Mayday! Mayday! Help needed

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Mayday! Mayday! Help needed

by kismet.leigh » Thu Feb 11, 2010 3:46 am
Hi,

I did the GMAT about 4 weeks ago and got an embarrassing 440.

I did a full course of study at a school in London but didn't quite grasp the Math. The Math teacher at the school here in London is amazing but his delivery style was not particularly condusive to learning, at least I thought so.

My dilemma now is what do I do to get a score of 700? Which is what I need to go to the schools of my choice. My GMAT course cost £975 and I cannot afford to do another course at another institution. Should I hit up my parents for another £950 for a 4 days intensive?

I have all the books, ie all the official guides and the Kaplan premier but I am so fustrated that I cannot study effectively.

Any advice would help!

Thoroughly confused Leigh
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by bhumika.k.shah » Thu Feb 11, 2010 4:07 am
I dont know if i am the correct person to really help you out in this. But i can try :)

For CR - i think u should go and buy the powerscore bible - RIGHTAWAY!! -

For SC - I'd recommend MANHATTAN GMAT SC guide.

For RC - i myself dont know coz it depends upon what manner suits you well to comprehend the passage. ive heard kaplan RC is good. LSAT RCs r too tough . Sowree cant really help for this section.
kismet.leigh wrote:Hi,

I did the GMAT about 4 weeks ago and got an embarrassing 440.

I did a full course of study at a school in London but didn't quite grasp the Math. The Math teacher at the school here in London is amazing but his delivery style was not particularly condusive to learning, at least I thought so.

My dilemma now is what do I do to get a score of 700? Which is what I need to go to the schools of my choice. My GMAT course cost £975 and I cannot afford to do another course at another institution. Should I hit up my parents for another £950 for a 4 days intensive?

I have all the books, ie all the official guides and the Kaplan premier but I am so fustrated that I cannot study effectively.

Any advice would help!

Thoroughly confused Leigh

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by Osirus@VeritasPrep » Thu Feb 11, 2010 6:17 am
If your main issue is the math, I would recommend getting all of the Manhattan GMAT math guides. The majority of this site swears by them. If you need help with verbal, get the powerscore critical reasoning bible, manhattan GMAT sentence Correction, and buy some past LSATs for additional reading comp practice. After this weekend, I will post a review for Veritas's books and their verbal class, so you may want to check that out when I post it.
https://www.beatthegmat.com/the-retake-o ... 51414.html

Brandon Dorsey
GMAT Instructor
Veritas Prep

Buy any Veritas Prep book(s) and receive access to 5 Practice Cats for free! Learn More.

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by ManhattanReview » Thu Feb 11, 2010 7:39 am
kismet.leigh wrote:Hi,

I did the GMAT about 4 weeks ago and got an embarrassing 440.

I did a full course of study at a school in London but didn't quite grasp the Math. The Math teacher at the school here in London is amazing but his delivery style was not particularly condusive to learning, at least I thought so.

My dilemma now is what do I do to get a score of 700? Which is what I need to go to the schools of my choice. My GMAT course cost £975 and I cannot afford to do another course at another institution. Should I hit up my parents for another £950 for a 4 days intensive?

I have all the books, ie all the official guides and the Kaplan premier but I am so fustrated that I cannot study effectively.

Any advice would help!

Thoroughly confused Leigh

If you've already done a structured GMAT course, doing this again may not be the best method to improve your score. As you undoubtedly imagine, a jump from 440 to 700 is quite a big one. How much time before your applications are due? What were your scores on any practice tests you may have taken? Did you feel particularly anxious on test day or under the weather? Any other reasons you may not have performed at your highest?

Answering these types of questions will determine the study time-line you should consider and your methods for attacking this thing moving forward. If it is mostly nervousness, I've listed out some standard suggestions we like to give our students for feeling confident. However, if you are particularly weak in Math, as you suggest, you may want to consider private tutoring. Private tutoring will allow you to hone in one your individual weaknesses and ends up being a better value for your time and money. If you'd like to find out about discounted private tutoring, private message us and we'll set something up.

Suggestions for test anxiety:
1. Minimize your worries and pay attention to good nutrition and adequate exercise. Maintain adequate sleep with a consistent schedule leading up to your test.
2. Make a special effort to improve your weaknesses along with strengthening your expertise during practice.
3. Locate or set up a serious test-taking environment in your house or a public library or a park or another facility so that you can exclusively focus on taking the mock tests.
4. Review all prior mistakes along with explanations. Make a list of those typical errors you tend to make and consciously remind yourself of them and refrain from making the same mistakes.
5. You may want to take the day before the test off entirely so that your brain can relax more right before the test day.
6. Keep a light-hearted and positive attitude on the test day. Maintain strong momentum from beginning to end as the final problems can sometimes be equally as important as the initial ones.

If you end up feeling like you'd need any help with certain sections of the test or even with your Admissions process once you knock the next one out of the park, let us know!

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by prinit » Thu Feb 11, 2010 8:47 am
kismet.leigh wrote:Hi,

I did the GMAT about 4 weeks ago and got an embarrassing 440.

I did a full course of study at a school in London but didn't quite grasp the Math. The Math teacher at the school here in London is amazing but his delivery style was not particularly condusive to learning, at least I thought so.

My dilemma now is what do I do to get a score of 700? Which is what I need to go to the schools of my choice. My GMAT course cost £975 and I cannot afford to do another course at another institution. Should I hit up my parents for another £950 for a 4 days intensive?

I have all the books, ie all the official guides and the Kaplan premier but I am so fustrated that I cannot study effectively.

Any advice would help!

Thoroughly confused Leigh
Well, you have a score now and you know your weaknesses better. Your case is not so unique, there are so many who experienced the same heat but later emerged as a GMAT destroyer. So Stop worrying and start focusing now..

1. Now is the time to work on the math part and get done with the basics first.
2. Don't move on until you get the math's basics right.
3. take few tests on maths only before starting the actual CAT.
4. See if you are able to do good in math section alone.
5. Find out the areas that are killing you the most and work on that.
6. Once you have some satisfactory score in math section, get into CAT practice tests.
7. Practice the CAT including essays otherwise it will bother you later.
8. Always analyze your score, thats the only way you can avoid mistakes/ errors.
9. Take the official GMAT Prep test CAT at least twice before taking the actual GMAT.
10. If GMAT Prep test CAT gives you some good score...go ahead with the GMAT.

Above all, keep posting your words on this forum. You can always find someone here...

Hope this helps. All the BEST.