I posted my score a few days earlier and promised to post detailed debrief. I am very sorry that it took so long to write debrief.
For me various posts on different forums were extremely useful and I would like to share my views, strategies and experience with others. I will try to make this debrief as useful as I can.
Prep strategy
GMAT is awesome. I enjoyed the preparation from very beginning and recommend everybody to do that. Enjoy your preparation, don't hate it. By enjoying, not by hating, you will be able to prepare efficiently and productively. As Ursula once said, treat the GMAT as an opportunity, not as an obstacle, to your future.
I began my preparation at the end of September and took the GMAT on April 1. You may think that I prepared for more than 6 months, but actually my preparation took me at most 3 months and I suspended my preparation for several times within this 6-month period. At the beginning my Quantitive skill was good, but my Verbal skill was literally awful! Therefore, I think, this preparation strategy is useful for those whose major weakness in Verbal overall and SC, CR, and RC in particular
.I studied Quant for the first two weeks and nothing special here. I studied what I had without any order or plan, but I did not read Kaplan, PR, MGMAT, or any other comprehensive review book. I mainly solved question to get into the format of the GMAT Quant.
My verbal prep took me about 2-3 months. You cannot imagine how much I improved. I remember spending about 15 minutes to read an RC passage from LSAT official tests and another 15 minutes to answer 7-8 questions. Now I can read typical (though not LSAT) RC passage in 3-4 minutes and answer a question in less than a minute. I had to work hard in order to improve my verbal from below 30 to above 40. I actually expected to get 45 on Verbal but I think I got my fair score. I will explain this later.
Quant
Initially I knew all the concepts needed to ace the Quant section. The only thing to do was to review these concepts and to learn how to avoid pitfalls. I solved a lot of hard questions and by the end I was totally familiar what kind of questions and what kind of tricks I was going to see on the GMAT. The only advice I can give here is to learn all the concepts that you are unfamiliar and to practice. Knowing the concepts is not so difficult, what is difficult is to get these concepts work fast and properly. I may recommend here MGMAT series on Quant. Though I did not do them I think they are good for those who lack Quant skills. Still I cannot guarantee. If you are good at basics you may learn from explanations of hard questions. By the way, I did not see any probability question on the GMAT, but I remember seeing permutation & combination questions.
Resources on Quant:
https://www.urch.com/forums/just-finishe ... v51-4.html
Verbal
This is the nasty part of the GMAT (at least for me and for most non-native speakers). Previously I thought that it is very difficult to improve verbal skills. I would not work so hard to improve verbal if I did not believe that high score is quite beatable. I believed that high score is possible because my acquaintance scored quite well and he has the same background as I have. He scored 770 (q50 v45) and is now studying at the business school that many can only dream about. He proved me that improvement in verbal is quite possible though it takes a lot of hard work. He inspired me to try and try hard. For those who are hopeless at verbal this is very valuable and insightful material. Here is the link to his debriefs:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/770-q50-v45- ... 31620.html
Reading Comprehension
At first I thought this is the most difficult question type in Verbal section. I was afraid of RC and thought that I will lack time on Verbal because of my slow reading speed. So I started Verbal preparation from RC. First I did OG questions. My time per question on RC was more than permissible.
Then I moved to LSAT question and did RC passages of more than 25 official LSAT tests (more than 100 passages). I strongly recommend LSAT passages because their difficulty level is a great deal more than that of the GMAT passages. LSAT tests were very useful in improving my verbal score. You may at first not notice improvement, but on the real exam you will really be confident and convenient with RC if you do LSAT passages. LSAT passages helped me more than OG passages: OG passages are good for becoming familiar what you are going to see on the exam, but they do not provide necessary amount and necessary difficulty for great improvement. Some high scorers said that RC affects your verbal score more than CR or SC (I think they are right), so, if they are right, the most useful material that you should do to improve your verbal is LSAT RC!
The other thing I should note about RC preparation is speed reading. If you are not a speed reader you must do speed reading exercises. Without this it is hard to cope with your verbal timing. All my friends who took the GMAT say that they could not complete verbal in time. They all lacked time on Verbal section. So you must pay attention to your reading speed. Moreover, it is useful not only for RC but also for CR, SC and even Quant timing. Certainly do speed reading exercises: get rid of your subvocalization and regression.
The other thing to improve your RC is simply to read. Read a lot. Read when you are bored with Quant problems, CR or SC. I read the Economist. You may choose one of internationally renowned publications such as Wall Street Journal, Economist etc. I read one article a day learning all the new words and understanding all the details. This helped me to enrich my vocabulary and improve my comprehension. Additionally I read four articles a day with maximum speed. I did not know every word and did not fully understand the details and, sometimes, even the whole concept. This exercise helped me to improve my speed and comprehension greatly. I did not do these exercises regularly but nevertheless they were very useful.
Reading Comprehension Resources:
https://www.urch.com/forums/gmat-reading ... -read.html
https://www.beatthegmat.com/general-stra ... n-t76.html
https://www.beatthegmat.com/tips-for-imp ... d-t77.html
Critical Reasoning
IMO this question type does not cause much trouble to most of test takers. I will list the materials that I think were most useful:
1. PowerScore the GMAT CR bible (or LSAT LR bible, I actually read the latter). This is the most comprehensive and detailed book. After reading this you should have no concept issues. This book is not only useful for CR, it is also very for you RC skills: you will know how to approach tough RC questions, you will use Fact Test when you are stuck between two very close questions.
2. LSAT LR (CR). LSAT LR tests are much more difficult and much more logical than the GMAT CR tests. Though they test some concepts (e.g. Formal Logic) that are not tested on the GMAT, LSAT tests are very useful. They make you very logical and prepare you to the toughest the GMAT CR's. I did LR (Logical Reasoning, LSAT name of GMAT CR) questions of about 15 LSAT tests (30 CR sections with 25-27 questions each).
3. OG's. No need to accent their importance. You should try to solve all the questions in them at least once. They are very useful and very representative: the real test will be similar and of the same difficulty.
Sentence Correction
This is the part in which I probably did the worst in the exam. You may learn the rules, idioms, but if you are not native speaker and if you have not a lot of experience in English, SC is a problem. My last three verbal scores on GMATPrep were 46 and 47, but on the real exam I scored only 42. I think a lot of people took GMATPrep exams and noted the rules and idioms on GMATPrep. Before I took GMATPrep I read their notes and knew beforehand the rules. Therefore I scored good and thought that real the GMAT will test limited set of idioms. On the real exam I encountered several questions testing idioms I have never seen before. So if your experience in English is not so profound expect to see new idioms. The most useful thing in solving SC questions were "generic" rules, rules that you can use everywhere, such as comparison, misplaced modifier etc. I saw only one question that tested idiom that I knew. I solved all the other questions using these generic rules. Learn idioms, remember them, especially very common ones, but allocate more time to learn and internalize basic generic rules! Be expert at finding misplaced modifier, agreement etc. problems.
- MGMAT SC Guide is very useful book for introduction, but is very limited for comprehensive practice. The chapter about agreement is very useful and sufficient: you only need to internalize these rules.
- SC Module from ETS (Educational Training Services, NOT Educational Testing Services). It is very good book covering rules and concepts. I strongly recommend it.
- OG questions and explanations. They, along with GMATPrep questions, are the best questions and explanations you can get on the GMAT SC. I read all the explanations and took notes. You should solve every OG SC question at least twice and read all the explanations (OG12, 11, 10; two OG Verbal Reviews also if you can) at least once, write down important rules and learn them by heart.
- 1000 SC questions. They are very useful for practice: you will be very good at using "generic" rules after solving so many tests. But there are some ambiguous questions. Nevertheless I strongly recommend them.
- Forum explanations. They are very useful and insightful. Especially explanations by 800Bob and GIN are quite worth reading. If you are attentive to rules in every question and look for rules even when the question does not test this very rule you will find many ambiguities in OG, but explanations by 800Bob and GIN make these ambiguities fairly clear. I did not read all of the explanations, but I am convinced that everybody must read them to learn the advanced concepts of SC. They give information about some exceptional rules and very nitpicky parts of SC.
PDF notes: They are useful for building the basis for concepts, but you should check the rules from OG question and explanations: they are not always correct.
Sentence Correction Resources:
My SC notes - will upload them later
Forum explanations and PDF notes - they are everywhere: BeatTheGMAT, TestMagic, GMATClub ...
Timing
Timing is crucial as are the concepts. If your timing is poor you have a problem! But this problem CAN be terminated. All my friends who took the GMAT said that they could not complete verbal section in the given time constraint, and they said that it is natural to be out of time on the GMAT Verbal. It is a big problem that makes a high score impossible. So I tried to improve my timing and I did. On the GMAT I controlled the time, not that time controlled me. What should you do to improve your timing?
- First, record the time of every single question you solve! I think everybody is familiar with fantastic TestGrid Excel File that shows you time spent on every question. This stuff is very useful: you will always observe your timing trend and improvement. Solve every question with this document. Now I have all the tests I solved recorded on copies of TestGrid, I know the results of every test I took, every question I solved.
- When you learn some concept, at the beginning try not to hurry and fully understand its usage. After becoming somehow familiar with the concept speed yourself. Make yourself solve questions faster.
- Improve your reading speed. All you need to do this is given above.
- Manage your anxiety. All my friends who took the GMAT said that they were very nervous during the exam and they had to read passages twice or three times: they were so nervous that their comprehension fell dramatically. I will write all I know about anxiety management later in this post.
Anxiety
Anxiety was not a problem for me: I am rarely nervous. But I think you may find the following debrief useful. The author of this debrief points a few good views about the test at the end of the debrief:
See "One useful strategy" uploaded on this post.
Anxiety is horrible: you understand that it is harmful, but you are more nervous as you understand this.
- I think you can get rid of your anxiety by undermining the importance of the GMAT. You should regard it as very tiny unremarkable point in your life without which you will not be so unlucky. Treat the GMAT as temporary stuff with temporary results; in the long run it is nothing more than nothing! How right was GIN when he said that the GMAT Is Nothing!
- Next, you should not aim at unreally high score. Aim at the score that you are confident to get! This is very important; actually I should have put this point to the first. If you are aiming at 750 whereas you are not confident about getting 700, you will naturally be nervous, very nervous. Don't aim above your head!
- If you are believer believe that what God wants will occur and what he does not want will not. So why should you worry about that?! Just do what you can, do your best, prepare as well as you can, and then leave it to God to decide your score!
- If you are not believer maybe you have reason to worry, but it is not a good idea to do everything for which you have reason!
Motivation & Proper Prep Strategy
To ace the GMAT you need motivation and good prep strategy, if you have these two you will almost certainly ace the GMAT! The first thing you need is motivation. There are several sources of motivation: learning about business schools, career opportunities they offer, etc., and, the one I used, reading debriefs by top scorers and learning from them! I read a lot of debriefs: from Twinsplitter, GIN, Ursula, pixel, Archangel and from many others whose name I don't remember, But their advises are really useful and remember them. I remember GIN, a guy from Bangladesh, who failed once (scoring 710 which is success many of us!) and then after several years scored 780; I remember Twinsplitter, a gut from California with excellent Verbal skills, who aced the GMAT scoring 790 and became a legend on TestMagic with an excellent debrief... I strongly advise everybody to read debriefs and learn from the strategies of top scorers. It is hard to develop good strategy independently and ace the GMAT - the direct way to high score is to learn from others and to take the best from their experience. One good thing about advices is that they do not become out of date (if they are not written before 2000), one bad thing about advices is that they are rare, so you must search for them from archives. I have a bundle of them:
Debriefs
The next thing you need to ace the GMAT is a good prep strategy, study plan. Without that you will not be able to get a high score. Where do you get a good prep strategy? You get it 50% from your own experience and 50% from top scorers' experience. But initially, when you have no, or at most very little, experience you get it 100% from others' advices.
Good strategy is recommended by Twinsplitter: Prepare for Quant, Prepare for Verbal weakness, prepare for your normal area in Verbal, prepare for your Verbal strength, and then take full-length tests. Read his debrief for details of the strategy, it is very useful. I followed this strategy almost strictly. What I did not follow was time allocation: I spent a little more time than 2-3-2-1-2 weeks for the above mentioned preparation. But I am strongly convinced that this time allocation is the best possible: if you spend more you will waste your time and efficiency, if you spend less you will not reach your potential capacity. So, I strongly recommend you to prepare for the GMAT no more than 3 months! I know from my own experience that reading a book (e.g. PowerScore CR bible) in a week will be much more efficient and yield more result than this same book in two weeks. If you spend more time a day on one thing your concentration is much greater and the outcome is more desirable. If you spend an hour a day for preparation each day, when you finish the book you will not remember the beginning! Therefore, try to put yourself in strict limits and devote as much time for preparation as possible. Study intensively. There were several periods in which I studied intensively, and I think I improved most during this part of my preparation. For example, I finished LSAT RC's in two week period, I read PowerScore LSAT LR bible in less than a week. Try to allocate your time so that you can be completely engaged in preparation.
If you are strong at Quant and weak at Verbal you may wish to follow this strategy:
Quant:
- Do OG's
- Do tough questions from forums
RC:
- Do OG's
- Do LSAT RC's
CR:
- Do OG's
- Read PowerScore CR bible
- Do LSAT LR's
SC:
- Do Manhattan SC Guide
- Do Module SC from ETS
- Do OG's
- Do 1000 SC's
Final Prep:
- Do Sets (I didn't do them, but I think they are good for getting used to the test format)
- Do GMATPrep (you may reinstall and take them even three times)
The order of the Verbal preparation may differ, but I think Quant should be put to the first and SC should be put to the last place: Quant is easy to remember, while SC rules may easily be forgotten.
Other Prep Materials:
GMATPrep: This software includes the best practice tests available. You can take each test twice or three times. Only few questions will be repeated. I remember GIN saying that he took GMATPrep every day in order to see as many official SC questions as possible. Take each test at least twice. Your GMATPrep score is very accurate predictor of your real score if there are no or few repetitions. Use GMATPrep wisely - try to take them at the end, but before seeing GMATPrep questions on forums or anywhere else.
Manhattan GMAT Quant Reviews: I think they are useful for basic concepts. But if you want to learn advanced concepts and techniques you should learn from solving hard questions and from explanations.
Module CR, RC, Quant: A friend of mine strongly recommends them.
Other 1000 series: 1000 RC is good for practice, but I didn't solve it. The beginning of 1000 CR was awful, I think you don't need 1000 CR, all you need is PowerScore, LSAT and OG's.
Forums: Explanations by Erin, 800Bob, GIN, etc are very insightful. Though I did not read them I recommend to read.
Kaplan: I don't recommend any material by Kaplan, they are completely different from real GMAT. Don't refer to materials that go to far from Official sources.
Princeton, Arco, Cracking, etc.: Didn't even look at them. I don't remember anyone recommending any of them, so I think you should stay away.
Test experience
My target was 51 on Quant, 45 on Verbal and 770 overall. OK, I will follow the tradition:
Quant
Good day: 51
Average day: 51
Bad day: 50
Verbal
Good day: >45
Average day: 44-45
Bad day: <44
AWA: I didn't have any targets here
I did not prepare for AWA and became familiar with its format just two days before the test. I wrote one essay and found out that my AWA was awful! I became a little nervous about that although I knew that AWA does not affect anything. A day before the test I was still nervous, went to bed early at 9, but I woke up at 1 am and could not sleep until 3. Overall I slept about five hours before the test. It was less than I planned but I did not care because I knew that it would not affect my concentration and test taking ability.
I was still a little bit nervous. I arrived at test center on time, but there was a problem with network. But soon the problem was solved and I began the test. By that I was no more nervous. I was totally calm! I thought that I will destroy my AWA score but I did well and wrote both essays in time.
After a break I began Quant. Here I was very careful because I knew how tricky traps may GMAC present. I detected several traps and I think because of this I was able to score 51. Finished Quant 10 minutes in advance and was totally satisfied with my performance on Quant.
After break I started Verbal with good concentration. CR's were easy except for two at the end. I solved them with certainty. At the end I had two CR's with two very close answers. I evaluated answers and chose the ones that seemed to be better. In fact, the answers were not so close, simply I could not eliminate one of them and the other one was obviously superior for me. I chose that superior one.
RC went quite smooth. I answered almost every question with confidence. I had one or two questions with two really close answers. Here I analyzed word by word, as GIN has suggested, or, in other words, used Fact Test (read PowerScore for explanation), and then picked the answer that passed the test. I am sure that I did no more than one mistake on RC part. Contrary to my expectation RC was the easiest part for me mainly because of preparing with LSAT RC passages.
I think I made most mistakes on SC. I saw new idioms, new constructions, and was stuck between two options in about four questions. I didn't expect such a novelty, so I think I got my fair score on Verbal. When I set my target to 45 I was misled by the illusion that my SC knowledge will be as relevant on real exam as it was on GMATPrep and other practice questions. I am totally satisfied with my verbal score.
At the beginning of Verbal section I mistakenly calculated that I was behind the time, but later I found out that I was spending just a little more than a minute per question. I was relieved and spent a lot of time on two CR's. By the end I had 10 minutes for 5 questions and finished 30 seconds before the time. In short, I controlled the time on Verbal section and finished in time.
Then I filld in personal information, chose to report my score and in a very short time saw my score:
760 99%
51 98%
42 95%
I expected the computer to calculate my score a little longer (If I'm not mistaken GIN said that he waited for about 3-4 minutes). I was surprised that q51 was 98th percentile; I remember it was 99th percentile.
Results
CAT's
GMATPrep1 600 (-) Oct 1-10
GMATPrep1 740 (q51v38) Dec 26
PowerPrep1 730 (q49v40) Jan 27
PowerPrep2 770 (q50v45) Jan 31
Kaplan CAT1 640 (q50v35) Feb 25-28
GMATPrep1 780 (q51v47) Mar 14
GMATPrep1 780 (q51v46) Mar 28
GMATPrep2 780 (q51v47) Mar 29
LSAT RC
Average accuracy: 84%
Average time: 2:35
LSAT CR
Average accuracy: 90.33%
Average time: 2:24
1000SC up to 640
Average accuracy: 86%
Average time: 0:59
I wish every test taker a score higher than what he is aiming at. Learn from others how to prepare and prepare thoroughly. I believe that everyone can get above 700 on GMAT, that 750 is achievable for most test takers through determination, endeavor and good study plan.
If anybody havew any question you are welcome to ask. I will do my best to answer
Regards,
Eldor
