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Common GMAT Words

Critical Reasoning, Reading Comprehension
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Common GMAT Words

by piyushdabomb » Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:57 pm
My reading comprehension is partly hindered by me not knowing certain words. While Googling around, I found lists of common GMAT words that are apparently vital to be successful on the GMAT (a total of 1500+ words).

I have enclosed the full list and a 100 common words list (I don't remember the website, but the authors emailed it to me). A few questions:

1. I have 4-6 weeks of preparation left and I'm scoring just about 20's on average on the verbal section of my gmat. Knowing my weakness is partially impacted by my vocabulary, should I go through these 1500+ words? The same list is located here:

https://www.urch.com/forums/gmat/570-gma ... -list.html

While traversing through the words, I only seem to know about 7-10% of the words! Ugh! So now what?

2. Has anyone gone through this list? I've also sorted the words by frequency (shown in the pivot table on the right). Should I memorize the list by letters that have the most frequency? For example, P-words make up >10% of all the listed words. Should I memorize the P-letter words first?

3. Is there a shorter version of the same list or a more updated list of smaller, more common words that appear on the GMAT that is easier to digest? I barely have time to memorize 1/10th of the list.

4. Am I going in the wrong direction with these words?

Moderators/Future MBA candidates... HELP!
Attachments
GMAT Vocabulary Builder.xls
A complete list of GMAT words
(291 KiB) Downloaded 530 times
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Sincerely,

Piyush A.
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by GambitOS » Mon Dec 14, 2009 11:21 pm
Dear, Piyushdabomb!
I began prepared to the GMAT few month ago and emerged this list very frequently. One time I tried to memorize the words, but it was unseccessful. If you want to remember this list you need to remember each word in some context. Otherwise it's absolutely impossible to absorb this lump.

When I had solved the problems from Verbal section, I understanded that this list is really useless. Yes, I met the words from it, but not often. You can spend your time on it, but the result will be insignificant.

Now I want to recommend to you some way to overcome your difficulties:

1. First of all - read, read and read (here is the good list of sources for reading - https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2009/12/ ... prehension). If you have any free time spend it on reading!

2. The second, you need a lot of practice in RC questions (you can use 1000 RC questions, official guid or something other).

But you are absolutely free in your decision! Remember it!
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by Brian@VeritasPrep » Tue Jan 26, 2010 3:09 pm
Piyush,

I apologize that I haven't seen this post since you put it up about a month ago, but hopefully I've caught you in time. Anyone who encourages you to memorize that list can only be motivated by hoping that enough students waste their time doing so and set the curve on the exam lower. I'd argue that if you thoroughly know even 2/3 of the words on that list, it's probably too many!

The GMAT isn't a vocabulary test, and in many cases the authors of questions will include difficult or technical language in an attempt to distract you from what's really important. Think about it - the GMAT is testing your ability as a manager, and not your ability as a linguist or an author, so there's not a whole lot of value for, say, Harvard Business School in determining the extent of your vocabulary or your ability to memorize.

The vocabulary that you do need to know, and to look for, includes language that indicates an author's intent. Verbal questions will often ask you to evaluate an author's conclusion, or determine the author's purpose in writing, or comment on the logic of an argument. Because of that, words that act as cues to the author's intentions and organizations of a passage - however, furthermore, in conclusion, etc. - are important to note. Please pay attention to those, but please also don't worry too much about technical terms or convoluted language!

One other note - if you notice the date on this web post, it's almost 8 years old. I doubt that the vocabulary listed on this document was all that relevant even ten years ago, but as the GMAT has grown more international, it's certainly evolved to perfect its role as a universal assessment of problem solving and logical ability, and has taken strides to eliminate or greatly reduce any regional or cultural bias.
Brian Galvin
GMAT Instructor
Chief Academic Officer
Veritas Prep

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by [email protected] » Fri Jan 06, 2012 12:39 am
Thank you Brian for the suggestion. I was making the mistake of learning all the vocablury. I truly support the part that you dont need the knowldge of vocab to take gmat. My only problem in gmat is reading passages and i want to practice as many as possible can you advice me a book or website where I can have acces to unlimited reading passages. Again I would like to thank you. Waiting for your reply.
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by santhoshsram » Wed Jan 11, 2012 11:27 pm
hi,
checkout aristotleprep's RC99. It has about 99 passages with good answer explanation. I found some of them ridiculously long, but it is useful nonetheless. https://www.aristotleprep.com/
[email protected] wrote:Thank you Brian for the suggestion. I was making the mistake of learning all the vocablury. I truly support the part that you dont need the knowldge of vocab to take gmat. My only problem in gmat is reading passages and i want to practice as many as possible can you advice me a book or website where I can have acces to unlimited reading passages. Again I would like to thank you. Waiting for your reply.
-- Santhosh S
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