Can some one please help !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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rockeyb: Legendary Member; Posts: 537; Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 7:15 amFollowed by: 1 member; Location: Nagpur , India; Thanked: 41 times

by rockeyb » Tue Dec 15, 2009 12:49 am

I took my GMAT on 8 th Dec 2009 and got 480 (Q36 , V 21) and I am very very frustrated at this point of time . My target was 650 - 700 and I want to achieve that score and I need help as to what I am doing wrong .

My GMAT Prep score just one week before the exams was 580 and I hoped to get at least above 550 but 480 is below my expectation . However I have seen a definite change in the question types that are there in actual GMAT as compared to GMAT prep . They seem to be much tougher in actual CAT specially the SC and PS .

In my prep exams I have never scored below 40 in quants but in actual test I was just overwhelmed by the questions . Can any one please confirm this finding of mine OR is its just me who thought that the problem patterns are actually changing.

Study Strategy used :

I have used OG 10 , 11, 12 twice atleast each of them .

Manhatten SC , Quants and CR .

I took 5 Princeton tests, 2 Manhattan CATs and 5 GMAT Prep CATs in my 6 months of study .

I am now confused as to what should be my strategy now where should I start ?

can some one please help .......

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Source: Beat The GMAT — GMAT Strategy | Tue Dec 15, 2009 12:49 am

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beatthegmat: Site Admin; Posts: 6778; Joined: Mon Feb 13, 2006 8:30 amFollowed by: 994 members; Location: Los Angeles, CA; Thanked: 1249 times

by beatthegmat » Tue Dec 15, 2009 10:48 am

Hi rockeyb,

Sorry to hear that you were disappointed with your recent GMAT experience. GMATPrep is usually an accurate representation of the actual GMAT--it's possible that you were 'unlucky' and were served with a slightly harder question bank by the test. But one thing to note: the GMAT should never feel easy. Since the test is adaptive, the GMAT should be serving you questions that are a little beyond your comfort or skills. Keep that in mind when you retake.

With regard to strategy, I would take some time to really assess how you went about your practices, and to also identify your weaknesses. Some resources I recommend your reviewing:

GMAT Practice Grid - Take some time to carefully read through this post. I'm a big believer of the practice grid methodology.

Evaluating Your Practice Tests Part One and Evaluating Your Practice Tests Part Two - Awesome series by Stacey Koprince on how you should approach practice tests.

Debriefing of a guy who went from 570 to 760 - For inspiration that you can make big gains on retakes.

Hope that this helps, good luck!

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rockeyb: Legendary Member; Posts: 537; Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 7:15 amFollowed by: 1 member; Location: Nagpur , India; Thanked: 41 times

by rockeyb » Tue Dec 15, 2009 8:44 pm

Hello Eric ,

Thanks for your reply . I have already been through the evaluating the practice test and practice grid posts . However my GMAT score shows that there is definitely room for improvement and I am keen on doing that . I am just confused at this moment what strategy I should follow .

My prep last time was for about 5 months in that time I use to practice fro OG and Manhatten books . My target was to solve atleast 20 problems each day . But I was soon running out of problems to solve and I would remember the answer to some of the problems so that would not help either.

I know my weak area is English as my score reflects I am good at quants but as you have rightly pointed out I may have got a difficult set but generally I score 40 -45 in quants easily .

In quants I want to solve the difficult level problems so that i am comfortable when I face them in exam , these are types that you will find in the end of every OG the last 10 quants question OR last 10 DS . These are the tricky ones and I would think these are 600-700 level questions .

How do I practice these also , how can I improve my english as a non native I have a relatively good english but in terms of GMAT my score dose not show that .

What do you suggest .

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GMAT/MBA Expert

beatthegmat: Site Admin; Posts: 6778; Joined: Mon Feb 13, 2006 8:30 amFollowed by: 994 members; Location: Los Angeles, CA; Thanked: 1249 times

by beatthegmat » Tue Dec 15, 2009 9:20 pm

With regard to how you can improve your English as a non-native speaker, I have the perfect debriefing to direct you to: https://www.beatthegmat.com/770-q50-v45- ... 31620.html

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JasLamba: Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts; Posts: 129; Joined: Tue Jul 21, 2009 6:04 amFollowed by: 2 members; Thanked: 15 times; GMAT Score:200

by JasLamba » Wed Dec 16, 2009 6:37 am

Rocky,

The test is adaptive so practicing only tough questions will get not get you far unfortunately because you will see very little if you are struggling with easy. Also, you have to increase your chances of seeing more and more 700+ questions to get a good score and to do that you need to get all the easy ones right.

As Eric mentioned earlier, the adaptive nature of the test yields a completely different and unique experience for each individual. This makes it difficult for you to pinpoint really if you got THAT much harder of a test - test nerves and projection of energy towards test day can play a crucial role, I think. Also you need to understand that the GMAT is a uniform test, so everything is relative to how others perform. So, in test day if you got those easy questions wrong (that 85% of the testtakers got right) your score will drop significantly, and like that for every problem. To you hard questions might not be hard to others.

Anyhow a mix of mastering the fundamentals further, reviewing your practice problems with greater attention to detail and more thoroughness, and reading various inspirational debriefs should do the trick. Focus and work hard I think you can do it. If you focus on the verbal section given that improvement as a whole there will yield best results overall. So diagnose your weakest area RC, SC, CR and practice practice practice. At this point maybe a course or personal tutoring would be effective if you have the appropriate means.

Hope it helps at least a bit.
All the best,
Jas

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rockeyb: Legendary Member; Posts: 537; Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 7:15 amFollowed by: 1 member; Location: Nagpur , India; Thanked: 41 times

by rockeyb » Wed Dec 16, 2009 7:42 am

Thanks Eric and Jas for your view I really appreciate your help , I think I will try and give my self a bit more time to practice and focus on my weak areas .

Hope to do a lot of practice and as always post a lot of queries and also help other on this forum .

Thanks a lot .

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beatthegmat: Site Admin; Posts: 6778; Joined: Mon Feb 13, 2006 8:30 amFollowed by: 994 members; Location: Los Angeles, CA; Thanked: 1249 times

by beatthegmat » Wed Dec 16, 2009 9:33 am

JasLamba wrote:Rocky,

The test is adaptive so practicing only tough questions will get not get you far unfortunately because you will see very little if you are struggling with easy. Also, you have to increase your chances of seeing more and more 700+ questions to get a good score and to do that you need to get all the easy ones right.

As Eric mentioned earlier, the adaptive nature of the test yields a completely different and unique experience for each individual. This makes it difficult for you to pinpoint really if you got THAT much harder of a test - test nerves and projection of energy towards test day can play a crucial role, I think. Also you need to understand that the GMAT is a uniform test, so everything is relative to how others perform. So, in test day if you got those easy questions wrong (that 85% of the testtakers got right) your score will drop significantly, and like that for every problem. To you hard questions might not be hard to others.

Anyhow a mix of mastering the fundamentals further, reviewing your practice problems with greater attention to detail and more thoroughness, and reading various inspirational debriefs should do the trick. Focus and work hard I think you can do it. If you focus on the verbal section given that improvement as a whole there will yield best results overall. So diagnose your weakest area RC, SC, CR and practice practice practice. At this point maybe a course or personal tutoring would be effective if you have the appropriate means.

Hope it helps at least a bit.
All the best,
Jas

Thanks rockeyb for that excellent response!

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