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When to Time and when not to Time?

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When to Time and when not to Time?

by mateodude » Fri Sep 21, 2007 9:13 am
First of all, i would like to thank the creator of this site. It is the cats meow!

I'm on the fence as to what strategy i should take going forward. I just finished Kaplan's online course and still have some weaknesses. Go figure. SC and CR are my weakest areas. Additionally, i am having a lot of trouble timing across all areas! I just can't finish.

I would like to use some of the strategies discussed on this blog; study in blocks of 40 problems (to increase stamina) and work from the OG11 book!!!, but feel that by doing so might not allow for further concept development because i will feel rushed. I am scheduled to take the test in one month, so time is a factor.

Should i just go right into the OG 11 book timed and structured or save that material for when i feel i most prepared? I would like to take this to the next level but am not sure where to go after Kaplan...I've read the Manhattan materials are goo.

i'm scoring in the low 600s on kaplan's CATs and am targeting in the low 700s.



Many thanks,
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by mayonnai5e » Fri Sep 21, 2007 9:35 am
As someone is also struggling with timing, I strongly suggest doing all practice timed. Why? Because it will reveal where your true weaknesses are. There are many problems that I can get correct given enough time, but when I started timing myself I realized I was missing easier questions because they took too long to finish the "normal" way. Consider this, your weaknesses in certain fundamentals/concepts will be there whether you time yourself or not, but timing yourself will reveal where other weaknesses lie. I would only do untimed practice if you're learning a new topic that you have never seen before and where you really are learning from the very beginning (e.g. you're learning permutations/combinations for the first time); however, you mentioned you've finished the MGMAT course so I do not believe that applies to you.

I've mentioned timing in my blog on this site several times:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/viewtopic.php?t=4899
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by mateodude » Fri Sep 21, 2007 11:01 am
Very good point, i agree with your reasoning. Given that timing is a large part of what is tested, a problem wrong due to concept or a problem wrong due to timing, is still a problem which must be fixed. No delaying the inevitable.

Thanks for the encouragement. On to OG11 i go.
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by mayonnai5e » Fri Sep 21, 2007 11:30 am
mateodude wrote:Very good point, i agree with your reasoning. Given that timing is a large part of what is tested, a problem wrong due to concept or a problem wrong due to timing, is still a problem which must be fixed. No delaying the inevitable.

Thanks for the encouragement. On to OG11 i go.
Exactly. The test doesn't test whether you can solve the problem in 5, 7, or even 10 minutes, but rather whether you can solve any given problem in 2 minutes on average. I've found that not timing my practice actually hid my weakest areas. Even worse yet when I used to take CATs, I would get STUCK on problems because of my pride and stubbornness ("I know I can do this problem, I know I can solve it, I just need a few more minutes...a few more minutes...").

Then BAM! 2 minutes left and I have 10 unanswered questions. GAME OVER. Thank you come again.
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Re: When to Time and when not to Time?

by beatthegmat » Fri Sep 21, 2007 1:20 pm
mateodude wrote:First of all, i would like to thank the creator of this site. It is the cats meow!

I'm on the fence as to what strategy i should take going forward. I just finished Kaplan's online course and still have some weaknesses. Go figure. SC and CR are my weakest areas. Additionally, i am having a lot of trouble timing across all areas! I just can't finish.

I would like to use some of the strategies discussed on this blog; study in blocks of 40 problems (to increase stamina) and work from the OG11 book!!!, but feel that by doing so might not allow for further concept development because i will feel rushed. I am scheduled to take the test in one month, so time is a factor.

Should i just go right into the OG 11 book timed and structured or save that material for when i feel i most prepared? I would like to take this to the next level but am not sure where to go after Kaplan...I've read the Manhattan materials are goo.

i'm scoring in the low 600s on kaplan's CATs and am targeting in the low 700s.



Many thanks,
First of all--disregard your Kaplan scores because they are skewed downward quite a bit. I was scoring in the high 500s/low 600s myself in Kaplan during my prep, but I was able to pull of a low 700 on the real test.

How much more concept review do you need? I have a sense that you only need minimal review, so I suggest emphasizing timed sets off of OG in your remaining weeks.

Good luck, you're almost there!
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by Stacey Koprince » Fri Sep 21, 2007 3:06 pm
Test yourself on a GMATPrep test to see where you're scoring. And I completely agree with mayonnai5e - time everything. I tell my students that they don't need to time themselves for the first few weeks while they're just getting started, but after that EVERYTHING has to be timed.

Timing is a major component of the test - it can change how you deal with any particular question or question type.
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by mateodude » Fri Sep 21, 2007 3:33 pm
hmm...Pride, don't know her.

Actually, I am very familiar with this pride concept, although I hadn't identified as such. Something i really need to work on, just after i pay off the IT guy at the testing center.

What I have consistently noticed on the several CATs i've completed is that I spend 5-6 minutes each on roughly 4 problems, 4-5 minutes each on another 4-5 problems and then rush the last 6 or so. Typical, i'm sure. However, there does not seem to be ANY correlation between the time i spend on a problem and the probability i answer the problem correctly. Ok, there may be a couple problems but not enough to justify the time

Kaplan:
As for Kaplan...ugh. Yeah, I've read the posts. Thank you for the encouragement. Just not very helpfull for the ego.

Perhaps its not concept review i need, perhaps its fundamentals for the areas i have the most issues with and tricks and shortcuts for the areas i'm doing o kay at. Indepently studying for this test does not seem to be conducive for that. Of course I am starting to utilze this website.

I don't feel Kaplan has taught me shortcuts, tricks or clever acronyms etc. They have to be out there??? I feel Kaplan has done a comprehensive job of teaching me the GMAT test in general, strategies to tackle it and giving me hart burn. As for the areas i have a conceptual deficiencies, such as combos/perms and rate/dist/faction problems, kaplan is too general and basic. I would prefer something more technical first then progress to tricks and shortcuts.

Any thoughts on additional material to supplement my next stage of OG 11 or where I might go after Kaplan to take it to the next level?

I just purchased:
OG Quant Review
OG Verbal Review
and Manhattan SC books
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by Stacey Koprince » Fri Sep 21, 2007 3:44 pm
However, there does not seem to be ANY correlation between the time i spend on a problem and the probability i answer the problem correctly. Ok, there may be a couple problems but not enough to justify the time
I can guarantee you there's a correlation in an least one area: the ones on which you run out of time and have to rush / guess. Not much time spent = wrong answers.

The point is, you're not improving your performance on those questions on which you spend 4+ minutes, but you are hurting your performance on those questions on which you can't spend normal time because you're rushing. So why are you spending extra time on those earlier and very hard (by definition, if you're spending so much extra time) problems at the expense of other later problems that you might get if you only had the time?
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by mateodude » Fri Sep 21, 2007 4:16 pm
Stacey, you are absolutly correct. There is no reason for my flagrent use of time.

Would you suggest, on my up coming CATs, that I try to recoginze early on when i have a deficiency in a certain problem and much much earlier (maybe 1 min into it) spend time strategiclly/spatially thinking about the problem. Then guessing.
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by Stacey Koprince » Fri Sep 21, 2007 5:06 pm
You need to be on track and know what you're doing on any given problem when half of your time is over - on 2 minute questions, that's 1 minute, on 90 second questions (SC), that's 45 seconds. If you're not on track at that point, you're not going to both figure out what to do and do it when you only have half the time remaining - so you have to change tracks. Spending the second half figuring out how to make an educated guess, make that guess, and move on!
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