Organizing your scratch board on test day

[caitlinbadeaux]

What is the best way to organize your scratch board on test day in order to track your time and keep your notes neat? Specifically for Quant. I've been doing 8 questions (boxes) per page in 15 min increments, but am not sure if this is the correct. For example, the first page starts at 75 min with 8 boxes, the next page starts at 60 min with 8 boxes, etc.

What should your timing be for Verbal - I usually don't use a whole space but would like to see if anyone has any ideas for organizing scratch boards to keep track of Verbal timing.

Thanks!

[Jim@StratusPrep]

For quant I write these numbers down

35 71
30 61
25 51
20 41
15 31
10 21
5 11

The left column is the question number you are on and the right is the time you should have left.

For verbal it looks like this:

40 73
35 64
30 55
25 46
20 37
15 28
10 19
5 10

This should help yo manage you time.

[caitlinbadeaux]

Hi Jim,

This timing really helps - thanks a lot.

Specifically though, how would you organize your scratch board for Quant? As in how many questions per page and how much time per page etc. It would just be hard to set up your paper with only 5 questions per sheet with this time frame.

Please let me know - I really struggled on this last time.

Thanks

[vomhorizon]

Given that we can ask for as many scratch boards as we want, do we really need to bother about how many questions per page etc?

[OfficialGMAT]

Hello, vomhorizon! It sounds like you are going to be very well prepared! I asked our GMAT team, and we do not have any best practices for that, but it sounds like you are getting some good advice. You may want to ask this question on the main board as well.

Good luck!

[caitlinbadeaux]

I'm not worried about organizing the scratch board for space - I'm wondering how to best organize to manage time through your scratch board. I do not want to stop mid quant section to ask for another scratch board. If anyone has any tips on how they organize their scratch board to manage time (for example 8 questions per page counting down in 15 min increments or something) it would be most appreciated.

Thanks,
Caitlin

[talueng]

Given that we can ask for as many scratch boards as we want, do we really need to bother about how many questions per page etc?

Is that confirmed? So I can ask for say 5 scratch boards? Or would I have to request a new scratch board every time I am running out of pages (which would cost valuable time)?

[vomhorizon]

Given that we can ask for as many scratch boards as we want, do we really need to bother about how many questions per page etc?

Is that confirmed? So I can ask for say 5 scratch boards? Or would I have to request a new scratch board every time I am running out of pages (which would cost valuable time)?

From what information i have, you can ask for one Scratch board at a time, however you do not have to finish each and every page before you ask them for it. If you have say 2 pages left and are doing quant, just raise your hand for a sec and then continue on with your questions. And then when they do arrive with the scratch board you will not be waiting for the material to arrive before starting on your next question (as you will have space left in your existing scratch board). I do not think that you'll need more than 2 Scratch boards, i mean with 10 pages a board (and i believe you can write on both sides), you can literally do a quant question per side and still not need a third SB....

[yourshail123]

I would rather say try to manage your work efficiently with limited resources.

[talueng]

A related questions:

In the actual exam, are numbering and time display the same as in GMATPrep, i.e. are the numbers showed as "n of total" and the time is running from total to 0? If so, the numbering scheme here, though in general useful, doesn't make sense for me, because the left column should rather show the question you are on than the questions left imho.

I would rather say try to manage your work efficiently with limited resources.

I would rather say: "Find out first whether the resource is limited, otherwise don't bother with a constraint you can get rid of."

[caitlinbadeaux]

Yes - you can have as many scratch boards if you want but I really think there should be a standard way to organize your paper so you spend for example 9 min per page for 6 questions or something. Regardless, I found during a CAT that the timing strategy above is extremely unhelpful. It just sets you up for having to count backwards, which takes up time and brain capacity. The time should show what questions you're on corresponding to what time you the clock should say at that moment.

Since I can't seem to find good advice for scratch board organization, I guess I'm going to have to come up with my own timing and own strategy, and basically this thread did not help at all.

[kevincanspain]

Jim's time scheme is very sensible. It allows for the fact that some questions will take longer than others.

What I do for the quant section is the following:

If I am beginning question number n, I have 38-n questions left and should have about 76- 2n minutes left. If I am behind, I will not rush through questions but rather make up time through educated or random guesses on a few questions I don't like and/or understand.

Regarding the scratch work, you need to find your own system, taking into account how much and how neatly you write, as well as how big you make your letters. I break up each page into 4 sections, but others make 6 sections

[David@VeritasPrep]

Not sure how we ended up on the "Ask the GMAT" maybe this one can get moved to GMAT Strategy?

For the Quant Section:

I have to agree with Kevin and second his advice about not trying to rush through questions to make up time. As he said, it is better to guess a couple of questions that you are not likely to get right anyway, as opposed to missing several questions because you tried to rush through them.

I just wanted to add one more thought...It is tough to say that you are actually behind based on an ideal sort of chart. Jim's numbers are very reasonable, but I found myself on the wrong side of those numbers in the Quant section the last time I took the test.

My own Quant timing standard is pretty simple, after question 25 I want to have 25 minutes left right? That leaves 12 questions and 25 minutes so 2 minutes per question and one extra minute for emergencies. I find that trying to decide where I am relative to the clock much sooner than that is apt to be inaccurate. Everyone gets some problems that they can do more efficiently than other problems. So I might seem to be ahead or behind after 10 questions when really I am just where I should be based on the questions that I have been asked and the questions that are remaining.

I found this to be true even after question 25. I was behind by about 5 minutes after 25 questions. So that seems like a problem, but over the next several questions I got quite a few of the number property sort of Data Sufficiency that can be done in 1 minute and so by the end of the test I was right where I should be.

So my advice is this...take it problem by problem and follow my two Quant timing standards.
1) If you can get a problem right, then focus on that problems and get it right.
2) If after 1 minute to 90 seconds you are not making progress on a problem then you will need to guess at that one and move on.

I have followed other experts' discussions of this topic and there seems to be agreement on a couple of things 1) Each correct answer is probably worth about 3:00 worth of your time so if it is going to take you less than that to solve the problem then do it. If it will take 5 minutes to answer then it is not worth it even if you answer correctly. And 2) after about 90 seconds your standard becomes "am I 30 seconds to 1 minute away from solving this?" If so then continue and carefully finish the problem. If not, if you are still multiple minutes away from solving, then you should probably guess.

Here is a link to an article I wrote about this subject called "Diagnose your way to success." It discuss some of these issues. https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2012/04/ ... at-success

[OfficialGMAT]

Great discussion all! I wanted to jump in and clarify the question of how many scratch boards you can get. You only can get one booklet at a time, which contains 5 noteboard sheets. You can raise your hand when it is filled to request a new one. You must turn in the used one to get a new one. You can request as many new noteboards as you need. I hope that helps!

[Codebreaker2k]

Will you have a scratch pad for the verbal section?


Thanks!