Need Strategy to prepare with MGMAT Quant. Books–Please he

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Hello All,

First a little background, I took GMAT round 1 on 05/01/10 and scored a 460:
Verbal: 27 / 42%
Quantitative: 26 /18%
Total: 460 / 24%
Analytical Writing: 4.5 / 37%

I need something around 500 - 560. I've registered to take GMAT round 2 on July 3rd (the latest my B-school will let me take it for fall admissions) so I have about a month left (and I'm getting nervous again!!!)
I purchased the MGMAT Quant. set a couple of weeks ago and had been reviewing the larger Quant. Fundamentals books the last week or so. I was doing well on the book, but it was very time consuming, so I've transitioned over the Numbers Properties and am about half way through in about 5-6 days, am on Ch. 6 as of today. I've been taking notes and doing the Problem sets at the end of each chapter and doing well on them. The downside of taking notes is that it's VERY time consuming.

Here's what I haven't been done since taking round 1 (and why I'm probably getting nervous again):
- Haven't taken another practice exam
- Have done at any Quant. Problems in either the 12th Edition or Green Quant. Book that came with the MGMAT set.
- Haven't done any verbal stuff since I did decent on the Verbal section of the exam.
I've been spending 2-3 hours on the weekdays and 6-8 hours a day on weekends studying the math stuff, so it's not that I haven't been studying. I think I'm just not studying the right way.

Sorry for the long post, I'm just getting really nervous again. I know I have time, 31 days and counting, but I want to use
it as wisely as possible. Any help / suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
P

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by LoveTheGMAT » Wed Jun 02, 2010 7:32 pm
Hey
First of all, don't be nervous. The material you have is capable of getting you 35-40 on Quant with decent amount of work (with a lot of effort, you can push it to 45-48). With your verbal of 27, you need the following Quant scores to get the following total scores:
Q33: 500
Q35: 520
Q37: 540
Q39: 560

So, the material you have is good. MGMAT's Quant material is excellent. As for the notes, its good to make some notes, but I wouldn't spend too much time on making notes as much as doing quant problems and reviewing them 2-3 times EACH. Notes are more helpful for verbal section. Instead, highlight the book (you might not be able to sell them, but who cares? $100 mean nothing in life). So highlight and go back to those books and review the highlighted parts.

Doing In Action problems is god, but since you don't have too much time, I would suggest doing last 5 problems of each chapters (as they are more difficult ones). If you get them right, you are ready to move. If not, then do a few more from that chapter.

More importantly, do the problems from OG because they are like what you will see on the test day. Again, since you don't have too much time, maybe do last 50 problems of PS and DS first and see how you do. But make sure you UNDERSTAND the problems well. As MGMAT puts it: "the goal is not exposure, but mastery". Do less problems if you don't have time, but MASTER them.

I suggest buying MGMAT's OG Companion. 1) They give some good explanation of questions from OG that are not explained very well. 2) Use MGMAT's OG Tracker which comes with OG Companaion. I started using it,, it really helps. It will tell you where you need to spend time studying. So do last 50 problems from each section and input that data and look at that stats. Wherever you need help, read those guides and then re-do those problems.

You can really improve a lot on quant considering which level you are at and the material you have. If you didn't have MGMAT's material, then I would be nervous. But you can do it! Keep you head up!

Last but not least, do 5 CR and 5 SC problems a day so you don't drop on Verbal.

Goodluck