Hi All,
My name is Brian, I am from Indonesia. Up to this point my GMAT preparation journey is really challenging for me. I studied in non-English speaking country. Currently I am doing nothing other than GMAT preparation.
I started my preparation in September'13, with cracking the GMAT 2013 from the Princeton review. I set my test date on 14th November'13. During the preparation I only use that book, few practices from the Princeton review website and the GMAT prep software.
My score:
GMAT prep software: #1 (450, Q 35, V 17, IR 1), #2 (450, Q 40, V 13, IR 4)
Princeton Review: #1 (360, Q 27, V 13, IR 4), #2 (370, Q 28, V 13, IR 1)
The result of 14th Nov'13 official test: 360 (Q25, V 16, IR 3, AWA 4)
I know that with that score I will barely enter any average MBA school. Then I registered for the next test on 21st January'14. During the second preparation, I opened this forum and searched for the best GMAT prep books. My choices down to: Manhattan GMAT CR, MGMAT RC, MGMAT SC, MGMAT Advanced GMAT Quant, Official Guide 13th edition, OG Quant Review 2nd edition, OG Verbal Review 2nd edition. Those books cost really much for me, due to the unavailability of all of those books in Indonesia except the OG 13th edition (ONLY); therefore I needed to order those books from Singapore.
While waiting the books to come, I made a study schedule (50-days study schedule). My schedule was to learn the verbal at the first place (I know my Verbal is horrible). My study schedule:
Week 1: Sentence Correction, Week 2: Reading Comprehension, Week 3: Critical Reasoning, Week 4: Problem Solving, Week 5: Data Sufficiency, Week 6: Integrated Reasoning, Week 7: Verbal, Quant and few AWA.
I have to admit that my study pace was slow, I need to concentrate harder for verbal and I am careless in quant problem. I only did 2 progress tests on 13th Jan from Princeton Review (370, Q 28, V 13, IR 1) and on 20th Jan (1 day before the test day) from GMAT prep software (450, Q 35, V 17, IR 3). Up to that point I didn't know what should I do to increase the score, so I surrender everything and hope I can do the best for the test day.
On the test day (21st Jan) : AWA section was quite ok (I learned the tips and tricks from OG, so I just wrote as much as possible); IR section was not so good; during the 8 mins break I took Gatorade and ate bread; Quant section was just like a race with time (I realized my time management was bad, so I needed to guess for like 8 last questions); 8 mins break I took another Gatorade and chocolate bread; Verbal section was a total surrender for me, again my time management was bad, it made me to guess more than 10 questions on the last minute.
The result of 21st Jan'14 official test: 420, Q 36, V 13, IR 5, AWA 4.5
As compared with my first official test: the score increased for 60 points (360 to 420), Q increased 11 points (25 to 36), V decreased 3 points (16 to 13), IR increased 2 points (3 to 5), and AWA increased 0.5 point (4 to 4.5).
After that, I researched better about GMAT prep, I enrolled for the 60-days free GMAT prep study guide from Brent. Now, I am doing my practice with stopwatch to know how long I spent on each question. Every 5 qs of Quant = 10 mins (@2mins) and every 5qs of Verbal = 9 mins (@1min 48 sec). Some of the questions took longer that it should, most of the times the Verbal q took much longer than that. Up to this point I did the practice questions from OG: PS (156/230), DS (95/174), and SC (52/140).
I can summarize that my weaknesses are:
in Quant: careless computation, confusing mathematics terminologies, and bad time management.
in Verbal: confusing vocabulary, need longer time to understand the question, not really understanding the question's meaning, easily bored with long reading, misconception of answering the right answer, and terrible time management.
In IR: confusing vocab, back-and-forth among tabs to find the answer, and bad time management.
To be honest, I am aiming to get a better score from 550 to 650. I totally understand that it will be a tough journey for me. I really need help to increase my capabilities in GMAT, Are there any suggestions for me to increase my score? I will really appreciate any suggestions, comments, critiques or anything for me.
Thank you so much for your kindness in helping me.
God Bless You.
My name is Brian, I am from Indonesia. Up to this point my GMAT preparation journey is really challenging for me. I studied in non-English speaking country. Currently I am doing nothing other than GMAT preparation.
I started my preparation in September'13, with cracking the GMAT 2013 from the Princeton review. I set my test date on 14th November'13. During the preparation I only use that book, few practices from the Princeton review website and the GMAT prep software.
My score:
GMAT prep software: #1 (450, Q 35, V 17, IR 1), #2 (450, Q 40, V 13, IR 4)
Princeton Review: #1 (360, Q 27, V 13, IR 4), #2 (370, Q 28, V 13, IR 1)
The result of 14th Nov'13 official test: 360 (Q25, V 16, IR 3, AWA 4)
I know that with that score I will barely enter any average MBA school. Then I registered for the next test on 21st January'14. During the second preparation, I opened this forum and searched for the best GMAT prep books. My choices down to: Manhattan GMAT CR, MGMAT RC, MGMAT SC, MGMAT Advanced GMAT Quant, Official Guide 13th edition, OG Quant Review 2nd edition, OG Verbal Review 2nd edition. Those books cost really much for me, due to the unavailability of all of those books in Indonesia except the OG 13th edition (ONLY); therefore I needed to order those books from Singapore.
While waiting the books to come, I made a study schedule (50-days study schedule). My schedule was to learn the verbal at the first place (I know my Verbal is horrible). My study schedule:
Week 1: Sentence Correction, Week 2: Reading Comprehension, Week 3: Critical Reasoning, Week 4: Problem Solving, Week 5: Data Sufficiency, Week 6: Integrated Reasoning, Week 7: Verbal, Quant and few AWA.
I have to admit that my study pace was slow, I need to concentrate harder for verbal and I am careless in quant problem. I only did 2 progress tests on 13th Jan from Princeton Review (370, Q 28, V 13, IR 1) and on 20th Jan (1 day before the test day) from GMAT prep software (450, Q 35, V 17, IR 3). Up to that point I didn't know what should I do to increase the score, so I surrender everything and hope I can do the best for the test day.
On the test day (21st Jan) : AWA section was quite ok (I learned the tips and tricks from OG, so I just wrote as much as possible); IR section was not so good; during the 8 mins break I took Gatorade and ate bread; Quant section was just like a race with time (I realized my time management was bad, so I needed to guess for like 8 last questions); 8 mins break I took another Gatorade and chocolate bread; Verbal section was a total surrender for me, again my time management was bad, it made me to guess more than 10 questions on the last minute.
The result of 21st Jan'14 official test: 420, Q 36, V 13, IR 5, AWA 4.5
As compared with my first official test: the score increased for 60 points (360 to 420), Q increased 11 points (25 to 36), V decreased 3 points (16 to 13), IR increased 2 points (3 to 5), and AWA increased 0.5 point (4 to 4.5).
After that, I researched better about GMAT prep, I enrolled for the 60-days free GMAT prep study guide from Brent. Now, I am doing my practice with stopwatch to know how long I spent on each question. Every 5 qs of Quant = 10 mins (@2mins) and every 5qs of Verbal = 9 mins (@1min 48 sec). Some of the questions took longer that it should, most of the times the Verbal q took much longer than that. Up to this point I did the practice questions from OG: PS (156/230), DS (95/174), and SC (52/140).
I can summarize that my weaknesses are:
in Quant: careless computation, confusing mathematics terminologies, and bad time management.
in Verbal: confusing vocabulary, need longer time to understand the question, not really understanding the question's meaning, easily bored with long reading, misconception of answering the right answer, and terrible time management.
In IR: confusing vocab, back-and-forth among tabs to find the answer, and bad time management.
To be honest, I am aiming to get a better score from 550 to 650. I totally understand that it will be a tough journey for me. I really need help to increase my capabilities in GMAT, Are there any suggestions for me to increase my score? I will really appreciate any suggestions, comments, critiques or anything for me.
Thank you so much for your kindness in helping me.
God Bless You.
