Hey Everyone,

I have been browsing the site for a while now while prepping for the GMAT (thanks for all your help!), but had not posted until now...

Up until actual test day I was getting moderate scores on the verbal section, and then about a week before my actual test I picked up the Official Guide to verbal. This book was very helpful, and I highly recommend it...

While reading the book, I took some notes and built a table from information from the book and other books I had on hand. I think this table was the single biggest reason my verbal score improved so much, so I hope helps everyone else here:
(Not sure how to draw a table here, so I will just bullet out all the table cells):

Present Perfect - Has or Have
- Indefinite Time in the past
- Began in the past, continues into the present
Present Progressive - Am, Is, Are
- Ongoing Action Happening Now
Present Perfect Progressive - Have Been, Has Been
- Began in the past, continues into the present and maybe into the future

Past Perfect - Had
- Order of two past events
Past Progressive - Was, Were
- Happening when another action occurred
Past Perfect Progressive - Had Been
- Completed before another action occurred

Future Perfect - Will Have
- Future event that precedes another
Future Progressive - Will be, Shall be
- Ongoing action that continues into the future

Future Perfect Progressive - Will Have Been
- Future ongoing action that will occur before a specified time

I posted this same info on my blog (here) if you prefer it in table form (or if someone knows how to build tables on the board, feel free!)

I recommend memorizing each of these, possibly with flash cards. Once you have them memorized you will see MANY questions that make use of this information. Whenever you see one of these words ask yourself if it follows the rules outlined above. I was amazed at how many questions this helped me answer.

I hope this does the same for all of you!

Kind Regards,
Jon