I just Beat The GMAT!

I attempted the GMAT today and my scores are not impressive.

Q46 V32
Total: 640 (i didn't indicate this earlier)

I have been an ardent visitor to the website and i have gained so much from the website, unfortunately, i was not able to get the scores i had hoped for.

I started studying in July, though haphazardly, but only began to take it serious in September.

I used the following texts during my prep:
Official Guide 12th edition
Manhattan Guide to sentence correction
GMAT critical reasoning bible (only read it halfway through as i started about 2 weeks ago)
Kaplan 2010-11 with CD ROM
Beatthegmat practice questions (signed up for this 3 weeks ago too )

My prep scores were pretty reflective of the real gmat. They were as follows

GMAT Prep 490 (without studying)
GMAT Prep 560
Kaplan 450
GMAT Prep 620
GMAT Prep 660
GMAT Prep 670

I feel the jump indicated progress and throughout my prepping, the highest i got in verbal was 34.

It is obvious that i need to improve on the verbal section and totally need advice on what can be done to improve on my scores in general.

P.S. i got one permutation question in quant.... it was the 8th question or so, thats when i knew i was doing pretty well in quant. In verbal, i got my first RC question as the 5th question... it never happened during my preps so i thought it was a good sign..... was totally burnt when i saw the final scores.

Would be glad if anyone can furnish me with suggestions, ideas, texts.... anything at all as i intend to retake in Dec and i want to get a minimum of 700. i know i can do it, i feel more confident now than i did before the exam.

Thanking you in advance

I have been in a similar position mate. I presume(you didnt specify your actual score) that you scored around 650. Believe me, GMAT verbal 32 isnt bad. I have been through worse in my 1st attempt.
I suggest you just continue doing stuff you did. Practice smartly. Go through OG as many times as possible. Do the beatthegmat questions. Practice everyday. Before you know it you ll be there where you want to be. I am talking on the basis of my own experience.

Thanks a lot for your response. Do you really think i can achieve 700 in four weeks. i forgot to mention that my work schedule is really hectic. i resume at half 7 (even though i have to be awake at 5am to beat traffic) in the morning and the earliest i get back home is 8pm at night (i live in a traffic prone country).

I never practiced more than 2 hours in a day. You should be able to squeeze out 2 hours each day for GMAT. And Yes.. you can increase your score in a month...

Thanks a million. I would heed to advice and hopefully, it will pay off.

By the way, i read your debrief and its really inspiring.

Have you gone through the practice exams to see what your weak spots are? For example do you have written down what your breakdowns are in each question type- RC, SC, CR. That would probably be a help to give you more ideas on things to look at.

I attempted to review my weaknesses after each practice and to be honest, the result was never consistent. I'd do okay in one and the two other sections would be awful. However, on the average, sentence correction and critical reasoning were my weakness and albeit I like answering SC questions, I feel like I always got the most questions wrong in this section. On the other hand, critical reasoning seems to be my nightmare as I always dread that section. I'd really love any form of advice on how I can tackle the CR section comfortably

I think 2-3 hours of daily studies should be helpful but make sure that you're wholeheartedly "into" the GMAT for that duration.
If you've not been getting good accuracy on SC, that indicates that you're comfortable with English as a language however your fundamentals are not strong enough.
Go through MGMAT SC Guide religiously. Additionally, I'd highly recommend that you to go through SC Grail. Both the books are must haves for Sentence Correction and will go a long way in improving your accuracy on Sentence correction.
For critical reasoning(or even for SC), instead of doing questions from the OG in a sequential manner, I'd suggest that you practice the questions topic wise. For eg, you may want to firstly practice all Assumption Questions from OG12, then move on Inference questions etc.
This strategy will ensure that you become strong enough in one each area.
Btw, when do you plan to take the GMAT again ?

I intent to do a retake by mid-Dec so I can meet the round 2 deadline for the b-schools.
Is there a particular methodology or schedule that I can adhere to with regard to the different topics in CR and SC. In addition, how can I get access to the SC grail ebook as it might take too long if I order for the print copy.
I have been advised that it is feasible to retake in a month's time judging from my weaknesses. Do you agree with that as well because I am fired up at the moment and I want to commit myself wholly to the GMAT prep. I really need to hit the 700marker.
Thanks in advance for your response

First thing you should do is to sharp your ability to "attention on detail". We are living in such a fast pace, anxious world that personalities are affected with many psycho diseases.

Too much haste in life actually creates these troubles such as "Answering something without completely listening to the question" or "making unwarranted assumption." or "speaking too fast" "using too many acronyms" and once these things become second nature, they adversely affect your ability to ace this test with desired score.

You can't do anything without developing this ability. Even if you hire best GMAT teacher of World and pay him 500$ an hour, you will get no result if "attention to detail" ability is weak or absent.

SENTENCE CORRECTION:

This area is exclusively testing few rules and ability to pay attention on detail.

CRITICAL REASONING:

This area is testing ability to "read between the lines" or "understand the inference, premise, assumption, conclusion" which is also a kind of "Ability to attention on detail."

READING COMPREHENSION:

This area is also pretty much looking for same ability "attention to detail" but the difference from above two is that in this area of GMAT is testing ability to control large amount of text as well.

I would also recommend that you go through www.e-gmat.com. A lot of people have recommended e-gmat. It has helped quite a few people in improving their SC accuracy. See a few of the debriefs below:


https://www.beatthegmat.com/700-49q-37v- ... 63767.html
https://www.beatthegmat.com/from-630-to- ... tml#306195
https://www.beatthegmat.com/690-in-three ... 66041.html


Their approach to understand the intended meaning is quite unique. I would recommend that you do their free trial and see if the course works for you.

Thanks a lot. Attention to detail seems like something I need to adopt as I easily get distracted while reading sentences and passages.
As per the e-gmat website, I'd check it out right away and let you know my thoughts. Thanks a million

If your RC is decent and your CR is poor you should try to figure out what approach you are using at RC and apply it to CR. In many ways the CRs are just small RC passages with a specific question attached.

Some things that worked for me:

When I first started I found that my biggest issue with CR was the fact that I was drawing too much information that was outside the passage into my answer. Once I understood that I started to get most, if not all, of the CR correct. You really have to go into the question with a complete blank slate which is hard to do. You cant infer things from the passages. Its very hard not to do it, but its a key point.

Read the question first so you know what to look for. I found that this saved me time. If you read the passage, then the question, odds are you are going back to the passage again. By knowing what the question is asking you can avoid that trap and know exactly what you are looking for in the passage.

As soon as you know a choice is wrong (and this goes for all verbal) cross it off your list and dont go back unless you think you made a mistake somewhere. Again a time killer is to reread things that you already know are wrong.

Dont get overly concerned about time. I think if you are overly concerned about doing things fast rather than reading the passage you skim it. Skimming it leads to mistakes. Its better to take your time to read and understand than skim and guess. The allotted time is alot if you use other methods to cut out time elsewhere.

I cant recommend any books for CR. I didnt really need them once I figured it out early in the process on my own. I believe that your RC will improve as well if you get better at CR. I bought Manhattans RC book and it really did not work for me simply because I think you have to find your own way at solving these types of issues and their methods did not suit me. That said, its a great book for practice passages and Id recommend it just for that.

Id recommend re-reading your SC book for that section. I cant imagine a better book. If you dont have extensive study time study the major areas of the book and get those down. Most questions in SC have multiple ways to solve them and if you get certain fundamentals down at the very least you will narrow every question down to either 2 or 3 choices which drastically increases your chances for a guess to be correct. Also if you can get fast on the SC questions you will give yourself a ton of extra time for all the reading questions.

Thanks a million for the advice. I feel like you know me and my weaknesses. I never thought of linking the CR strategy to the RC strategy. Seems to make a whole lot of sense now that you mentioned it. I'm definitely going to adopt this in mind while strengthening those sections.
Lest I forget, I intend to tackle each section per week till the retake. Week 1 for SC, week 2 for CR, week 3 for RC and the last week for a holistic review of the all quant and verbal questions. Do you think this strategy makes any sense in achieving my target score or will an alternative method be more helpful?

peco wrote:I intent to do a retake by mid-Dec so I can meet the round 2 deadline for the b-schools.
Is there a particular methodology or schedule that I can adhere to with regard to the different topics in CR and SC. In addition, how can I get access to the SC grail ebook as it might take too long if I order for the print copy.
I have been advised that it is feasible to retake in a month's time judging from my weaknesses. Do you agree with that as well because I am fired up at the moment and I want to commit myself wholly to the GMAT prep. I really need to hit the 700marker.
Thanks in advance for your response

I'd suggest that you take an off from your office for 15-20 days. Until and unless there's no urgent work in the office, you can "get" sick,and go on a leave.If you are able to do that,I think you'd be able to focus completely on your studies.