IBPS Clerk Exam: Tips and Strategy-Numerical Ability

Indian Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) has announced the dates for Clerk Examination to rope in aspiring candidates to various nationalized banks. It conducts online written examination every year to select candidates for banking jobs. Exams are scheduled for the month of December and the candidates are on the verge of final preparation. It is the time to get ready for the last minute preparations for the candidates that would help them to score well in the examinations. The candidates would have to prepare for the four consisting subjects equally which are of 200 marks. The total time to solve all the questions is two hours and time management thus becomes a crucial issue for the candidates to score well in the examination.

There are five subjects in the overall examination namely Reasoning, Quantitative Aptitude/Numerical Ability, English Language, General Awareness and Computer Knowledge which carries equal marks in the IBPS Clerk examination. Numerical Ability paper tests the basic mathematical knowledge of the candidates and becomes quite tricky at times. It is a wise decision to move away from questions which causes trouble and takes a lot of time in the examination, to solve them later when you finish all the other questions that you are familiar with. The paper tests the basics of mathematical and quantitative knowledge of the candidates and questions related to decision making and basic mathematical operations are asked in general.

Preparation for Numerical Ability

The quantitative aptitude or the Numerical Ability section contains questions related to basic mathematical operations and those candidates having their basics clear can score well in the examination. It is quite a scoring paper where the candidates, having a clear knowledge and techniques of solving the problems in limited time can score really high. It helps in reaching the overall cut-off marks for the candidates as well. It carries varied questions related to algebra, trigonometry, profit loss, interest problems, Time and distance measurements, Percentage and ratios, number system, HCF & LCM, number series and many other. There are questions related to statistics carrying questions in bar graphs, line graphs, mensuration, data table probability etc.

Tips to Prepare

• The candidates must have undergone quite a lot of training till date and have practiced quite a lot of questions of numerical ability through various sources available. But one thing has to be kept in mind by the candidates that they need to derive methods of solving various problems so that they can apply them to solve the problems in time at the examination. It is must to branch out techniques on your own to be on time.
• The basics of mathematics are the key for the paper and thus candidates who are weak in that particular section, must give their best to cope up with the same. If the candidate is clear with the basic concepts, it would be easier for them to solve the paper with efficiency.
• Constant practice is the key and that too keeping the stopwatch on. This would give idea to the candidates on how much time they are taking to solve a particular question and how fast they need to cover up to be on time.
• For any candidate it is important to understand the questions well, thus it is important to see through the questions well, before attempting them. It would save enormous time and effort and would land up into easy findings while giving the examination.