HELP. Third time taking the exam

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HELP. Third time taking the exam

by spla626 » Thu Oct 24, 2013 3:36 am
Following instructions of Ron Purewal, I copy a private message sent to him in order to make the questions public.

Here is the message:

<I took my gmat on july 26 and got a 690 -q44 v40-. I took again today and, sadly, got a 680 (q42 v41). However, I am going to take the test again on November 19, because my last practice tests where 710 and 720 from the gmat prep new exams and I think I can beat the beast. I saw no repeats.

So I improved my verbal. I really think I cannot do more on that. As I said in a previous message, I (almost) only fail those questions in which some unknown words are critical or fundamental, and indeed I cannot guess the meaning. In this sense, I remember a SC question about the material which some planets are made. In this question, the underlined part began with a verb that I did not know and, additionally, the two precedent verbs -with which the underlined part had to be parallel- were also unknown for me. I cannot fight with this. My English is what it is. I wish the exam were in Spanish.

Actually, I think that my one of improvement comes from SC, my weakest area in verbal. And I think I must thank you again because I think the improvement comes from an advice you made: to read the correct sentence in a row to get the vibe of how gmat writes. In fact, I made a 15 page word archive with official correct answers to read them.

That being said, I messed absolutely in quant.

First, I messed it when I study quant. As the last time I took the exam I saw two probability questions and combination questions that I think I got wrong (at least 3 of them), this time I study hard these areas but I did not p ut too much attention in other easier areas, areas in which today I think I missed several questions -otherwise i would have seen more Prob and Comb questions-.

Second, I messed with the time devoted to quant. Keeping in mind that I have historically loved heavy books and texts, grammar and logical reasoning and not so much math, I devoted half of my time to each. Now I realize that I should not have done it this way; I should have devoted 80 % of the time to quant, as the ROI was much higher. I will not happen again.

Third, I disregarded my weaknesses -except prob and comb, areas in which I put a lot of time perhaps because I saw them as the most difficult and the ones that would give the victory-. I did not keep an error log, and I regret now for that. In fact, I think while I trained in order to defeat the best team of the league, I have been beaten by an average one.

I also think that I did have a proper rest the night before. I do not get so nervous at night because I am really used to stress. However, I did not rest the days before the exam. Every week I have a fatal deadline in my job as a lawyer and this time I had to work three weeks in a row, including the weekends. No single day of relax in almost one month. To study these lasts days, I had to stop working on my lawsuits and reports and begin with the gmat, putting no quality time. In fact, the day before the test -yesterday- I worked from 8 o'clock in the morning to 9 at night, just had a little dinner and went to sleep.
So I think I have some clues concerning what to do before my third, and absolutely last attempt. I short:

-Rest one week and then put a lot of effort for a month, till November 19, when I will take my exam again.

-Devote 80 % of the time to my weaknesses, starting with fundamentals, while using the rest of time to make my best better.

-Take the day before of my exam off and do nothing except playing videogames and watching documentaries -can you recommend one for me?-. While I think this is always important, it is really important in my case. I am a night owl, and in Barcelona, my city, the Gmat exam can only be taken at 9,15 in the morning, a time of the day when I do not work at 100 percent neither nearly. This makes that the day of the exam I have to wake up at 6 in order to have at least 3 hours awake before beginning the test. So if I have to work until 9 at night the day before, the result will be disastrous again.

-Keep an error log.

Do you have any idea? I know you always have good insights. In particular, I have realized that I am somehow slow in math -calculating-. I have been more than 10 years using calculator even for the easiest things -why should I make a silly mistake if the machine next to me can do the work?-.

I do not know what else I can do. It is hard to have been always one of the bests students/workers wherever I have been and now to be de stroyed by an exam. Sincerely, 680-690 is not bad, but, hell, is not close to be great. I know I am not like you or other geniuses that fly around the forums, but I want to give the last try.>

Thanks in advance

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by [email protected] » Thu Oct 24, 2013 11:20 am
Hi spla626,

Both of your GMAT scores are strong performances (just shy of the 90th percentile) and both are in range of your practice CAT performances. You're in position to apply to any Business School in the US and most Business Schools world-wide.

If you can answer a few questions, then I'd be happy to advise:
1) Other than pride, is there any specific reason why you're taking the GMAT again?
2) Where do you plan on applying to school?
3) When do you plan on applying?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
Contact Rich at [email protected]
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by lunarpower » Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:51 am
Warning: This reply is going to be spread out over several posts.
spla626 wrote:So I improved my verbal. I really think I cannot do more on that. As I said in a previous message, I (almost) only fail those questions in which some unknown words are critical or fundamental, and indeed I cannot guess the meaning. In this sense, I remember a SC question about the material which some planets are made. In this question, the underlined part began with a verb that I did not know and, additionally, the two precedent verbs -with which the underlined part had to be parallel- were also unknown for me. I cannot fight with this. My English is what it is. I wish the exam were in Spanish.
Schools know what is on the exam, and, presumably, they will also know that your native language is not English.

A 40+ verbal score from any candidate whose first language isn't English is seriously impressive. Your background will definitely be taken into account.


Actually, I think that my one of improvement comes from SC, my weakest area in verbal. And I think I must thank you again because I think the improvement comes from an advice you made: to read the correct sentence in a row to get the vibe of how gmat writes. In fact, I made a 15 page word archive with official correct answers to read them.
That's great. Yes, GMAC has a very particular "style", not unlike any human author. (In fact, I am willing to bet that GMAC has its own "stylebook" that details exactly how SC sentences should be written -- just as newspapers and magazines have stylebooks that dictate how articles should be written. Of course, if such a thing exists, there's no way we will ever get our hands on it.)
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by lunarpower » Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:51 am
First, I messed it when I study quant. As the last time I took the exam I saw two probability questions and combination questions that I think I got wrong (at least 3 of them), this time I study hard these areas but I did not p ut too much attention in other easier areas, areas in which today I think I missed several questions -otherwise i would have seen more Prob and Comb questions-.
^^ No.
The test regulates how many questions you see in each subject area. There is nothing "special" or "magical" about probability or combinatorics -- you'll see roughly one of each, regardless of how you are doing.
Second, I messed with the time devoted to quant. Keeping in mind that I have historically loved heavy books and texts, grammar and logical reasoning and not so much math, I devoted half of my time to each. Now I realize that I should not have done it this way; I should have devoted 80 % of the time to quant, as the ROI was much higher. I will not happen again.
When you say "the ROI was higher", what do you mean?
In conjunction with what you said directly before it, that statement surprises me. If you are more of a verbal person, I would think your "ROI" would have been better on verbal. So I'm curious what you mean.

Maybe you're just referring to the idea of "diminishing returns" -- i.e., if you are already better at thing X than at thing Y, then any unit of time spent on thing X (= the thing you're better at) will lead to less improvement than a comparable unit of time spent on thing Y.
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by lunarpower » Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:52 am
Third, I disregarded my weaknesses -except prob and comb, areas in which I put a lot of time perhaps because I saw them as the most difficult and the ones that would give the victory-.
No.
I really don't understand why everyone -- and I mean EVERYONE -- is obsessed with combinatorics and probability. They are just topics, like any other topics. They are not more important (or more "difficult") than other topics. They're just ... things that are there.

Where you should spend the MOST time -- perhaps even 100% of your time, if you are not doing these things on a regular basis -- is on alternative methods.
* In multiple choice: backsolving, plugging in your own numbers, and estimating answers.
* In data sufficiency: listing cases and testing them.

These things are MUCH more important than any single mathematical topic. No topic will appear in more than 1-2 questions. By contrast, you'll be able to do each of these things in several questions -- especially testing cases for DS, which may apply to as many as ten different questions on one exam.
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by lunarpower » Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:53 am
I also think that I did have a proper rest the night before. I do not get so nervous at night because I am really used to stress. However, I did not rest the days before the exam. Every week I have a fatal deadline in my job as a lawyer and this time I had to work three weeks in a row, including the weekends. No single day of relax in almost one month. To study these lasts days, I had to stop working on my lawsuits and reports and begin with the gmat, putting no quality time. In fact, the day before the test -yesterday- I worked from 8 o'clock in the morning to 9 at night, just had a little dinner and went to sleep.


You should get exactly the same amount of sleep you normally get.

If you don't normally get much sleep, then ... don't get much sleep.

Getting more than your usual amount of sleep is just as bad as getting less than that amount.
-Rest one week and then put a lot of effort for a month, till November 19, when I will take my exam again.
You should also rest for the LAST week. Don't do anything AT ALL on the last few days before the GMAT. Nada. Nothing.
-Devote 80 % of the time to my weaknesses, starting with fundamentals, while using the rest of time to make my best better.
This sounds like a decent plan -- as long as you count alternative methods you don't use very much as "weaknesses". If you spend all of your time studying math topics and neglect strategy, then you will have a very hard time improving your score.

In fact, here's something to think about. If you are scoring 42-44 in math, then, most likely, you already know all of the math you will ever need for this exam.
At that level, your improvement will consist ENTIRELY of
* better ORGANIZATION (especially on word problems and DS problems)
* better FOCUS (= ALWAYS having a goal for what you are doing, and NEVER doing random work without a clear purpose)
* FLEXIBLE THINKING (= being equally good at, and equally comfortable with, both "traditional" methods and "alternative" methods)

In fact, my advice to you is "Don't study mathematics at all anymore." It's probably going to be a waste of time.

Here's an analogy: Let's say you have to take a biology test ... in French.
* How much French do you have to study? Well, enough to understand the questions and to write responses to them ... but really not much more. Beyond that point of basic competency, studying more French will accomplish nothing whatsoever.
* How much biology do you have to study? Well, lots. It's a biology test.

In this analogy, "French" is mathematics. Mathematics is the "language" in which the quant section is written, but isn't what the quant section is really testing.
In terms of mathematics, all you need to know is enough math to understand the questions. For the most part, that's your math from early high school and before.

"Biology" is ORGANIZATION, FOCUS, and FLEXIBLE THINKING.
Once you have achieved basic competency in math, you should spend at least 99% of your time studying these things, because these things are what the quant section actually tests (unless you are scoring at a very low level, which you aren't).
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by lunarpower » Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:54 am
-Take the day before of my exam off and do nothing except playing videogames and watching documentaries -can you recommend one for me?-
Take more than one day off.

As for movies, I'm the wrong guy to ask.

. While I think this is always important, it is really important in my case. I am a night owl, and in Barcelona, my city, the Gmat exam can only be taken at 9,15 in the morning, a time of the day when I do not work at 100 percent neither nearly. This makes that the day of the exam I have to wake up at 6 in order to have at least 3 hours awake before beginning the test. So if I have to work until 9 at night the day before, the result will be disastrous again.
That is brutal.
I'm the most epic night owl ever (since age 11 or so, I've never been able to fall asleep before about 6 a.m.), so I feel your pain.
* Take caffeine/ephedra/synephrine. Or whatever similar thing you can get over there in Catalunya.
* Do not, I repeat DO NOT, eat anything containing more than a trace amount of sugar or white flour. Not only will "fast carbs" make you ravenously hungry after a couple of hours, but they will also flood your bloodstream with insulin, making your brain "crash". (In fact, if you are over 16 years old, you should pretty much never eat sugar or white flour ever again for the rest of your life. But, this is the wrong blog for that topic.)
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by lunarpower » Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:57 am
Do you have any idea? I know you always have good insights. In particular, I have realized that I am somehow slow in math -calculating-. I have been more than 10 years using calculator even for the easiest things -why should I make a silly mistake if the machine next to me can do the work?-.
I'll bet you $100 that you're faster at arithmetic than I am. I am ... not fast.

The little secret of this exam is that "time pressure" is an illusion. If you are honest with yourself about when you are stuck -- and if you STOP working as soon as you no longer have a clear goal in mind -- then you will have all the time in the world to try different things, even if you are not particularly "fast".

"Time pressure" only exists if you keep doing random work without a clear purpose, simply refusing to give up when it's time to give up.
I do not know what else I can do. It is hard to have been always one of the bests students/workers wherever I have been and now to be de stroyed by an exam.
Don't take this the wrong way, but, referring to a score of 680-690 as "getting destroyed" just makes you sound like a bratty child.
Let's be serious here -- That's a strong score by any measure, and especially for an English learner from a non-quantitative field.
If your work history, essays, and recommendations are strong, then you could very well get into the world's top schools with that score. Don't shortchange yourself.

Good luck.
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by jaichil » Sat Nov 09, 2013 1:52 pm
lunarpower wrote: * Take caffeine/ephedra/synephrine. Or whatever similar thing you can get over there in Catalunya.
* Do not, I repeat DO NOT, eat anything containing more than a trace amount of sugar or white flour. Not only will "fast carbs" make you ravenously hungry after a couple of hours, but they will also flood your bloodstream with insulin, making your brain "crash". (In fact, if you are over 16 years old, you should pretty much never eat sugar or white flour ever again for the rest of your life. But, this is the wrong blog for that topic.)
Great info. Do you participate in any blog or forum on nutrition and food to discuss about them? Just curious since I am interested in those as well.

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by lunarpower » Sat Nov 09, 2013 10:36 pm
jaichil wrote:Do you participate in any blog or forum on nutrition and food to discuss about them? Just curious since I am interested in those as well.
I would, but I don't really have the time.
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by AliceP » Thu Nov 14, 2013 8:24 am
Thanks Ron for all great advice you've given us!

spla626, I'm also a third-time GMAT taker and take the test on November 19 as well. Let's see what we'll get then. Good luck! ^^

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by spla626 » Thu Nov 21, 2013 4:36 am
Thanks very much, Ron, for your detailed response.

Bad luck that I did not read it till today (i checked some days and saw no response and just waited to receive an e-mail notifying me that I had a response.. I should have reviewed the threat everyday, but i thought that when an answer was send to a post created by me, I would receive an email...).

I think that read your respone would have been very very useful, especially the part on nutrition... What happened during my third exam was very sad, because I put a lot effort studying with the worst result of all the times.

The exam started more than 1 hour late because supposedly the server was not working. I spent the whole hour and a half thinking on the worst. However, the problem was solved and started the test with a funny and easy essay topic. Then, I took IR part and, well, I was short of time but answered confidently to 8 questions and ended up getting a 7 (82 percentile). My best score ever. Break: I ate a chocolate, drank a red bull and headed to quant.

Quant part was smooth and I enjoyed it more than ever. I was answering confidently and, when not, did not hesitate and made an educated guess. Ended up with a 47! My best score ever. Break: I ate a chocolate and drank another red bull, while at the same time telling me that it was my day and that I was doing really well. I was pretty confident because verbal is my strenght.

However, when I started verbal I spent arround 10 minuts in the first 4 questions. I could not read at all. Even I had to read 3 times a simple sentence. I could not even try to read a whole CR problem. It was impossible. My brain did not want to work anymore, it went on strike. After ten minuts I knew that I was lost and nothing could be made to make the situation better. So I just finished the exam, randomly answering most of the questions, because I wanted to know the quant score. My verbal was 25!! The worst verbal score ever, including that of my diagnostic test, whose verbal score was 32.

I studied a lot both quant and verbal (practiced to solve the problems in two or three different ways, using shortcuts, backsolving, testing etc; in verbal learned all obscure rules, for instance, that of the "including" that is not acting as a modifier), with no result. Well, maybe now I can teach math to me future children...

In any case, I never thought that this kind of thing could happen to me. I always finished my other gmat with energy, performing really well on verbal. Life just wanted to laugh on me.

Do not know exactly what happened, my brain just stopped. What do you think it happened?

Conclusion: 47 quant, 25 verbal. 580...

In any case, thanks very much again for your response and attention. I will be eternally in debt with the whole community and, especially, with you.

Josep

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by lunarpower » Sat Nov 23, 2013 11:09 pm
There are some schools that will combine your best quant and verbal performances from different tests. I believe Tuck (Dartmouth) is one such school, although I am not 100% sure.

Worth checking out.
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