score tanked.....now what?

allenkt · Posted: Tue May 08, 2007 9:55 am Post subject: score tanked.....now what?

Wow, what an interesting day. I am scheduled to take the GMAT in 2 days (on Thursday) so I took this week off so I can do nothing but study. Quantitative has been my weak area so that is what I've been concentrating on (doing the problems in OG 11).

I took the GMATPrep test #1 a few weeks ago and scored a 560. Not great but figured it was an ok starting place. Yesterday I took test #2 and scored a 620 with individual scores of 39 in Quantitative and 37 in Verbal. Not the best but given my goal is to score around a 650 I thought I was on track.

But then today I reinstalled the GMATPrep software so I could take it again, realizing some questions would be repeated. But for some reason the math just kicked my butt today. I ended up with a 550, Q = 29, V = 36. I'm not sure what happened but I think it was partly because the first few questions were pretty hard and I think that really distracted me. Upon reviewing my results I saw that I missed 9 out of the first 10 questions (only got the 2nd question right).

So now what is the best way to study? I did a print screen of the ones I missed so I can post them and get help with the right answer but should I do that or just concentrate on studying the OG questions?

Rescheduling the GMAT is not an option, btw.

allenkt · Posted: Tue May 08, 2007 12:44 pm Post subject:

For the record, I went back through the problems I missed and was able to solve all but three of them (two function questions and one geometry question) and I have posted those three on the forum for help. I did have to look up some information for a couple of them but for the most part my problem was that I just need to slow down a little and think about what I'm doing. I think I'll take the 2nd test tomorrow and really try to spend more time on the first few questions. Today I just got so frustrated when I knew I was struggling with the first set of questions.

Stacey Koprince · Posted: Tue May 08, 2007 12:55 pm Post subject:

Sounds like your nerves got to you on the test. FYI it is okay to get some questions wrong early on that you knew how to do... as long as you don't let it get to you and mess up your performance for the rest of the section.

allenkt · Posted: Thu May 10, 2007 11:29 am Post subject:

Just wanted to report that yesterday I took the 2nd test and scored a 660 on it. Although there were 3-4 questions that I had already seen I still did much better than previously. And today I took the real deal and scored a 640 so I was quite satisfied with that result.