What changed in the papers
Over the last few years CBSE has steadily raised the share of marks given to competency-based questions in the Grade 10 and Grade 12 board papers. These are case-based, source-based and integrated items: a short passage, a table, a diagram or a real situation, followed by questions that ask students to use what they know rather than repeat it.
The exact weighting is set each year in CBSE's assessment scheme and shown in its sample papers. Check the current year's documents on cbseacademic.nic.in before planning revision, because coaching sites often quote last year's numbers.
What a competency-based question asks for
A recall question asks a student to state Ohm's law. A competency-based question describes a household circuit that keeps tripping, gives two readings, and asks which change would fix it. The physics is identical. What is new is the step before the answer: noticing which idea the situation is about.
Same physics. A new first step.
Recall
Q1. State Ohm's law. [1]
The question names the idea.
Competency-based
Q4. The kitchen circuit trips whenever the kettle and the toaster run together. Which change would stop it tripping? [3]
The student has to spot the idea first.
Students who struggle with these questions usually know the content. They miss the signal in an unfamiliar setting, or they stop reading once they think they have spotted the topic.
- Case-based: a short scenario with three to five linked questions.
- Source-based: an extract, map or data table to read before answering.
- Integrated: one situation that draws on two chapters at once.
The content is the same. The new skill is recognising it somewhere new.
Practise with what you already have
You do not need a new workbook. Take a question your class already answers well and change its setting.
- Swap the context. Move a textbook example into the school canteen, a cricket match or a monsoon street.
- Add something to read first. Put a short table or paragraph in front of a familiar question, so students must find the numbers themselves.
- Join two chapters. Ask one question that needs both this week's topic and one from last term.
Ten minutes a week is enough if it happens every week. The habit matters more than the volume.
Teach the reading, not just the answer
Most marks on case-based questions are lost in the first thirty seconds. Teach a routine students can run every time: read the questions before the passage, underline what is given, and write down which idea they think it is about before calculating anything.
Mark the routine as well as the answer. A student who identified the right idea but slipped on the arithmetic has learned the harder part.
Plan it across the year
Competency practice works best when it is in the scheme of work from the first term, not added in the revision weeks. Agree as a department which chapters will carry a case-based question each month, and share one bank of questions so every section practises the same ones.
