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It is wise to self-study before my Veritas Prep Course?

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It is wise to self-study before my Veritas Prep Course?

by xcel730 » Mon Feb 28, 2011 9:13 am
Hello All,

I've been contemplating about going to grad school for some time. A few weeks ago, I decided to at least give the GMAT a shot. If I do well, then I could re-evaluate my options to go to grad school. I've scheduled to take the GMAT on 5/14.

Anyway, a few weeks ago, I signed up to take a Veritas class (in person) that will start on 3/12 and end on 4/23. At the same time, I started self-studying with the Manhattan GMAT books that my friend gave me. From your perspective, is this a wise thing to do? I don't want to just waste time and not study while waiting for the Veritas prep course to begin. However, I also don't want to get stuck with some bad habits that I may develop along the way. Should I just wait and do nothing at the meantime or just go through the books and learn what I can learn on my own to get a head start?

Thanks
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by Ashish321 » Mon Feb 28, 2011 9:20 am
xcel730 wrote:Hello All,

I've been contemplating about going to grad school for some time. A few weeks ago, I decided to at least give the GMAT a shot. If I do well, then I could re-evaluate my options to go to grad school. I've scheduled to take the GMAT on 5/14.

Anyway, a few weeks ago, I signed up to take a Veritas class (in person) that will start on 3/12 and end on 4/23. At the same time, I started self-studying with the Manhattan GMAT books that my friend gave me. From your perspective, is this a wise thing to do? I don't want to just waste time and not study while waiting for the Veritas prep course to begin. However, I also don't want to get stuck with some bad habits that I may develop along the way. Should I just wait and do nothing at the meantime or just go through the books and learn what I can learn on my own to get a head start?

Thanks
If you have already signed up for the Veritas Course , i believe that you would have the option to collect the Study material beforehand as well. Also , you would have the access to the On-Demand Course . So , before you begin with your In-Class Course , you can go through the Video Lessons and the structure of the Material . I think that will prepare you well before the class begins
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by Brian@VeritasPrep » Mon Feb 28, 2011 11:04 am
Hey xcel,

It's great to hear that we'll be working with you! As you prepare for your class, I definitely think it's useful (and highly recommended) to complete the "Lesson Zero" Math Essentials book and companion On Demand lessons. We offer those as pre-course, independent study lessons so that students are up to speed on calculations-by-hand and fundamental math theory before class begins, so that you can better focus your attention on GMAT math strategy and concepts and not merely on trying to catch up on what you used to know back in junior high. If you have the time, please take the pre-test in the front of that book and then visit the relevant sections that the test indicates you'll want to go back and review.

As Ashish also mentioned (thanks, Ashish!), we do have the entire course available to you in the On Demand version and in your books. I'd caution you - for the reasons you mentioned about not wanting to develop bad habits - against trying to plow through entire modules and lessons before class begins; your 7-week program will allow you to master two lessons per week with your instructor's guidance, so it's not really necessary to go through those lessons ahead of time, and in some cases you'll either start to apply strategies inefficiently and build some bad habits, or you'll just "lose the lesson" ahead of time. As a teacher, I'm a huge fan of some of the embedded lessons within those books that are best taught when you go in blindly so that you're apt to make a mistake that we can show you - if you've browsed through the lesson you may not be as receptive to the "reveal" in the lesson.

However, if you have the time and nervous energy that makes you want to do something before class starts, I think there's some value in previewing sections of the initial math lessons just so that you're familiar with the pure content; if people do ever feel behind early on in the course it's typically because the math moves quickly for them based on years and years of inattention to math calculations, so it's not a bad idea to get comfortable enough with some of the basics like fractions, linear algebra, etc. that it's not intimidating when we start dissecting it in a GMAT context during class.

We're looking forward to getting to work in a couple weeks!

Cheers,
Brian
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by xcel730 » Mon Feb 28, 2011 11:48 am
Ashish321 / Brian,

Thank you for your replies.

Brian, hopefully we will cross path within the next few weeks.

So far, I've went through math book 0 and completed the diagnostic problems. I didn't get all the questions correct, so I'll definitely review my errors in more details before class begins. From Veritas' recommendation, the only thing that's left for me to do before class is to take the first test. I've committed myself to doing so this upcoming Sunday.

Regarding the Veritas on-demand lessons. Initially, I wanted to preview ALL of them before class started. I did go through Lesson 1 and 2, but decided to stop. The reason is that I'm afraid I may NOT pay attention in class because I've already previewed the lesson.

I guess I'm trying to determine whether I should just relax for the next couple of weeks and spend quality time with my family or spend additional time studying myself a slight edge in the study curve. The way I've been approaching the MGMAT books is that I go through them fairly quickly ... retain whatever comes naturally to me, jot down anything are critical, and skip whatever concepts I have troubles with.

Brian, as mentioned in my original post, I'm scheduled to take the GMAT on 5/14. Since the Veritas course ends on 4/23, I have approximately 3 weeks before the actual exam. From your assessment, do you think 3 weeks is sufficient amount of time? I'm sure it varies from individuals, but my goal is to get 700+. Academically, I've done fairly decent. I got a cumulative 3.7 GPA from Boston University, but I graduated about 10 years ago.


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by Brian@VeritasPrep » Mon Feb 28, 2011 12:22 pm
Hey xcel,

Sounds like you're on the right track! And, honestly, I'm glad to hear you say that about the On Demand lessons...like I said, if the in-class lessons feel like review for whatever reason or you already know some of the letter-choice answers (even if you don't fully get the theory behind them) I think there may be a tendency to be less bought into the lesson overall. There are certain questions in the lesson that I want you to get wrong and be totally lost on...there's an old saying that you can learn a lot more from a few seconds of pain than from a few hours of glory. Certain questions just lend themselves so well to lessons-learned!

So if you're done with the Math Essentials book, the only other thing I'd recommend is to browse a few more math problems here and there just in the interest of making GMAT math skills a little more second-nature. We'll hit the heavy strategy and some content reinforcement in class, so it's by no means "necessary", but I do think that familiarity-with-math is a great place to direct some of your nervous energy.

As far as the timeline, I've always figured that 3 weeks is about the perfect recommendation I'd make for how long to take the test after the 7-week course. I think if you have 3 weekends between the end of class and your test that gives you time to take at least one practice test per week and to learn from those tests about pacing, particular question types or concept areas that are giving you more trouble than you anticipated, etc. Much more time than that and I think there's a definite tendency for people to procrastinate or just fall out of practice with the core concepts (e.g. spending two full weeks on combinatorics problems and losing some of the more-universal algebra and number properties skills that you had been so in-tune with). Much less time than that and you may not have a ton of time to react to a practice test that tells you that you really need to pick up the pace on the quant section, or that you're falling into way too many Data Sufficiency traps when you're thinking quickly under timed conditions.

So right now I think your plan is about as solid as it can be. Definitely keep us posted!
Brian Galvin
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Veritas Prep

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by xcel730 » Mon Feb 28, 2011 1:14 pm
Thank you Brian for your detailed responses. I'm very eager to take the classes next week :)

I'll keep you guys posted with my progress.
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by txjustin » Wed Mar 02, 2011 10:59 am
I absolutely suggest studying before the Veritas course. I didn't and was behind the whole time. I'm actually contemplating retaking the course.
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by David@VeritasPrep » Fri Mar 04, 2011 7:07 pm
TXJustin -

As you might know...All Veritas students are welcome to join a second course. We don't refer to it as "retaking" because students do not have to prove anything (with some other companies your score has to have not improved or you have to show that you attended every session). We know that people get busy or have something come up or just feel like they would benefit from taking the course again. So no questions asked!
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by txjustin » Sun Mar 06, 2011 5:59 pm
Thanks David. I am not sure whether I am going to retake it or not. I'll see where I'm at the end of April to see if I'm going to retake in May. I'm just the type of learner that needs to go over everything several times before it sinks in.
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