Dear Aspirants,

How was your previous week? Were you able to execute your plans?

Welcome to another Kaleidoscope post. Your weekly dose of unique perspectives about the UPSC exam.

Special Thanks to the readers who have replied with their feedback and perspectives.

In Today's post I will cover the following:

• How well do you know your Optional syllabus?

• Daily Quiz Scores

• One Quote by John F Kennedy

• Mains Exam Meme Collection

Have a good read :)

How well do you know your Optional Syllabus?

Finally, the Mains 2022 has got over.

Only those who might have gone through this journey will be able to relate to the intensity of the last 10-12 days.

I was catching up with a couple of friends who had given the exam and there was a wide range of emotions expressed.

One particular friend is giving his 9th attempt and 6th Mains. I really do hope and pray that he makes it through with flying colours.

He was describing how he approached a question about "New Localism." This was a question in Paper 2 of Public Administration. He had mentioned an author who wrote a book on this title. He also interlinked concepts from Paper 1 in his answers.

I was glad that he wrote well. But I paused him and asked, "Where did you hear about this word? I have not come across this till now"

That is when he mentioned that this was a term mentioned in the syllabus. I was shocked. I had gone through the syllabus at a surface level a couple of times. But somehow I had missed this word.

A number of questions asked in both GS and Optional papers have their roots in the holy syllabus that UPSC has given.

If you like me have given it a surface-level glance, it is high time we shrug away such complacency and learn about every keyword mentioned in our syllabus.

Challenge your friend to ask you a keyword and you can try to guess which chapter it falls in. Gamifying this exercise can make it fun and help you learn all the sub-topics in the syllabus.

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[ I found a useful link about the strategy for reading GS-3. GS-3 Strategy suggested by Sumit Rai AIR 54, 2018 ]

Daily Quiz Scores

I had not read the daily current affairs posted by Insights and attempted the RTM quizzes. You can see the effect on the scores. On average, this week's scores have been reduced by 2 marks compared to the previous.

Hope to revise well and do better next week.

How did you do this week? Were you able to meet your Daily MCQ targets?

Do a Self Assessment with this link

One Quote by John F Kennedy

Mains Exam Meme Collection 🤣

If you have written the Mains exam in the past few days, hope you take a good break!

Wishing you a productive and peaceful week ahead :)

See you again next Monday.

Best Regards,

Satya