what to do to improve from 620 to near 700 within a month

This topic has expert replies
User avatar
Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts
Posts: 4
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 6:47 am
Hi all,

Please give me some guidance or direction what I can do for the next month or so to use limited more efficiently when I have to work from 8 till 10 everyday and engaged with family every weekend. I know it is tough but I want to do this.

I just took the first GMAT today and got 620 (q41/v34) and I want to increase near to 700 as my gpa score is low. I find Math is quite easy when I practice, but today i took the time too luxuriously and coultn'd solve the last 5 problems. too bad time management.

So far I have read strategy guide section from all the MGMAT books and finished og twice. What more can I do to have an increase by 50+ from 620?

Your guidance and advice will be much appreciated. Please let me know.

Thank you very much.

GMAT/MBA Expert

User avatar
GMAT Instructor
Posts: 16207
Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:26 pm
Location: Vancouver, BC
Thanked: 5254 times
Followed by:1268 members
GMAT Score:770

by Brent@GMATPrepNow » Sun Apr 27, 2014 9:35 am
620 suggests that you have a strong grasp of the material. From here's it's a matter of identifying and strengthening weaknesses.

To this end, I suggest that you take several full-length practice tests. This will help you build your test-taking skills (endurance, time management, etc), and it will help you identify any remaining area(s) of weakness.

While analyzing your practice tests, there are four main types of weakness to watch out for:
1. specific Quant skills/concepts (e.g., algebra, standard deviation, etc.)
2. specific Verbal skills/concepts (e.g., verb tenses, assumption CR questions, etc.)
3. test-taking skills (time management, endurance, anxiety etc.)
4. silly mistakes

For the first two weaknesses, the fix is pretty straightforward. Learn the concept/skill and find some practice questions to strengthen that weakness. To focus on one topic at a time, you can use BTG's tagging feature to isolate one concept. For example, here are all of the questions tagged as statistics questions: https://www.beatthegmat.com/forums/tags/ ... statistics
See the left side of that linked page for more tag options.

If your test-taking skills are holding you back, then you need to work on these. For example, we have a free GMAT time management video at https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gener ... es?id=1244.

Finally, if silly mistakes are hurting your score, then it's important that you identify and categorize these mistakes so that, during tests, you can easily spot situations in which you're prone to making errors. I write about this and other strategies in the following article for BTG: https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2012/09/ ... n-the-gmat

Cheers,
Brent
Brent Hanneson - Creator of GMATPrepNow.com
Image

GMAT/MBA Expert

User avatar
Elite Legendary Member
Posts: 10392
Joined: Sun Jun 23, 2013 6:38 pm
Location: Palo Alto, CA
Thanked: 2867 times
Followed by:511 members
GMAT Score:800

by [email protected] » Sun Apr 27, 2014 1:30 pm
Hi beavis,

I'm hoping that you can answer a few questions; the extra info will be helpful to assess your situation.

1) How long have you been studying?
2) What were your scores on your practice CATS (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores)?
3) Have you scheduled your next GMAT? If so, then when is it?
4) It sounds like you've been focused primarily on book-work. Have you used any other GMAT resources during your studies?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
Contact Rich at [email protected]
Image