IBPS Clerk Exam 2015: Syllabus and Preparation Tips for English Language

Indian Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) has invited candidates to apply for clerical posts in participant national banks like every year. The written exams this year would consist of prelims and mains as lakhs of candidates apply for the jobs every year. The body has decided to conduct the Clerical Preliminary Exam (CWE V), this year in the month of December and the successful candidates would get through to the Mains Exams which is scheduled to take place in the month of January 2016. The process of filling application forms for the examination has begun and the aspiring candidates, due to fierce completion from fellow applicants should begin preparing from now onwards.

The preliminary exam would be easier in comparison to the mains and would contain three papers instead of five in the mains. The three papers are English Language, Quantitative Aptitude and Reasoning Ability which in total would contain 100 marks. The candidates need to pass in each of the exams to be able to qualify for the Main written examination. The candidates would need to solve 100 questions in total under 60 minutes which itself is a challenging feat to achieve. There is no point of guessing as well as there would be negative marking on every wrong evaluation of the candidates. English Language paper is probably the only paper where the candidates can save time and use the time to solve questions of the other papers in the examination.

Syllabus for English Language: Although IBPS does not provide syllabus, Jagranjosh has come up with topics to be prepared for IBPS Clerk Exam 2015.

The topics list:

1. Vocabulary:

• Homonyms
• Antonyms
• Synonyms
• Word Formation
• Spelling

2. Grammar:

• Spotting Errors
• Phrases and idioms
• Direct and Indirect speech
• Active/ Passive voice

3. Reading Comprehension:

• Theme Detection
• Passage completion
• Topic rearrangement of passage
• Deriving Conclusion

Tips & Strategy:

• Arrangement and re-arrangement of sentences: Sentences and their formation knowledge is one sphere where the aspiring candidates need to really focus upon as there are many questions that are related to the same. The arrangement of sentences in correct order and re-arrangement of the words within the sentences are some of the questions that are quite prevalent in the paper to test the basic sentence formation skill and understanding of the language.
• Keep an eye for the Grammar: Grammar is the backbone for any language and candidates who need to score really well in this paper need to be quite strong in this feat. There would be questions related to active/passive voice, direct and indirect speeches, use of verbs, tense and other questions pertaining to basic grammar. Hence it is a must in the candidate’s part to have a stronghold in the particular segment.
• Make a habit of reading: Reading daily and that too from different sources available makes it easier for the candidates to undergo newer sentences, words and sentence formation used in popular culture. This also improves the vocabulary and knowledge of the language and helps in solving questions related to homonyms, synonyms, antonyms, phrases and idioms etc. This also helps in going through the reading comprehension easily and find the answers of the questions asked from the passage.
•  Write regularly: Writing is also very important practice during the process of preparation of the prelims examination. Though there would not be any descriptive questions to deal with by the candidates, but practice writing regularly would enable them to enhance their spelling skills and would make them aware of the newer forms of writing sentences and deriving meaning out of the passages that they write.