Not the Jump in Score I had Hoped For...

[Hayek33]

I recently took the gmat for the second time and failed yet again at achieving the score I had hoped. My first attempt was somewhat rushed into with scattered study habits which landed me a devastating 580. I signed up for one month later and this time regimented my studying and kept track of my practice exams,strengths, and weaknesses. However I still failed miserably with a mere 10 point increase to a 590. I cannot understand where it came from. The first attempt at the gmat I had ranged from around 600-690 on every practice cat(Mgmat & Gmat prep). The second time around I I kept around the same scores and even scored a 660 and 700 on gmat prep less than a week ago.

My problem, judging by my scores is quant, even though in my last two gmat prep cats I scored 42 and 47 respectively. I am considering buying the Total Gmat Math by gmat hacks and the complete fundamentals questions set, also by gmat hacks. If anyone could give me an idea of how I might improve with these tools I would really appreciate it. Also any other suggestions would be welcome. I plan to retake the exam again in mid December and start studying in about a week, after the brain rests for a bit.

[pemdas]

this post is mainly for quant section prep >>
if you scored under 40 in quant, the hacks will not take you so far either
it's mainly for polishing fundamentals but not to battle the CAT's quant

my advice to you would be - buy MGMAT CATs, do their three tests in untimed manner, that is employ your best effort; afterwards, search on their forums what people did answer on what question and why (reasoning behind the answers, including yours). This way you will analyze your strength and weaknesses in quant abilities. Keep in mind that untimed test is as much ineffective for real GMAT as not preparing at all. It only helps you to identify your weaknesses. The benefit of untimed test in your case should possibly be seeing how you do some questions in grueling (time consuming), hard way (unnecessary calc, awkward expression of algebraic statements, targeting a solution rather than answer). After analyzing your and other answers on MGMAT forum and going through every question marked by you, you will definitely improve your GMAT quant strategy. You may buy MGMAT advanced quant book after completing three untimed tests and compare what you have learned in your own experience and what have been left out.

When you complete do-analyze-identify-apply cycles by using the set of MGMAT three (initial) CATs and feel desire to write GMAT, please complete the remaining three CATs under strict timed controls (if you violate time control when taking CAT you should ignore the resulting score). Your real GMAT quant score in the next attempt should be +2 points in quant as compared with that of MGMAT CAT.

https://www.amazon.com/Advanced-GMAT-Qua ... 1935707159 gives you access to 6 CATs

if you've already used/completed MGMAT CATs once, ignore this post!

good luck

[AbhiJ]

I beg to diagree with PEDMAS. "Total Gmat Math by gmat hacks and the complete fundamentals questions set" is not going to harm you. I don't recommend you solve all these questions. You can pick and choose areas where you are weak at and solve those sets. If your quant is under 40 you need to refer back to your high school books.

More specifically
1.) For geometry and mensuration - High School Books are the best.
2.) For Algebra - You can refer to Higher Algebra for hall and knight(its a dirt cheap book) and read the GMAT relevant chapters.

This may sound like a lot of work but there is no easy way out of GMAT. If there was we wouldnot have a billion dollar GMAT Prep industry.

Also unless you are consistently scoring Q46- Q47. Manhattan Advanced Quant would not be the best source.

[Hayek33]

AbhiJ,

I do consistently score below 40 in quant but I have aced every math course through calc 2 and actually feel confident as far as that math goes. However I think my issue comes in problem identification and pattern recognition, that is why I thought the fundamentals set from gmat hacks would help. I have heard that doing drill sets like the ones in the book and the fundamental problem sets is really helpful in making connections between what kind of problem you are dealing with and how to approach it. Also, have you heard anything about the gmat hacks total gmat math book; I have the 8 strategy guides from mgmat and they are good but would prefer another source. Thanks.

[AbhiJ]

Calculus 2 is pretty different from GMAT Math. Don't be suprised if you find a Math PhD scoring less than 50 on GMAT Quant. The makers of GMAT says that they test high school fundamentals.

GMAT Hacks is a pretty good resource, you can try and see if that helps.

[pemdas]

@AbhiJ: I don't say not to read fundamentals. I have intuitively responded on the original poster's enquiry. What you do recommend him is high school math and he responds back with acing all math books. You see the difference between how I have approached the matter and you qualified my advice?

@hayek: if you really want to improve in GMAT quant, do ANALYZE. Do ANALYZE and ANALYZE again. Reread the post I did not only spent my time on writing, but also shared my 2-year GMAT related experience. I do teach myself and others back the exact way I advise you, and the result is satisfactory. If you keep taking the exam in one or two-month period by only looking up the mastered content and solving drills from various publications, then you will not improve your GMAT strategy to allow for your scoring as high as you want. One can be a math lecturer and yet score below the average percentile in GMAT if one's strategy has not been put in right place at the exam.

To promote my sincere advice to you in improving the quant score I would say - even if you exhausted MGMAT sets, there still can be unseen questions in your repeat CATs. Do them in untimed manner, then analyze ... You may buy some good quality CATs like Master-GMAT or GMAT club CATs for timed practice. These resources can be used for checking strategy controls of yours as being set on or not.

If you know yourself (strengths, weaknesses, what you can solve quickly and with the certain result, and what's just waste of time, in what direction should the educated guess solution be directed, etc.), your sitting for GMAT will be test of your general math competence and right strategy. People who are unaware of the concepts and problems you were solving back at home, all could score 5, 6 and more points higher than you. They just skipped difficult questions and let themselves solve their level bins. Whereas your arduous homy quant practice might push you to solve many difficult questions further and leave you with less time in approaching low score questions. If you cannot solve a low score question in exam, regardless of your circumstances (time runs out) then penalty on your score will be harsh.