outbreak in March. The students were evaluated on the basis of a new assessment scheme, the result was released in July. In 2020, around 18 lakh students appeared for class 10 exams, while 12 lakh students for 12th board exams.

Pre-boards: Before the exams, there will be pre-boards and most of the schools are holding their preboards online due to either lack of nod from state government or unwillingness of parents to send children to school amid the new strain of COVID-19 virus. The key concerns of most schools are that students have little practice of writing in an exam-like situation and that there is no anti-cheating mechanism in place.

Bishwajit Banerjee, principal of VidyaGyan Bulandshahr said they are keen to start school with students present physically. However, the only option is to do it online. “For students, writing continuously for three-hours is a bit of a challenge in the online mode. So, we may look at a shorter question paper and therefore a shorter exam duration. CBSE is also increasing the objective section of the paper to reduce the time duration,” he said.