Can't translate practice results to practice tests

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I've been following the Magoosh 3 month Math focused GMAT study plan for the last 7 weeks and I have found that it has indeed been helping my quantitative scores, and the overall study plan is very well structured so kudos to Magoosh.

As the study plan calls for I've recently begun taking MGMAT practice tests in order to simulate the real thing.
My first test was Q 41, V 37 650
Second Q 43, V 36
Third Q 44. V 33

However, before you jump to any conclusions, I have been studying the Verbal sections quite frequently in my spare time, and when I do practice problems on Magoosh or in the OG, I find that in the verbal sections I generally get around 80-95% of the problems correct aside from sentence correction which is around 75%. When reviewing my practice tests and looking through the problems I find that most of the questions I get wrong are because I was "turned around" by answer choices, I initially had the correct answer but then went with a different answer, or they are mistakes that are generally uncharacteristic considering how I do in the practice questions. Perhaps it's a combination of being tired, and second guessing. In addition the latest score of a 33 I had poor time management and felt that I had to rush through the mid portion of the test where I admittedly got most of my incorrect answers.

It is frustrating that I feel there is this disconnect between how I know I can do, given my results on practice questions, and how I've been performing on these practices tests. I'm wondering if any of the experts can perhaps offer some advice on how I can get a more consistent verbal score.

Many thanks

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by Knitgeek » Tue Oct 11, 2016 2:35 pm
As someone who used Magoosh as their main study resource and did a bunch of the MGMAT practice tests I do have to say I found the way the Verbal questions of the two sources were written to be quite different and that I had different success rates with both. I performed better on the GMAC practice tests in verbal than MGMAT - for what that is worth, I am only one data point after all.

Alternatively if you are taking your CATs in a test-like environment you could be coming up against some mental fatigue as it is the last part of the test. I'm generally much stronger in verbal than quant but I found that my verbal scores in my practice CATs and the GMAT suffered a bit just for the sheer length of the test. If I was going to make careless mistakes it was in the verbal section.

Overall if it helps, my practice CATs looked very similar to your scores and I managed a 700 on exam day :)

Good luck with the studies!

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by vill4geidi0t » Tue Oct 11, 2016 3:28 pm
Knitgeek wrote:As someone who used Magoosh as their main study resource and did a bunch of the MGMAT practice tests I do have to say I found the way the Verbal questions of the two sources were written to be quite different and that I had different success rates with both. I performed better on the GMAC practice tests in verbal than MGMAT - for what that is worth, I am only one data point after all.

Alternatively if you are taking your CATs in a test-like environment you could be coming up against some mental fatigue as it is the last part of the test. I'm generally much stronger in verbal than quant but I found that my verbal scores in my practice CATs and the GMAT suffered a bit just for the sheer length of the test. If I was going to make careless mistakes it was in the verbal section.

Overall if it helps, my practice CATs looked very similar to your scores and I managed a 700 on exam day :)

Good luck with the studies!
Hey knitgeek thanks for the reply.

It also seems to feel like I can't manage to put it all together on the practice tests and I know if I could then I would be able to score much higher. I'm going to try taking 5 hour energy before my next practice test and see if that helps with mid test fatigue. Thanks for sharing your experience