GMAT Strategy

That was my third try and that was the biggest dissapointment!
Dec, 2008 - 630 Q(47) and V(29)
July, 2009 - 680 Q(49) and V (34)
2 Dec, 2009 - 650 Q(50) and V (27)

I have been working on both parts of the exam for my second and third tries for a couple of months before each. Especially I paid attention to Verbal part (I am not a native speaker). So I could see the improvement form my first try to my second try but my today's verbal scores simply killed me, leaving me with quetions. How could it be that my English has become even worse that a year ago? Despite all the English classes I have taken, tonns of essays I have written and tonns of critical reasoning arguments I have done.... I feel kind of devastated and not sure whether I should retake GMAT fourth time. And if so, how can I improve my Verbal score (the verbal scores look pretty arbitrary and unlogical to me now)

Has anyone else encountered such a dilemma?
Please, share your opinions and strategies guys.

^^ ?? I'm not sure that makes sense - she took the exam three times already, so she is familiar with the format. Also, she clearly is strong in quant and weak in verbal.

My advice to you Katrusya (privet) is to study verbal for about 3-4 weeks, take 1 week to review quant, and go take the exam.

For verbal, is the weakness across all sections, or just 1 or 2? For sentence correction, buy the Manhattan Guide to Sentence Correction book and study it rigorously, and for critical reasoning, pick up Power Score Critical Reasoning Guide. These two books should help you improve your score.

If you still have trouble with sentence correction, than pick up a book on grammar. There are many recommendations on books on this great site.

Best of luck!

I would also recommend just getting a basic grammar book. Go through that before looking at any GMAT specifics. Which books to you have and which parts of Verbal do you have most problems with? I haven't taken the GMAT yet, still in th epreparing stages, but it seem that the Powerscore CR bible is the most recommended for CR and the manhattan books for others.

What score and school are you aiming for? Remember that there are other parts to your application not just the GMAT score. You have already taken the GMAT three times, so if it looks like you cannot improve from 680, then there are always all the other aspects to your application.

How did you practice test go BTW? If the GMAT preps for example are significantly higher, then maybe you are panicking or stressing the test ituation.

Just some thoughts! Good luck with whatever you decide! And regarding the first reply to the original message, it seems the person has written exactly the same reply to other messages, too. So, not really valid.