Major changes introduced in the JEE Main Pattern: How can the aspirants tackle them?

The National Testing Agency, which is in charge of conducting the Joint Entrance Examination, has introduced a series of changes in the exam pattern of JEE Main examination which is currently postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These changes are sure to impact the students positively as the measures are taken to streamline the examination process for different courses. Some of the changes in the JEE Main pattern are listed below:

• The separate examination will be conducted for B. Planning in JEE Main.
• In addition to the conventional multiple-choice based questions, numerical based questions have been added to the JEE Main exam pattern.
• There is a different marking scheme for the newly introduced numerical based questions as compared to the conventional multiple-choice question.
• There is no negative marking for the numerical based questions.
• The National Testing Agency has also announced that the JEE Main would be now conducted in three different languages – English, Hindi, and Gujarati (specific to some centers and states only).

JEE Main 2020 Exam Pattern – B. Tech./B.E.

The engineering aspirants have something to cheer about as the number of questions has been reduced to 75. Each subject i.e. Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics would have only 25 questions. The maximum marks for this course stand at 300 with each correct answer having 4 marks and wrong response fetching a deduction of 1 mark.

Another change to highlight over here is that there would be 5 numerical based questions in each section. These questions would require you to enter an integer. For a correct response in the numerical based questions, you will be awarded 4 marks and would not attract any penalty. It is important to note that negative marking still remains for the multiple-choice questions which form the 80% of the JEE Main examination.

The Engineering aspirant will have 3 hours of time duration to complete the exam. This gives a little more flexibility as you have more than two minutes for every question and gives the aspirants a room for revising the answers as well.

The JEE Main examination will be available in all the three different languages Hindi and English. For the engineering aspirants taking this examination from the centers in Gujarat, Daman & Diu and Dadra & Nagar Haveli, they will be given an option of Gujarati as well.

• Exam mode- Online
• Number of Questions- 75
• Type of questions- 60 MCQs and 15 Numerically based questions
• Section:- Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics

JEE Main 2020 Exam Pattern– B. Arch.

For the Architecture aspirant, they will still get the drawing paper in their JEE Main examination. The drawing test will contain two questions compared to three in the earlier version of the exam pattern. The total number of questions in the JEE Main B. Arch exam would be 77 instead of the previous count of 81.

In B. Arch Paper 50 questions will be asked from Aptitude section carrying 200 marks, 25 questions from Mathematics section carrying 100 marks while 2 questions from drawing section carrying 100 marks.

As far as the numerical based questions are concerned, the pattern similar to above would be replicated here in the Mathematics section, where out of the 25 questions, 20 would be the multiple-choice questions and 5 questions would be from the numerical based questions. The marking scheme would again be the same, as these numerical based questions would not attract any negative marking on attempting and fetch 4 marks when attempted correctly.

With the maximum marks of 400, you would get 4 marks for each correct response, 1 mark will be deducted in case of each incorrect response. The questions which are not attempted will not be marked.

• Exam mode- Online and offline for drawing section
• Number of Questions- 100
• Type of questions- 2 drawing questions in the drawing section, 50 MCQs from Aptitude section and 25 questions from Mathematics section out of which 5 questions are numerically section.
• Section:- Aptitude, Drawing, and Mathematics

JEE Main 2020 Exam Pattern– B. Planning

The major change towards the planning course examination is that there will be a separate exam from that of the B. Arch. The B. Planning aspirants will have to take a planning paper instead of the drawing paper. This opens the door for the students who have Mathematics as one of the subjects in 10+2 can also take the examination, which means that the students from the Arts, as well as Commerce stream, can also take JEE Main for B. Planning.

The JEE Main conducted for the aspirants of Planning course will have a total of 3 parts, 100 questions in total and the maximum marks for this test would be 400. The marking scheme would remain the same as the other courses in the Mathematics section, where out of the 25 questions, 20 would be the multiple-choice questions and 5 questions would be from the numerical based questions with correct response fetching 4 marks and deduction of 1 if the answer is marked incorrectly. However, in the case of the numerically-based question, there is no negative marking.

• Exam mode- Online and offline for drawing section
• Number of Questions- 100
• Type of questions- 25 questions in the Planning section, 50 MCQs from Aptitude section and 25 questions from Mathematics section out of which 5 questions are numerically section.
• Section:- Aptitude, Planning, and Mathematics

Impact on current preparation for JEE Main aspirants

It is quite evident that change is part of life. The changes in the JEE Main exam pattern do point out that the testing agency wants to lower the burden and streamline the process even further. For the same reason, you see that the total number of questions asked for any course has been greatly reduced so that the students can focus more on the questions at hand and can manage the time more easily, which means that the student doesn’t need to think about solving a question in a matter of a few minutes.

For the numerical based questions, there is a challenge as there is insecurity over the answer, but with practice, this can be worked out as well. Even the agency knows that there could be a marginal difference in the attempted answer and the correct answer, which is why there is no negative marking for such questions. It is so to encourage the student to attempt all 5 and practice more and more for practical knowledge.