Simple & well-balanced: An analysis of CBSE class X English paper

Hyderabad: The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) held the Class 10 board exam for English language and literature on 27 February. On the same day, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., CISCE administered the ICSE English language paper. The CBSE examination started at 10.30 a.m. and ended at 1.30 p.m.

More than 38 lakh children will take the CBSE board exams this year. This comprises 16,96,770 Class 12 students and 21,86,940 Class 10 students.

CBSE Board Exam 2023: English exam analysis

“I personally think the paper was fine but think some children, especially because of Covid-19 and having classes online, didn’t have enough written practice. My only concern was the time management aspect of the exams. When they are in school, we challenge them with tests and assignments often which allows them to practice their time management skills which are helpful during exams. But during Covid, with everything being online, I feel some children lack that skill. This was a major concern. We didn’t have any issues as such during the pre-boards, and having two pre-boards definitely prepared the students for what to expect,” said Dr. Usha Reddy, CEO of Meridian Group of Schools.

“I was watching the students write their exam and I noticed that not even one single child looked around, their focus was completely on the paper. It was quite a lengthy paper because most of them took all three hours to finish. The paper seemed to be easy but it required a lot of problem-solving skills and practical thinking skills. After collecting the papers and going through them, I didn’t really feel good about the way they were written. I didn’t see them pour the amount of information that was necessary for an answer. There was very limited information and there were a lot of blanks left by the children in their papers. Maybe they wanted to revisit it after understanding better but couldn’t because of the time constraint,” said Sunir Nagi, principal of Pallavi Model School, Alwal, Hyderabad.

She added, “What I understood is that these students lacked time management skills. Usually, the board is very student-friendly and checks to see if the child has at least been able to understand the concept. If their answer is even a little close to what is expected, the board does award marks for it. There are so many skills required to attempt the boards that I think have been lost on the children in the last two years. I don’t see or expect extraordinary results in the future but considering the last two years of education that they’ve had, even scoring 90-92% as their highest percentage would be great.”

The Class 10 CBSE English language and literature papers were simple and well-balanced. According to the students, the level of difficulty was moderate. The exam consisted of a well-balanced combination of knowledge, analytical, and application-based problems. Some of the students were able to complete the work on time and spare some time for revision.

The exam was for 80 marks, to be attempted within three hours.

The paper was divided into three sections—Section A, Section B, and Section C.

Section A: Reading (20 marks)

Section B: Grammar & Creative Writing (20 marks)

Section C: Literature (40 marks)

The three sections were all rather simple. Section A passages were not challenging in terms of difficulty, but the questions were value-based, whereas the second passage demanded students’ undivided attention.

Section B Grammar Sets 1 and 2 had basic questions with direct answers. Unfortunately, a couple of questions in Set 3 were a little challenging. Letter writing and analytical paragraph questions in writing skills were also basic and straightforward.

Section C was based on inference. The literature part was simple, but it required the learner to have a solid understanding of the topics and sub-topics, as well as an understanding of the themes, characters, and literary techniques utilized in the text. Most pupils should have been able to effectively answer the long-answer questions.

The question paper included no errors. Sets 1 and 2 included nearly identical problems, whereas Set 3 had a few differences in the grammar, writing, and literature parts.