I just Beat The GMAT!

NB1234 wrote:Thanks.
I think there were a few things that I did differently for the re attempt. My analysis is based on the fact that I was getting scores close to 750 on my practice tests before the first attempt.


1) THIS ATTEMPT-
Didnt overstress and took some time off work- I "felt" different on the re atempt. I would contribute that to taking monday off(the re attempt GMAT was on tuesday). So in fact I had 3 days off including the weekend. I didnt write a practice exam on monday. Just spent the day idling with my son and family. The re attempt was early in the morning, so having a fresh mind helped. I would have gotten questions wrong on this attempt as well but they werent 4+2=8 kind of mistakes.

FIRST ATTEMPT-I remember on the first attempt, which was on saturday, I was too tired mentally. The day before, ie on friday,I worked for half day. My work involves a lot of activity on the phone, emails and constant time pressure to deliver things. That left me tired, I think.I remember on the first exam there was a question about decimals(hundreths etc) and I knew what to do but kept scaring at the screen for 5 mins re-re reading the question. On the third question I calculated 4/25 as 8 pecent instead of 16%. Getting an easy question wrong hurts your score more than getting a hard one wrong, IMO. And you are more prone to getting harder questions wrong if you are stressed for time.

2) Time management- This time I was both cautious of my answers as well of time.

RE-ATTEMPT- I would re check my answers, though as you would notice in the link I provide, that I already lost some time before I started quant.Also, I didnt just waste my time on one question. If I had to guess it I did within 3 mins of seeing the question. I didnt draw the grid this time but kept a mental note of time(roughly 10 mins for 5 questions).
On Verbal on the exam, even though on practice exams I would finish the section 10 mins ahead of time, I barely finished on time. Qstn 40 : Ihad to guess it in 30 secs and on 41 I just managed to click on a random option WITHOUT getting the time to click Submit/Next. The clock ran out on me.

First Attempt- I was behind time right away and probably left out /got wrong some pretty easy questions. Throughout the exam I was behind the clock. On Verbal though I cant say what went wrong. Perhaps I was over confident since I finished the verbal 10 mins ahead of time. This might have led to ignoring some of the right choices and settling on a "seemingly" right choice.

3) Extra Practice- I did put in extra hours of practice the second time by using Magoosh(primarily for DS) and GMAT Question Pack 1. The Question pack has good questions and allows you to practice under timed constraints on the computer.

NB1234 wrote:Thanks.
I think there were a few things that I did differently for the re attempt. My analysis is based on the fact that I was getting scores close to 750 on my practice tests before the first attempt.


1) THIS ATTEMPT-
Didnt overstress and took some time off work- I "felt" different on the re atempt. I would contribute that to taking monday off(the re attempt GMAT was on tuesday). So in fact I had 3 days off including the weekend. I didnt write a practice exam on monday. Just spent the day idling with my son and family. The re attempt was early in the morning, so having a fresh mind helped. I would have gotten questions wrong on this attempt as well but they werent 4+2=8 kind of mistakes.

FIRST ATTEMPT-I remember on the first attempt, which was on saturday, I was too tired mentally. The day before, ie on friday,I worked for half day. My work involves a lot of activity on the phone, emails and constant time pressure to deliver things. That left me tired, I think.I remember on the first exam there was a question about decimals(hundreths etc) and I knew what to do but kept scaring at the screen for 5 mins re-re reading the question. On the third question I calculated 4/25 as 8 pecent instead of 16%. Getting an easy question wrong hurts your score more than getting a hard one wrong, IMO. And you are more prone to getting harder questions wrong if you are stressed for time.

2) Time management- This time I was both cautious of my answers as well of time.

RE-ATTEMPT- I would re check my answers, though as you would notice in the link I provide, that I already lost some time before I started quant.Also, I didnt just waste my time on one question. If I had to guess it I did within 3 mins of seeing the question. I didnt draw the grid this time but kept a mental note of time(roughly 10 mins for 5 questions).
On Verbal on the exam, even though on practice exams I would finish the section 10 mins ahead of time, I barely finished on time. Qstn 40 : Ihad to guess it in 30 secs and on 41 I just managed to click on a random option WITHOUT getting the time to click Submit/Next. The clock ran out on me.

First Attempt- I was behind time right away and probably left out /got wrong some pretty easy questions. Throughout the exam I was behind the clock. On Verbal though I cant say what went wrong. Perhaps I was over confident since I finished the verbal 10 mins ahead of time. This might have led to ignoring some of the right choices and settling on a "seemingly" right choice.

3) Extra Practice- I did put in extra hours of practice the second time by using Magoosh(primarily for DS) and GMAT Question Pack 1. The Question pack has good questions and allows you to practice under timed constraints on the computer.

NB1234 wrote:Jaya
I can see that you have had a big jump from 28 to 34 on your verbal. You are not that far off from achieving 40. Here are the things I would advice
1) Note down the question types in SC.The easiest ones fall in the range of Subject verb agreement and parallelism. MGMAT is good for getting the basics right about SC. However, you need to practice. Make a target, say, 25 SC questions per day. Each day, practice 25 questions. Then analyze each answer, even if it is right. The answer explanations for the SC questions in OG are pretty good. Once you read ALL answer explanations(including the ones you get right) you will feel confident in approaching new questions. Trust me on that.
2) Practice questions from a variety of sources. Get as many questions as you can. OG is the #1 resource for verbal so make sure you finish up ALL SC questions in OG, Verbal review and if possible the question pack1. You can try other providers as well, Magoosh is good with SC and they have an online portal so you would be practicing under timed conditions.
3) Make sure you get ALL(or as many as possible) questions right on RC. This is the lowest hanging fruit that people miss out on. All the information is there, you cant go wrong too much on these questions. I used to get may be 1 question wrong on my mocks or during timed practice on RC. All you need is mental stamina. So read a few passages a day from the economist and Scientific American. Most of the passages that I noticed were in the following categories
a) Biological facts/organisms and their behavior.
b) History of Womens rights in Europe and America.
c) Cosmological phenomenons, planet formations, stars.
d) Economic theory, labor movements etc.

If you find any article on any of these topic, read it as if you are sitting in a test and have to answer in next 2 mins. Read it with interest as if you have to narrate it to your friends and family about these facts. Once you read a few paras of each type you will feel confident in tackling these.

NB1234 wrote:Jaya
I can see that you have had a big jump from 28 to 34 on your verbal. You are not that far off from achieving 40. Here are the things I would advice
1) Note down the question types in SC.The easiest ones fall in the range of Subject verb agreement and parallelism. MGMAT is good for getting the basics right about SC. However, you need to practice. Make a target, say, 25 SC questions per day. Each day, practice 25 questions. Then analyze each answer, even if it is right. The answer explanations for the SC questions in OG are pretty good. Once you read ALL answer explanations(including the ones you get right) you will feel confident in approaching new questions. Trust me on that.
2) Practice questions from a variety of sources. Get as many questions as you can. OG is the #1 resource for verbal so make sure you finish up ALL SC questions in OG, Verbal review and if possible the question pack1. You can try other providers as well, Magoosh is good with SC and they have an online portal so you would be practicing under timed conditions.
3) Make sure you get ALL(or as many as possible) questions right on RC. This is the lowest hanging fruit that people miss out on. All the information is there, you cant go wrong too much on these questions. I used to get may be 1 question wrong on my mocks or during timed practice on RC. All you need is mental stamina. So read a few passages a day from the economist and Scientific American. Most of the passages that I noticed were in the following categories
a) Biological facts/organisms and their behavior.
b) History of Womens rights in Europe and America.
c) Cosmological phenomenons, planet formations, stars.
d) Economic theory, labor movements etc.

If you find any article on any of these topic, read it as if you are sitting in a test and have to answer in next 2 mins. Read it with interest as if you have to narrate it to your friends and family about these facts. Once you read a few paras of each type you will feel confident in tackling these.