The Hindu : New Delhi News : CBSE examinations begin on a happy note

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CBSE examinations begin on a happy note

Staff Reporter

– PHOTO: V. SUDERSHAN

“ALL THE BEST”: Children appearing for the CBSE Class XII examinations being blessed by their teachers outside one of the examination centres in New Delhi on Saturday.

NEW DELHI: The Class XII and X Central Board of Secondary Education examinations began without a hitch on Saturday with most children claiming that the question papers were along expected lines. The newly-introduced concept of assessment of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) in children also did not cause any major hiccups.

The Class XII Science students appeared for their Chemistry examination, while for Class X it was Elements of Business and Introductory Information Technology. Their first main subject – Social Science – comes up on Monday.

Most students in the Capital said the Chemistry paper was “very easy” and that all the questions were from the syllabus.

“I did well. All the questions were from the NCERT book. All my friends were also happy. Everyone said their paper went off fine. I think it was a nice way to start our exams,” said Arpita Mandal of Army Public School in Dhaula Kuan after her exam.

Harshit Gupta of Modern School, Vasant Vihar, said: “The paper was very easy. I am expecting around 55-60 out of 70 marks. There were some children in our class who messed up one or two questions, but nothing major.”

The students were relieved that the question paper was not lengthy and everyone felt that the additional cool-off time of 15 minutes allowed prior to the exam was a help.

“A couple of my friends complained that they had left out one or two questions, but I could not see why. We could easily complete the three-hour paper in two and a half hours. It was easy. I had prepared well. If you prepare all round the year, everything is easy,” said a confident Juhi Paralkar, a Class XII student of Tagore International School.

The CBSE this year had decided to revise the design of question papers in all the major subjects of Classes XII and X to assess HOTS in children to evaluate their abilities to reason and analyse.

However, the changed pattern did not pose any major problems to the students.

“I could not figure out which questions pertained to HOTS. There was nothing out of the blue or unusual in the question paper,” said Harshit.

Agreed Snehashis Mitra of Mount St. Mary’s Class X: “It was mostly easy. There was one application-based question worth eight marks. I think that was for HOTS. But even that was easy. We finished our papers much before time.”

“Since HOTS was a new concept, we were a little apprehensive about how the paper would turn out to be. But it was much simpler than expected,” said a Chemistry teacher.

Earlier in the morning, minutes before their entry into the examination centres, the children were busy catching up with last-minute revision. Looking nervous and a little jittery before their first CBSE Class XII exam, most of the students seemed completely immersed in their textbooks. However, there were some chatting away their worries.

Most candidates were accompanied by their parents, in some cases siblings as well as pets, who came packed in one car.

There was a tinge of melodrama too as some affectionate mothers pecked their children on the cheek, some applied “tilak” on their forehead before they entered the examination hall.

Some students also touched the feet of their mother and teachers before stepping inside.

One FM radio music station had parked its staff outside some schools to distribute red roses to students as they began arriving at the centre.

As many as 160,414 children from Delhi are appearing at the Class XII examinations and 219,796 for the Class X.

The Board has set up 547 centres across the Capital for Class XII and 562 for Class X.

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