Most Bihar STET English candidates start in the wrong place. They open a literature anthology, or a 600-page grammar book, and only later discover that the Paper 1 syllabus is narrower and more predictable than they feared. This guide lays out what the English paper for Classes 9-10 actually contains, how the 150 marks are split, and what that means for your first month of preparation.
Status check (4 October 2026): BSEB issued the Bihar STET 2026 notification in mid-August and applications ran from 17 August; reports say the window was extended to 22 September, with a correction window in the first week of October. At the time of writing, a confirmed exam date had not been published, and some sources expect November. Treat dates as provisional and confirm on the official STET portal before you plan around them. The pattern below is the one used in the 2025 cycle.
The paper at a glance
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Paper | Paper 1, Classes 9-10 (secondary), subject: English |
| Mode | Computer-based test |
| Total | 150 questions, 150 marks, 150 minutes |
| Marking | 1 mark per question, no negative marking |
| Subject section | 100 questions on English |
| Art of Teaching | 30 questions |
| General Knowledge, Environmental Science, Mathematical Aptitude, Logical Reasoning | 5 questions each (20 in total) |
Two things stand out. First, two-thirds of the paper is your subject. Second, there is no negative marking, so an unattempted question is a wasted mark. Never leave a blank.
What the English syllabus lists
The Paper 1 English syllabus is a list of grammar and usage items rather than a reading list. The topics named are:
- Sequence of tenses in connected speech
- Reported speech in extended texts
- Use of non-finites
- Passive voice
- Punctuation: semicolon, colon, dash, hyphen, brackets and exclamation mark
- Prepositions
- Synthesis using cohesive devices
- Phrases and idioms, including phrasal verbs and prepositional phrases
- Conditional clauses
- Subject-verb agreement
Literature, including the literature of marginalised communities, belongs to the Paper 2 (Classes 11-12) syllabus. If you are sitting Paper 1 only, you can leave the anthology on the shelf and put that time into the list above.
One caution. Candidates often assume "grammar syllabus" means "grammar rules only". Previous-year question sets for teacher-eligibility and recruitment exams in this family also test vocabulary (synonyms, antonyms, one-word substitution, spellings) and fill-in-the-blank items that mix several rules at once. We cover those in a separate post on vocabulary and idioms, and the topic-wise breakdown is in our weightage analysis.
The 50 questions that are not English
Do not treat these as a footnote. Fifty marks decide whether you clear the qualifying mark comfortably.
- Art of Teaching (30): child development, learning theories, classroom management, assessment and the basics of teaching English as a language. These repeat across subjects, so a week of focused study pays off.
- General Knowledge, Environmental Science, Mathematical Aptitude, Logical Reasoning (5 each): 20 marks that most students lose by not practising at all. Fifteen minutes a day is enough to turn this into steady marks.
Qualifying marks
STET is a qualifying test, not a ranked exam. The pass marks used in the last cycle were roughly 50 percent (75 out of 150) for General, lower thresholds for reserved categories, and 40 percent for SC/ST/PwD and women. Check the exact figures in the current notification. The practical meaning: you do not need to be perfect on every grammar topic. You need a reliable 75 to 90 across the paper, and a strong grammar core plus a solid Art of Teaching section gets you there.
How to read the 100-mark English section
A sensible way to plan is by topic families, not by the order of the syllabus list:
- Sentence transformation: tenses, reported speech, passive voice. Rule-driven, so practice converts directly into marks.
- Sentence correction: subject-verb agreement, prepositions, conditionals, punctuation, error spotting.
- Vocabulary: idioms, phrasal verbs, one-word substitution, synonyms, antonyms, spellings.
- Mixed fill-in-the-blank items: these draw on all of the above.
We have written a post for each family, linked below.
Common mistakes
- Spending the first month on literature that is not in the Paper 1 syllabus.
- Memorising rules without timed practice. A 100-question English section in about 60 to 70 minutes needs speed.
- Skipping Art of Teaching because it "feels like common sense".
- Leaving questions blank when there is no negative marking.
Practice the whole series on Pareeksha
The Bihar STET English series has 25-question timed sets for this: Fill in the Blanks (22 sets), Tenses and Verb Forms (10), Change of Voice (10), Synonyms (8), Idioms and Phrases (7) and eleven more topics, plus 102 mixed sessionals. Each set is a fixed paper, so you can compare your attempts over time. The exam page has the pattern and syllabus in one place.
These questions come from previous-year questions of comparable teacher exams (KVS, EMRS, NVS and state TGT/PGT papers) on the same topics, not from Bihar STET papers themselves.
Next steps
Read the topic weightage post, then the 60-day study plan. For the overall exam picture, see our Bihar STET overview, and when you are ready for timed practice, use the free test series.
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