time per one CR?

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time per one CR?

by towerSpider » Mon Feb 07, 2011 4:56 am
we all know that we should do CR questions timed but it's not as simple as diviing 75 by 41 because question types are different. in my practice, how much time should i give to one CR question? i have given 2 min so far, but i am thinking i might be making some mistake.
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by jaxis » Mon Feb 07, 2011 5:54 am
Try posting these questions in strategy section.

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by Brian@VeritasPrep » Mon Feb 07, 2011 1:35 pm
Hey towerSpider,

Good question - and especially good recognition that verbal is tricky on a pace-per-question front just because the question types are so different and require different investments of time.

Given that, there's definitely not a one-size-fits-all pacing strategy. I'm of the mind, though, that:

-Sentence Correction should be pretty quick for most of them as there really isn't much "work" to do. If you can solve most SC problems in around a minute, that's an extra 10 minutes or so that you can allocate to your ~1:45 per question for CR and RC.

-If you read effectively on the RC passages, many of the questions themselves can go pretty quickly as so many are "universal" and geared toward the main point of the passage or the author's intent.

-The biggest time-killer on the verbal section is "disengagement" in which you lose track of what you're reading and have to re-read. So I firmly believe that, at least in practice, you shouldn't overemphasize pure pacing on a stopwatch basis, but rather focus on methodology - what portions of each passage or question tend to be the most important? Which portions tend to bog you down? What are the fatal flaws in each answer choice? From there, that's where I think you can pick up speed, by focusing on what you know tends to always be important (the conclusion of a Strengthen or Weaken question; the transition statements like "however" and "furthermore" in RC passages, etc.) and not allowing yourself to be sucked in by what's not typically important (technical terms, etc.).

I doubt if that directly answers your question, but like you said the question types are so different that it's hard to say "this is exactly how it should be done". I do think that you should train yourself to make quick elimination decisions on SC problems and that's a huge first step, and then see if you can find patterns in the types of questions or passages that tend to give you trouble getting started. Verbal questions are both more accurately and more quickly solved with proper technique, so I'd hate to have you focus so much on pace that you don't get the benefits of both...
Brian Galvin
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Veritas Prep

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