Importance of discussing News & GS topics with peers during ias preparation

1
IMPORTANCE OF DISCUSSING NEWS GS TOPICS WITH
PEERS
www.o2iasacademy.in
2
INTRODUCTION

• The road to LBSNA where IAS/IPS/IFS aspirants
  undergo training is a rough one. The journey is
  long and arduous. Thousands of aspirants studying
  in IAS coaching institutes in Chandigarh at
  present aspire to reach its gates and come out as
  officers. To help aspirants realise their goal of
  becoming a civil servant in India we at O2 IAS
  academy in Chandigarh regularly post about all
  major issues relating to various dimensions
  of UPSC preparation.
• UPSC CSE is touted as one of the worlds toughest
  exams to crack. Hence, devoted aspirants do not
  waste even a minute of their precious time. Most
  dedicated aspirants have this doubt whether they
  should discuss newspaper and other GS subjects
  with their peers, what should be the duration and
  topics of discussion etc.  Today we will discuss
  this topic and all its dimensions in detail. We
  have already established in our previous blog
  posts that execution of daily, weekly and monthly
  plans and revisions are the recipe for success in
  UPSC CSE. Lets discuss the relevance of having
  meaningful discussions related to various topics
  of UPSC syllabus and all the dos and donts
  related to it.

3
IMPORTANCE OF PURPOSEFUL DISCUSSION

• When we say purpose we do not mean purpose at a
  large scale or in general. We are not referring
  to the larger purpose in life or purpose in
  becoming civil servant. What we mean by
  purposeful is the aim, goal or reason behind
  having discussions during your UPSC journey.
• We believe that while you are studying for long
  durations on a daily basis it becomes very
  important to break the monotony of the day with
  some light discussion with friends and family.
  But, we are not talking about aimless gossip
  sessions with friends on daily basis. While
  discussions and debates with your peers can be
  beneficial but what matters the most are the
  contents and topic being discussed. Thus spending
  hours and hours on futile gossip is irrelevant.
  What matters is how much you have learnt during
  your discussions from your friend, family or
  teachers.
• Thus, it is very important to have a purpose
  behind what you are discussing. The scope of
  discussion should be specific and defined and not
  vague and pointless. We would consider it a
  success if the only take away from this blog is
  that students should not indulge in sort of
  aimless gossip and should have structured
  discussions or debates with purpose i.e. related
  to UPSC syllabus directly. This mantra will aid
  in streamlining your study and discussions. This
  will make you more productive and reducing the
  amount of time you are wasting drastically. Since
  every human being crave some sort of minimum
  social interaction and UPSC journey is a long one
  which cannot be completed without social
  interactions. So it is beneficial in longer run
  if aspirants streamline and customize their
  social life according to their upsc journeys
  requirements.

4
WHAT TO DICUSS WITH PEERS

• Before you start forming big social circles and
  indulging in deep discussions in the name of upsc
  preparation caution must be taken in ensuring
  that you are well equipped to have a well
  informed discussion which is expected of a well
  read UPSC aspirant. There are certain
  pre-requisites of that you should have read the
  NCERTS, have gone through UPSC syllabus, previous
  year question papers and should have started
  reading at least one newspaper. These are
  absolute minimum essentials that you HAVE to
  cover. No discussion has to be done on whether
  standard books and newspaper is necessary for
  UPSC. So, for clearing your doubts we will
  address some widely talked about topics amongst
  aspirants.

5
WHAT IS THE ROLE OF NEWSPAPER READING?

• If you dont have the habit of reading newspapers 
  daily then it will take at least two months to
  get accustomed to daily newspaper reading.  You
  should read either The Hindu or The Indian
  express. You may read both if you are a fast
  reader. Do not refer to any other newspaper.
  Random selection of newspaper and moreover news
  is futile for UPSC preparation. You should choose
  a standard newspaper for preparation of UPSC CSE.
  An aspirant must never skip out on reading
  newspaper since it forms the basis of many
  questions directly and indirectly.
• Do not spend 3-5 hours on Newspapers daily as it
  is not the optimum strategy to cover the IAS
  syllabus! Avoid anything on Politics (read polity
  related news not politics), Sports,
  Entertainment. Avoid making notes in the first
  reading. There is no point in creating parallel
  news paper type notes of your own!

6
WHAT TOPICS TO BE COVERED FROM NEWSPAPER

• Newspapers are written with a very specific
  formula the who, what, when, where, why, and
  how always come first. As an IAS Aspirant, you
  have to focus on the underlying theme or issue
  rather than specific technicalities. 
• Go through PYQs and prescribed UPSC syllabus
  and analyse each topic of syllabus properly. You
  will understand the trend and type of news which
  is of significance in newspaper. Mainly the news
  related to sports, entertainment and fiction are
  not required. Local news which is related to
  national policy is important, otherwise ignore.
  In addition national and international news
  related to socio-economic, environmental and
  economy should be analysed. Recent happenings in
  science and technology and International
  Relations of India with neighbouring countries
  and other organisations are also very important.
  Moreover, Editorial section is the most important
  part of the newspaper and must never be missed.

7
WHAT ARE THE MISTAKES ONE SHOULD AVOID

• Aspirants who are preparing at home or studying
  in UPSC coaching institutes in Chandigarh and
  other parts of India make following most common
  mistakes during their UPSC journey Wasting time
  on online forums, debating on irrelevant issues
  which have no connection with your UPSC
  preparation, and wasting time and effort to
  impress people with your knowledge, wasting time
  on social media platforms.

8
SHOULD AN ASPIRANT INDULGE IN DEBATE AND
DISCUSSIONS

• Indulging in debates on any topic on social media
  is a wastage of time.  Facebook, WhatsApp, and
  other forms of social medias should be used
  sparingly. It is not beneficial and has low cost
  to benefit ratio.
• In addition try to limit your time on internet
  over all. Also aspirants should avoid reading too
  much on one sub topic as our aim is not to become
  a scholar on some topics/ subjects, without
  focusing on the whole syllabus. This will not
  serve the purpose.

9
SHOULD ONE DICUSS TOPPER STRATEGIES?

• Many aspirants have the tendency to blindly
  follow Toppers Strategies how many hours they
  sleep, what they eat, what movies they watch,
  what software they use for taking notes, etc.
   This is a very wrong strategy. You should never
  discuss anybodys strategy too much in your group
  since every aspirant has different strengths and
  weaknesses and preferences which vary as per
  their educational background and understanding.
• As the main ingredient is revision of standard
  text books. Everything else is just secondary
  insignificant technical stuff One Note or
  Evernote or paper for taking notes? Should I take
  test series or not? Should I also join the
  coaching that my friend is attending? How many
  hours to study? What to eat?

10
WHAT SHOULD NOT BE DISCUSSED?

• There are many aspirants who spend more time
  observing other aspirants than themselves and
  scrambling for more books, materials, websites,
  YouTube channel, news papers, and magazines
  during discussions with fellow UPSC aspirants.
  This should never be done

11
DO NOT MAKE IMAGINARY PLANS

• In the company of fellow aspirants avoid day
  dreaming about which schemes and policies all of
  you will implement when after becoming officers,
  what kind of facilities the officers get, and
  what kind of cadre to get in the future. Do not
  waste time in thinking such things even without
  clearing Prelims or Mains once.

12
QUEST FOR MAGICAL EXAM STRATEGY

• A huge chunk of aspirants reach library even
  before the gate opens at the break of dawn. Their
  sole goal is to occupy that one magical seat they
  adore in library. After that you will never find
  them on seat or studying. This is a sheer wastage
  of time. A upsc aspirant should never waste their
  time arguing and disturbing other aspirants for
  not getting their choice of seat. You aim is to
  complete your syllabus not to attain that fav
  seat in library.

13
HOW TO DEAL WITH COLLEGE FRIENDS AND RELATIONSHIPS

• For aspirant who are preparing during or just
  after finishing your graduation, college friends
  also a major source of disturbance. But you have
  to remind yourself that they already placed in
  some good jobs. But you still a student studying
  for UPSC CSE and they have plenty of time after
  their classes or jobs. So if they distract you
  from your studies by their unnecessary gossip
  then you should be mentally strong to not deter
  from your aim. You should minimize such social
  obligations. Do not indulge is petty gossip of
  who said what to whom and why, who wore what to
  which place etc. If somebody is being a bad
  influence then you should minimize your
  interaction since it will be better for you in
  long run.

14
ROLE OF HAVING DISCUSSION WITH COACHING FRIENDS

• At times even the coaching friends can act as a
  major distraction during our preparation. Some
  the mutual competition which is supposed to act
  as external motivation can be too much and end up
  distracting you from your goal. So do not take
  the competition in class tests and mock tests too
  seriously. If during discussion and debates the
  other aspirants do not conform to your opinions
  then do not get worked up. Sometimes there can be
  more than one correct opinion with varying
  perspectives. Opinions should be shared and taken
  with a pinch of salt.

15
CONCLUSION

• most common mistake made by many UPSC aspirants
  is that they reinforcement their mistakes. Since
  many of them never take or accept any
  feedback. Sometimes it can be difficult to see
  and realize ones own mistakes. One can be blind
  to ones own flaws at times. So, always take a
  feedback of your answers from teachers or from
  mains qualified fellow aspirants and have
  discussions with them. Such purposeful structured
  discussions will relieve a lot of your doubts,
  fears and worries. The social company provided by
  them is also fulfilling basic human need for
  interaction. Thus take full benefit of your free
  time by having news related or GS related
  discussions. Sometimes discuss major rivers,
  industries may be social issues like dowry, labor
  laws, fundamental rights, IR etc and enrich your
  UPSC preparation even in your free time.
• We hope that these tips will help you. These were
  our views and opinions on this topic. What are
  your thoughts and inputs or queries on this
  topic? Comment below and share your views with
  us. We would be happy to assist you in your IAS
  preparation battles and answer your queries.