Please help with GMAT course of action

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blemming: Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts; Posts: 14; Joined: Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:23 pm

by blemming » Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:27 pm

Hey all,

I graduated from the College of William and Mary in 2008 with a major in English and a minor in Sociology. So, yes, I'm going to get completely handled by the quantitative section for a few months.

I went out and picked up the Official Guide to the GMAT (12th ed.)

That said I see that the Manhattan books also come highly recommended.

What books should I read first? I took the assessment in the OG guide and scored quite miserably in most sections, aside from the qualitative bit, but even there I only pulled out average scores. I'm very dedicated, eager to learn, and put myself in new, unfamiliar waters. But, I'm also very anal, and I want to go about this methodically.

Suggestions? Which book to start with?

Last edited by blemming on Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Source: Beat The GMAT — GMAT Strategy | Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:27 pm

papgust: Community Manager; Posts: 1537; Joined: Mon Aug 10, 2009 6:10 pmFollowed by: 252 members; Thanked: 653 times

by papgust » Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:54 pm

To start with your quants, first make sure that you are strong with basics. If you are not confident, i would suggest you to spend some time with your high school maths. Or you could get all 8 strategy guides of Manhattan GMAT 4th edition. However, i'm not sure how far these strategy guides are good at strengthening your basics. I currently own only MGMAT Number properties guide of Quants and this particular guide is great!

With verbal, get a Powerscore CR bible if you are not confident in CR. Although this book is meant only for CR, it also helps in RC in some way. For sentence correction, MGMAT Sentence Correction guide is the best! But as you have majored in English, i believe you could spend little less time in verbal than in quants.

Good luck with your prep!

blemming: Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts; Posts: 14; Joined: Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:23 pm

Thanks

by blemming » Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:02 pm

Thanks Papgust,

Would you suggest I put the OG guide off until I am first familiar with the basics?

If the Manhattan's won't help with the basics, what do you suggest?

papgust: Community Manager; Posts: 1537; Joined: Mon Aug 10, 2009 6:10 pmFollowed by: 252 members; Thanked: 653 times

by papgust » Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:13 pm

For quants, until you are strong in basics, i would suggest you to not only put off practicing OG problems but also any other source's problems (MGMAT, Kaplan, Princeton Review etc.). Do not straight away start practicing GMAT problems unless you are confident in basics.

I believe that any high school maths will always help in building our foundations well. So if MGMAT guides doesn't help you with basics, search for your high school maths book or get a new one and start working on it. This will definitely help!

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