640 in MGMAT!! Very Bad Verbal Score !! -- Please advice

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harish: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 42; Joined: Fri May 30, 2008 10:30 pm; Location: India

by harish » Thu Jul 03, 2008 5:15 am

Hi Guys,

I still have 1 month to prepare and give my GMAT.
I have been preparing for past 20 days and gave the MGMAT CAT1 yesterday.

I scored 640(Q-48/V-31) As you can see my difficulty is Verbal.
I am able to eliminate 3 choices out of 5 but end up choosing the last option wrong (':?') -- Most of the case.

I have now started working on Kaplan - GMAT 800 as after analyzing I find I have done more mistakes on tougher verbal questions and in all the 3 verbal sections.

I am aiming for 720+ in GMAT.Can someone please guide me or let me know how i could plan this 1 month and improve my verbal score.

Also can you please advice whether 720+ is achievable.
I have attached my Verbal analysis sheet for ref..

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Source: Beat The GMAT — GMAT Strategy | Thu Jul 03, 2008 5:15 am

Prasanna: Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts; Posts: 418; Joined: Mon Feb 26, 2007 6:41 pm; Thanked: 24 times

by Prasanna » Thu Jul 03, 2008 12:37 pm

harish

I would say you have made a good start. There is room for improvement. I think you should identify the question types in each section you have made mistakes and prep on them. Once you strengthen your basics you could try Kaplan 800. I have found Manhattan SC guide very useful.

720 should be within your reach if you focus your energies in the right direction. Get your basics right on all question types

lastday: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 30; Joined: Wed Jun 04, 2008 11:20 am; Thanked: 3 times

by lastday » Thu Jul 03, 2008 1:10 pm

Don't use Kaplan for verbal. It's not representative of the real thing. Use Princeton Review...it's much better.

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Stacey Koprince: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 2228; Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:28 pmFollowed by: 694 members; Location: Montreal, Canada; Thanked: 639 times; GMAT Score:780

by Stacey Koprince » Wed Jul 09, 2008 5:04 pm

Since you say that you can usually eliminate 3 choices confidently and then just struggle with the last two (the right one and the most tempting wrong one), another thing you need to do is go study those wrong answers. Ask yourself two quite different (though related) questions:

Why is this choice so tempting (even though it's wrong)?
Why is this choice actually wrong (even though it's so tempting)?

They specifically write choices to make them tempting but wrong. You need to learn how to identify those - and that takes actual analysis of those questions and tempting wrong answers. You can also use the forums here to help you brainstorm this stuff - post a question, mention the two answers you narrowed it down to, and ask the community to comment on why we think something's tempting, but wrong, and why it IS wrong, though tempting.

Please note: I do not use the Private Messaging system! I will not see any PMs that you send to me!!

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