1st attempt 600 (Q-45, V-28) Need help!

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Daniel_Widjaja: Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts; Posts: 7; Joined: Thu Oct 21, 2010 8:02 am

1st attempt 600 (Q-45, V-28) Need help!

by Daniel_Widjaja » Mon Nov 01, 2010 8:20 pm

I just took my first gmat exam yesterday and was pretty disappointed. I'm planning to retake it in around 3 months and am planning to go shopping for helpful verbal books. I read in a number a posts that the manhattan books are quite useful. Any recommendations?

btw I used OG 12 and Kaplan 2011 (general) for the first exam. I also took a bunch of mocks online (scores ranging from 520 to 640). What's frustrating is that my verbal progressively worsens everytime I take an exam. I get confused over SC questions and struggle with lots of mental fog while reading CR questions.

My target is 700, any help would be great!

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Source: Beat The GMAT — Verbal Reasoning | Mon Nov 01, 2010 8:20 pm

zorya: Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts; Posts: 26; Joined: Fri Dec 03, 2010 11:54 pm; Location: Bangalore; Thanked: 5 times; GMAT Score:740

by zorya » Sat Dec 04, 2010 12:15 am

The Manhattan Sentence Correction guide is really good and a must-have IMO. Will probably help you get your SC basics in place. And the OG of course.
I haven't gone through Kaplan 2011, so can't comment on that. For CR, I referred to Manhattan's CR quide and did all the OG questions(twice!) and that pretty much helped me

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Random Wok: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 59; Joined: Wed Aug 11, 2010 3:26 pm; Thanked: 8 times; GMAT Score:750

by Random Wok » Mon Dec 27, 2010 9:35 pm

I agree with @zorya about using the MGMAT guides and focusing on Sentence Correction. SC is the most common problem you will see on the test, so if you focus on learning grammar and working through those problems, you will definitely get the best return on your investment.

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VivianKerr: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 1035; Joined: Fri Dec 17, 2010 11:13 am; Location: Los Angeles, CA; Thanked: 474 times; Followed by:365 members

by VivianKerr » Fri Dec 31, 2010 7:34 pm

Hey Daniel,

MGMAT makes good books, I agree! Here's what I suggest:

SC - review your grammar (as said); I suggest getting a good non-GMAT English grammar book from Amazon.com, preferably one with exercises. This can be a welcome break from just doing endless SC questions and reading explanations!

RC & CR - redevelop your relationship with your scratch paper - how are you using it? What is your methodical process for each question? Soak up some articles on strategy!

A few articles to help:

https://grockit.com/blog/gmat/category/g ... rehension/

https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/11/ ... -questions

Create a Verbal error log for questions that seem very challenging/mystifying. Look for patterns in your own mistakes.

Good luck to you!
-Vivian

Vivian Kerr
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