GMAT Strategy

Hi there, greetings from Buenos Aires! I`ve been around a while and would like to thank everyone for the precious insight that can be found everywhere in this site. That same insight I plan to leverage on...

I`ve ended my "orientation period" as I came to name the month or so I spent learning the bases of GMAT and building my quant base. In this period I`ve relied on some "math refreshment" books ("Kaplan GMAT Math Workbook" and "The Ultimate Math Refresher", both recommendable) and chose Princeton Review`s "Cracking the GMAT 2009 Ed" as my GMAT strategy foundation. After going through those I decided to take OG Diagnostic Test and GMAT prep1 in order to see where I`m standing.

Just took GMAT prep 1 today and got Q42 V38. Not amazing but not bad neither, I think that should translate to somethig like 630-640, not far from my 660-680 objective. After taking the test I realize my objective should be something like Q44 V40, based on the following facts I put together after analyzing my Diagnostic Test and GMAT prep1 results:

Quant:
My hit rate for Quant was around 60% (25/37 in GMP1), which I think leaves a lot of room for improvement. This is certainly true if you take into account that 40% of the questions I got wrong were because of careless mistakes (mostly partial answers or losing my north in the middle of the problem). My stats for GMP1 said that I got a 85% success rate for PS, but a miserable 55% for DS. The fact that confuses me is that most of my DS I got at the end of the test, which I assume are the harder questions and also the ones done under the most stressed part of the test. But I must improve DS since 45% fialure rate is inadmissible and also because DS is a great time saver.

Verbal:
My hit rate for Verbal is almost 80% (32/41). Opposite to Quant, I think there is little room for improvement in this section, since I have read Verbal gets really hard to improve after 40, in fact you can notice a huge jump in percentile between 38 and 41 in Appendix A from the OG. There are some facts that may probe me wrong, however. My performance in the section can be opened in the following: RC 95%correct, CR 80% and SC 65%. I think it`s useless (or at least not cost effective) to try to improve my RC, CR has some room for improvement, but clearly SC is the verbal section with the most potential (and the one I hate the most also).

So based in the above stated, I`m planning the following:
Quant: two weeks. One week each DS and PS. Improve my concetratraion hability. Resources: OG, Q OG. Do all questions, re do the ones I get wrong.

Verbal: two weeks. One week doing the harder qestions from OG and V OG for RC and CR, and one week (two weeks?, god I hate SC!) SC doing every question OG, V OG and Manhattan SC Guide (which I bought in advice knowing my hatred of grammar).

After those 4 weeks, take GMAT prep2 or MGMAT CAT(free). If everything goes as planned, register for the exam, start doings CAT like crazy while re visiting difficult questions from OG, V OG and Q OG.

Any input about strategy/ resources is welcomed!

Cheers

Quant: -
Clearly you have got your basics right in quant. You seem to be comfortable with quant concepts and that is reflected in your PS scores. If a persons PS is good and his DS isnt, then in most cases it is because he hasnt practiced enough DS questions and is still confused by the different DS questions. I wouldnt blame it on your grasp of quant concepts, because, if they are weak it should be reflected in your PS scores. So my advise to you would be to devote more time on DS and understand the different type of DS questions. Also make a strategy to tackle each type of question, you can also follow the strategy stated in one of the prep books, but make sure you have one and make sure you make an effort to apply that strategy each time you practice DS no matter how much time it takes to get it right. After enought practice you should be able to spot the type of DS question immediately and just as fast have a road map of how you will tackle it.

Verbal:- Clearly RC is your strength. You also seem to be comfortable with CR and some more practice should help you to raise the score for CR.

SC (like for most non native speakers of English) is where your problem lies. A hit rate of 65% is not acceptable if you are aiming for a high score (which I believe you should be able to score if you practice enough). For SC again make sure you are comfortable with most type of concepts tested on SC. Try and purchase the Manhattan GMAT guide on SC, they are supposed to be very good, and they cover the concepts that get asked in most SC questions in GMAT along with that keep practicing and you should see an improvement in your score.

Cheers.