Hey guys,
I just wanted to do a quick post about my experience and give some hope to other people googling for answers. I haven't really used this site a lot other than reading posts. Anyway, I took the GMAT today and scored a 730 Q49 V40 and IR 7. My practice test scores were:
Kaplan CAT 1 630
Kaplan CAT 2 660
GMAT Prep 1 700
GMAT Prep 2 680
Kaplan CAT 3 690
In that order.
I consistently scored really high on quant on all my practice exams, between 48-50, but struggled a lot with my verbal score. It was a dismal 29 but steadily improved to a 40. The week of the exam, I was scheduled to take it on Friday, I took one practice exam on Monday and that's it. I honestly think this was the key. I ate well and slept at least 7 hours every night of the week and come friday, was super rested and relaxed. And when I say that's all I did, I mean it. I didn't do any other questions, or make some crazy review sheets, I watched a lot of movies and the night before reviewed my wrong answers on practice exams. I can't stress how much score will improve if you go into the real exam calm and relaxed.
To prepare I bought all the usual crap everybody gets, Manhattan guides, Kaplan 2013 book, and OG guide, but didn't find it terribly effective. I spent about month going over Kaplan guide in pretty close detail and then started doing questions. I kept getting destroyed by sentence correction and was sure I couldn't improve in time for my exam. I was actually scheduled to take my exam on April 1st and was all but resigned to the fact that I wasn't going to get the score I wanted. Then I stumbled on to the GMAT pill site and thought it was pretty much a scam at first. But then I said, screw it why not, at the very least I might make a Nigerian Prince happy. So against almost all conventional wisdom I forked over another 250 to change my exam date by 10 days, it was March 27th when this happened, and paid for the sentence correction pill. I went through the Sentence Correction pill tediously, I even took notes on the guy's videos and reviewed them constantly. I skimmed some of the other stuff but didn't feel like it was going to help me that much. I went through the OG guide sentence correction questions and then did the practice exams. That's it. I didn't look at any other section in og guide and barely skimmed through manhattan guides.
The point of me writing this is that there are a lot of people telling you what to do and what not to do but honestly keep it simple. Pick up a kaplan guide, go through it, familiarize yourself with the test, and then most importantly figure out what you suck at, verbal or quant. If it's both, well you got a lot of work to do. It's ok though. Once you know what you suck at, only focus on that. Don't pick up the Manhattan guides, they weren't very helpful. They're not bad if your good at learning by yourself but why slog over a bunch of books when you have something like the GMAT pill? Seriously, the guy makes it a lot easier and has videos. Really focus and watch the videos and do A LOT of questions. And remember only focus on what you suck at. Don't waste time making yourself feel better by doing a bunch of CR questions when you can't get DS right to save your life. Doing stuff your already good at will only lull you into a false sense of security that your doing work and moving closer to your goal. Focus on your biggest holes first.
Get the GMAT Pill, OG, Kaplan Book, and that's it. Focus on the parts you suck at and be a mad man at improving them. Take practice tests and if you feel like your not ready, forget what other people say and move your test date. Finally, be rested going into your exam. Sleep well, eat like a pig, and have fruit during your break (I had mangos).
Good luck and have fun studying! I'm done
PS I didn't proof this and wrote it literally hours after my exam so sorry if some of it is a bit incoherent
I just wanted to do a quick post about my experience and give some hope to other people googling for answers. I haven't really used this site a lot other than reading posts. Anyway, I took the GMAT today and scored a 730 Q49 V40 and IR 7. My practice test scores were:
Kaplan CAT 1 630
Kaplan CAT 2 660
GMAT Prep 1 700
GMAT Prep 2 680
Kaplan CAT 3 690
In that order.
I consistently scored really high on quant on all my practice exams, between 48-50, but struggled a lot with my verbal score. It was a dismal 29 but steadily improved to a 40. The week of the exam, I was scheduled to take it on Friday, I took one practice exam on Monday and that's it. I honestly think this was the key. I ate well and slept at least 7 hours every night of the week and come friday, was super rested and relaxed. And when I say that's all I did, I mean it. I didn't do any other questions, or make some crazy review sheets, I watched a lot of movies and the night before reviewed my wrong answers on practice exams. I can't stress how much score will improve if you go into the real exam calm and relaxed.
To prepare I bought all the usual crap everybody gets, Manhattan guides, Kaplan 2013 book, and OG guide, but didn't find it terribly effective. I spent about month going over Kaplan guide in pretty close detail and then started doing questions. I kept getting destroyed by sentence correction and was sure I couldn't improve in time for my exam. I was actually scheduled to take my exam on April 1st and was all but resigned to the fact that I wasn't going to get the score I wanted. Then I stumbled on to the GMAT pill site and thought it was pretty much a scam at first. But then I said, screw it why not, at the very least I might make a Nigerian Prince happy. So against almost all conventional wisdom I forked over another 250 to change my exam date by 10 days, it was March 27th when this happened, and paid for the sentence correction pill. I went through the Sentence Correction pill tediously, I even took notes on the guy's videos and reviewed them constantly. I skimmed some of the other stuff but didn't feel like it was going to help me that much. I went through the OG guide sentence correction questions and then did the practice exams. That's it. I didn't look at any other section in og guide and barely skimmed through manhattan guides.
The point of me writing this is that there are a lot of people telling you what to do and what not to do but honestly keep it simple. Pick up a kaplan guide, go through it, familiarize yourself with the test, and then most importantly figure out what you suck at, verbal or quant. If it's both, well you got a lot of work to do. It's ok though. Once you know what you suck at, only focus on that. Don't pick up the Manhattan guides, they weren't very helpful. They're not bad if your good at learning by yourself but why slog over a bunch of books when you have something like the GMAT pill? Seriously, the guy makes it a lot easier and has videos. Really focus and watch the videos and do A LOT of questions. And remember only focus on what you suck at. Don't waste time making yourself feel better by doing a bunch of CR questions when you can't get DS right to save your life. Doing stuff your already good at will only lull you into a false sense of security that your doing work and moving closer to your goal. Focus on your biggest holes first.
Get the GMAT Pill, OG, Kaplan Book, and that's it. Focus on the parts you suck at and be a mad man at improving them. Take practice tests and if you feel like your not ready, forget what other people say and move your test date. Finally, be rested going into your exam. Sleep well, eat like a pig, and have fruit during your break (I had mangos).
Good luck and have fun studying! I'm done
PS I didn't proof this and wrote it literally hours after my exam so sorry if some of it is a bit incoherent
