One of the most common pitfalls people encounter when preparing for the Verbal section of the GMAT is the urge to guess between their remaining two answer choices in a practice question.

What happens is that a student eliminates three out of five answer choices relatively easily and is left with two that are harder to choose between. Then, having trouble deciding which is correct, the student basically gives up and guesses. Taking this approach can seriously undermine the effectiveness of your GMAT Verbal prep.

In fact, we could say that the Verbal Reasoning game is all about deciding between the last two answer choices. After all, the other three choices are generally relatively easy to eliminate. So, much of what we do in answering Verbal questions is aimed at deciding between the infamous remaining two.

So, if we guess between the last two choices, we’re skipping what is possibly the most important step in answering a Verbal question. In other words, we’re almost not even practicing. We’re certainly not practicing doing what we need to do to master GMAT Verbal, and we’ll likely see little progress.

So, don’t guess between your remaining two answer choices when practicing! Instead, expect it to be hard to decide between the last two choices, and stick with the question until you’ve figured out how to decide. That way, you’ll be learning to do what it takes to achieve your Verbal score goal.

Warmest regards,

Scott Woodbury-Stewart
Founder & CEO, Target Test Prep