i followed a link here from an older thread.
what strikes me most about this brief post is the apparent contradiction between the following two sentences:
Rastis wrote:I cannot comprehend the math and remember how to do any of it.
...
I can do all the basics
i guess i'm misunderstanding what you're trying to say here, but, literally, "i can't remember how to do any of [the math]" and "i can do all the basics" are precisely opposite statements. so, you're going to have to explain more precisely what you mean here.
i think you're also overlooking the issue of
organization. if word problems cause you to freak out more than other types of problems do, then your issue probably has little to do with your mathematical foundation; in all likelihood, the problem instead stems from lack of organization.
* when you see a word problem, do you read through the whole problem first,
before writing any numbers or equations to make sure you actually UNDERSTAND the problem?
* once you've read through the problem and gotten your bearings as to what is happening in it, do you make charts/organizational devices BEFORE you start throwing numbers and variables around?
if your answer to either of these questions is "no", there's the source of your difficulty with word problems: you are trying to
do stuff ... without any actual understanding of
what you're doing.
incidentally, the same issue is also at the heart of data sufficiency, regardless of whether you're dealing with a "word problem".
* when you see a data sufficiency problem, do you understand EXACTLY what would be "sufficient" and/or "insufficient" BEFORE using either of the statements?
if your answer here is "no", that's the same issue as with word problems above -- you're trying to do stuff before you actually understand what you're doing.
--
if you indeed "know all the basics", then you should essentially have the mathematical foundation you need for the exam; the vast majority of problems, regardless of difficulty level, are based on fundamentals. if that's the case, then your primary issues are very likely to be the ones i've outlined above.
those issues are quite common, because most people are accustomed to studying math in a "classroom" environment -- in which the problems are very routine and predictable, to such an extent that exam problems look identical to homework problems. under those circumstances, it's actually possible to memorize and execute solution methods without really understanding them, because the exam problems mimic the homework so closely. however, on the gmat -- a test whose problems will
never be identical to practice material -- that kind of approach will crash and burn.
