The concept of HOTS is a fundamental shift in Evaluation Reform that aims at promoting thinking skills in learners and taking them away from rote learning. Higher level mental abilities of the learners such as to analyze, interpret, reason out, synthesize or evaluate the given information are likely to enable them transfer learning to totally different situations. Inclusion of questions based on testing higher order thinking skills in the question paper has certainly affected teaching-learning processes. The typology of such questions include open-ended questions, data-based questions, graph-based questions, activity-based questions and reasoning-based questions.
Exemplary Questions
Q. 1 The plot of the variation of potential difference across a combination of three identical cells in series, versus current is as shown below. What is the emf of each cell?
Q. 2 Two students X and Y perform an experiment on potentiometer separately using the circuit diagram shown here.
Keeping other things unchanged
(i) X increases the value of resistance R (ii) Y decreases the value of resistance S in the set up.
How will these changes affect the position of null point in each case and why ?
Q. 3 Two students X and Y, draw the following graphs for the (corresponding) ‘u’ and ‘v’ values for a convex lens. The graphs have been drawn for different object positions all lying between the optical centre and the focus of the lens. Identify the correct graph and justify your choice.
Q. 4 The following data was recorded for values of object distance and the corresponding values of image distance in the experiment on study of real image formation by a convex lens of power +5D. One of these observations is incorrect. Without making any calculations, identify the incorrect observation. Give reason for your choice.
S.No.
1
2
3
4
5
6
Object Distance (cm)
25
30
35
45
50
55
Image Distance (cm)
97
61
37
35
32
30
Q. 5 Four point charges are placed at the four corners of a square in two different ways (i) and (ii) as shown below.
(i) (ii)
Will the (i) Electric field (ii) Electric Potential at the centre of the square be the same or different in the two
configurations. Give reasons for your answer.
