Maharashtra board class 10 ssc science ii 2018 exam review and analysis

Maharashtra Board Class 10 (SSC) Science II 2018 Exam Review and Analysis

Science Paper II Exam, Relaxation Continues? Read to Know!

By 16th Mar, 2018 | 05:42 pm

The Class 10 Board Exams of the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary & Higher Secondary Education, commonly referred to as the SSC exams, are on in full swing. This year a total of 17,66,098 candidates appeared for the SSC examinations, an increase of 2.33% from last year.

After a pretty good Science Paper I held on 14^th March, students must have been a bit relaxed because they got a one-day study break to prepare for today’s Science Paper II (16^th March). This might have helped students to continue with their geared up efforts for the overall Science and Technology paper.

With this paper, students are almost nearing the end of their life’s first and most feared board exams. Here we quickly analyse the structure and core elements of Science Paper II.

Question Paper Structure

Science and Technology Paper II had questions worth a total of 50 marks, of which students had to attempt 40 marks. The questions were distributed as follows:

Question No.	Total Number of Sub-questions	Permitted Attempt	Marks
Q.1 (A)	5	All	1 mark each
Q.1 (B)	5	All	1 mark each
Q.2	6	Any 5 of 6	2 marks each
Q.3	6	Any 5 of 6	3 marks each
Q.4	2	Any 1	5 marks

This year, ‘Question 1 (A)’ was broken into three parts with 2 questions of ‘Fill in the Blanks’ for 1 mark each, 2 questions of ‘True or False’ for 1 mark each and 1 question of ‘Odd One Out’ for 1 mark. The rest of the paper structure remained the same as expected.

Distribution of Marks

Science and Technology Paper II is a mix of Biology, Chemistry and Environmental Studies. The percentage distribution of marks of these subjects is shown below.

This distribution was strictly followed in this year’s question paper.

Let us now compare the usual and actual chapter-wise marks distribution of this question paper.

To help our student readers who attempted the various questions, we have analysed the complete question paper of 50 marks without considering the options.

The chapter-wise distribution of marks was according to the usual pattern. However, this year the weightage for the chapter ‘The Life Cycle’ was reduced, and the corresponding marks were added to the chapter ‘Life’s Internal Secrets’.

Question Types and Difficulty Level

Let us decode the types of questions and their difficulty level with respect to all the chapters in the syllabus of Science and Technology Paper II.

Questions with the most marks were from the chapters ‘Understanding Metals and Non-Metals’, ‘Life’s Internal Secrets’ and ‘Mapping Our Genes’, with a corresponding weightage of 9, 9 and 8 marks, whereas ‘The Life Cycle’ had the least marks.

Chapter Details		Type of Questions				Total Marks
Ch. No.	Chapters	Objective Type (1M)	Short Subjective (2M)	Long Subjective (3M)	Essay Type (5M)	Total Marks
8	Understanding Metals and Non-metals	2	2	1	-	9
9	Amazing World of Carbon Compounds	2	-	-	1	7
10	Life's Internal Secrets	2	1	-	1	9
11	The Regulators of Life	-	2	1	-	7
12	The Life Cycle	2	-	1	-	5
13	Mapping Our Genes	2	-	2	-	8
15	Striving For Better Environment (Part II)	-	1	1	-	5

The 2 marks questions were the biggest stress busters because these questions were more or less of the objective type and were aimed to test the remembering skills of students. For example, students were asked to classify, give examples or name the following.

The 3-markers were entirely based on the understanding of concepts within the chapters. The 5 marks questions involved a diagram and could have been a bit time consuming, but answering this question was eased because the functions of the excretory organs were asked instead of the structure of the human excretory system.

For students who referred to the list of Most Important Questions (MIQs) published by TopperLearning, the paper would have been a relief because quite a few MIQs appeared as is in the board paper.

This year, the Maharashtra State Board surprisingly deviated from its usual trend and hardly had questions which were directly picked up from the exercises in the chapter. So, this was an opportunity for students who had actually studied hard and understood concepts. In contrast, the Science Paper I however had quite a few questions picked from the exercises.

Overall, Science Paper II was not as straightforward as Science Paper I and required thorough reading along with understanding of the concepts to answer questions. Without worrying too much about this paper, students should now buckle up for the next paper — Social Science Paper I covering History and Political Science — which is to be held on 19^th March 2018.

All the very best to all SSC students, and stay tuned with www.topperlearning.com for more paper reviews and exam updates.