Understanding DS questions

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[email protected]: Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts; Posts: 1; Joined: Sat Dec 26, 2015 10:26 am

by [email protected] » Sun Jan 10, 2016 10:09 am

IÂ´m having trouble understanding and answering some DS problems (Official Guide 2016). I already read the answer explanation and I dont think that i would be able to answer it the next time, right and in less tan 2 or 3 minutes.

DS: 96, 97, 106, 147 and 153

Could someone help me with some of this questions?

Thank you

MAIL: [email protected]

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Source: Beat The GMAT — Data Sufficiency | Sun Jan 10, 2016 10:09 am

MartyMurray: Legendary Member; Posts: 2135; Joined: Mon Feb 03, 2014 9:26 amFollowed by: 140 members; Location: https://martymurraycoaching.com/; Thanked: 955 times; GMAT Score:800

by MartyMurray » Sun Jan 10, 2016 4:35 pm

Hi Tanya.

Often the methods outlined in the explanations given in the OG are not close to what someone who is clued in would do when answering the questions. So it's not surprising that even after reading those explanations you are still wondering how to answer the questions in under two minutes.

Regarding getting some great responses on these forums, you are best off posting one question per thread and in each case actually writing out the DS question itself along with the two statements. Naturally you don't have to write out the five DS answer choices as they are always the same.

Do it that way, and you will get plenty of ideas, I can assure you.

Marty Murray
Perfect Scoring Tutor With Over a Decade of Experience
MartyMurrayCoaching.com
Contact me at [email protected] for a free consultation.

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Brent@GMATPrepNow: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 16207; Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:26 pmFollowed by: 1268 members; Location: Vancouver, BC; Thanked: 5254 times; GMAT Score:770

by Brent@GMATPrepNow » Wed Jan 13, 2016 8:36 am

[email protected] wrote:IÂ´m having trouble understanding and answering some DS problems

Your situation is very common among people preparing for the GMAT. The truth of the matter is that EVERYONE struggles with Data Sufficiency (DS) questions at first. Keep in mind that this question type is unique to the GMAT, so it's totally foreign territory.

It just takes time for the concepts and strategies to become secondary, at which point you may come to find that DS questions are actually easier than Problem Solving questions.

I could start listing dozens of DS strategies and common mistakes (like confusing the answer to sufficiency question to the answer to the target question), but it's easier to just direct you to our free set of 16 videos that cover everything you need to know to tackle DS questions: https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gmat-data-sufficiency

Cheers,
Brent

Brent Hanneson - Creator of GMATPrepNow.com

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[email protected]: Elite Legendary Member; Posts: 10392; Joined: Sun Jun 23, 2013 6:38 pmFollowed by: 511 members; Location: Palo Alto, CA; Thanked: 2867 times; GMAT Score:800

by [email protected] » Thu Jan 14, 2016 12:10 pm

Hi tanya_ba,

Data Sufficiency is the question type that is unique to the GMAT, so you probably have never faced a real-world 'equivalent' before you began your studies. Learning how to properly deal with the variations in DS takes time, but there are Tactics that you can use and patterns that you can learn to spot that should help you to improve. Your goal should NOT be to solve each question in under 2 minutes though - certain questions are designed to take you 3 minutes to solve (and that's if you KNOW what you're doing). Thus, your actual goal should be 'efficiency' - learning the proper Tactics to answer questions in the most efficient way possible.

1) How long have you been studying?
2) What materials have you used during your studies?
3) How well do you know the various Tactics (math, TESTing VALUES, Number Properties, Logic, etc.) for dealing with DS questions?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Contact Rich at [email protected]

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