Verbal Reasoning for SSC CGL Exam

by Vidya Guru Coaching Institute

When it comes to SSC CGL Tier-I examination, candidates are expected to take a written test that consists of objective type questions. The exam has to be attempted in 2 hours. It has a total of 200 questions which are divided equally into 4 different sections: Quantitative Ability, General Intelligence & Reasoning, English and General Knowledge.

The section on General Intelligence & Reasoning aims at testing a candidate’s logical and reasoning capabilities. You can say it is a test of one’s general mental ability. This section is, in turn, divided into two parts, i.e. verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning. While the latter requires tremendous practice, verbal reasoning can be easier to crack if you focus more on conceptual clarity.

While it is a given that different intellectual levels of candidates provide them with differing capabilities of understanding, it is important for you to get a strong grip on verbal reasoning in order to improve your overall performance as an SSC exam candidate. Giving sufficient focus to this part can significantly influence your prospects of getting selected.

Here are a few things that you must consider so as to master the verbal reasoning part of the exam –

Honing your powers of Logical Deduction

Since this part is especially designed to put one’s ability to perform logical deduction to test, it does make candidates slightly apprehensive. Questions are made trickier with the help of challenging combinations and puzzling patterns. In order to crack these questions, you cannot rely on a straight cut formula based approach to work every time. You have to make your thinking process flexible enough to come up with an alternative approach, if you are getting stuck while solving a certain question.

Appropriate Exam Orientation

Although there are no limitations to the sources from where questions can appear on the exam, yet you must go through the past year papers and analyze the pattern of questions. This will give you a fairly clear idea about the difficulty level of the questions and the methodology required to solve them. Paying attention to the minute details and practicing consistently will sharpen your mind and enable you to handle these questions in a tactful manner. Be prepared for reading complicated language which is quite often used to frame verbal reasoning questions. The best way to handle these questions is by penning things down on paper and following a step based systematic approach.

Avoid Guesswork

Guesswork essentially defeats the purpose of asking questions which are intended to assess your logical ability. If you are not sure about the answer, remember that the exam contains negative marking. For every incorrect answer 25% marks allotted to that question are deducted from your overall score. Hence, it is best to avoid random guess work. Remember to read these questions with patience and care. Many times a single reading may not help you grasp what the question is really about.

Finally, you can even consider enrolling yourself in the institute providing the best coaching for SSC exam to find the much needed support for mastering this part of the exam. Also, many centers for Bank PO coaching in Delhi offer SSC classes to interested students.