GMAT Strategy

Hi All,

I have been preparing for the GMAT from Aug 2012 and am mediocre in both quant and verbal.

Here is a list of my GMAT scores so far

GMAT prep 1#1-June 2012-530 q36 v26
GMAT prep 1#2-Aug 2012-470 q37 v19
GMAT prep 2#1-Nov 2012-560 q39 v28
MGMAT CAT 1 -Dec 2012-590 q39 v33

I was not serious until aug 2012 so I consider having studied only for around 4 months now.
My goal is to see a 100 point improvement so that my target score is 630 when I take the test in Feb 2013.I study for 1-2 hrs on weekdays and 3-4 hrs on weekends with one day rest a week.After putting 3+ months of effort studying the theory and understanding the concepts my score has improved only by 60 points.Although I am happy at the improvement I am not yet satisfied.Have started working OG12 questions from Nov last week only.Have completed 30 questions in each of the sections except DS.
My weakest area is DS in Quant and CR in Verbal.

Queries:

1)When I take the next test on Dec 16 2012,11 days from now,I plan to get 620.I am not sure whether i have to improve in verbal or quant.Although Quant seems to be the weakest of the two i feel it would be better if I concentrate on my strength which is verbal and try improving to a V36,so that a V36 Q39 would give me a 620.What are your thoughts on this???
Should I improve my Verbal or quant to get 620 on Dec 16 2012?? or

2)should I postpone my MGMAT#2 to a date later than Dec16 2012??

3)How should I go about achieving 620 on dec 16??-should I revisit theory or is practise sufficient??

Adding my MGMAT 1 assessment report as attachment.

Any input is highly appreciated.

Hi

I would say that you should put more efforts for practicing the full time tests rather than learning any further concepts. Practicing will increase your speed which will help you with better scores. Learning at this stage, may not be that fruitful.
Also, during practice tests, the Qs you get wrong, just analyze and practice such questions.

You can also read my blog for more details - gmatexecmba.blocked

You need to make a list of question types that cause you problems most often and either try to improve your performance or use the informed guessing strategy. Keep track not only of questions that you have solved incorrectly but also of the ones that take you the longest to crack.

How are you studying? I had a friend who was really disappointed with her score the first time around. She scored either high 500s or low 600s. And the problem was... she was focused on whether things were right or wrong. Rather than why things were right or wrong. We don't just do problems to do problems. We do them to learn. When we review each problem, we should be asking ourselves:

1. Why did I get this problem right or wrong?
2. What concepts are involved in the problem?
3. If I got it wrong, why did I get it wrong?
4. If I could it right, are there other ways I could have solved this problem? Were the faster?

Then go and figure out how you would explain the problem to someone else. Type out an explanation. It's one thing to think you know how to do a problem. To actually explain it requires you to put the concepts into a solid concrete form in your mind. You might struggle with this last step, but it'll be worth it.

Best of luck! Let me know if you have any other questions.
Riprop

Hi buzz,kazia and riprop,

thanks for your suggestions.I am working on them.

I have started working on the OG 12 and here are my stats for the verbal section

Topic No. of questions solved Accuracy
Reading Comprehension 55 74%
Critical Reasoning 55 73%
Sentence Correction 64 71%

Are these stats OK for the easier section of the OG 12.I have heard that questions get tougher after this level.what do you suggest??

1)should I revisit SC,CR again??I still have not read the Advanced SC part from the MGMAT guides nor the idiom section.do you suggest me to read them before attempting any more questions??

2)I have not covered the Powerscore book only upto Assumption questions??Do you guys suggest me to cover the entire book before proceeding any further??

Now, I will present my math stats,

Topic no. of questions Accuracy

PS 64 77%
DS 34 62%

How to go about improving my DS accuracy.if i score so poorly in the first 34 questions then you can imagine how poor i am at DS.Pl suggest tips to improve DS.

Thanks a lot for your inputs so far.