Not yet .. on a way to 700+

[California4jx]

I took the test today in the morning and scored 650 which is not what I was aiming but still was a significant milestone for me since I scored 490 in my first attempt.

Wanted to write up here to share with those average guys who are struggling to score high. This forum is great. It has provided me with invaluable information like focusing more on OG 11 and other GMAC material.

I was just counting on Kaplan material and didnt use any of GMAC material (orange, and other colored books). I got very upset when after 2/3 months of preparation with Kaplan stuff I scored 490 last month !! and thats when I discovered about BeattheGMAT and testMagic forums and from there discovered how important GMAC material is to score high.

Because of uncertainities at work (project/travelling), I wanted to write GMAT again immediately after 30 days so I just started with OG 11,finished it twice, took the test and finally scored 650. A significant gain from 490.

I also tried to participate actively in the forums trying to solve other's problems; that really helped. I learned a lot from others during this whole process of participation and build confidence.

So, the take away for average guys like me is that if the orange book can make such a strong impact in taking my score from 490 to 650 within a month, I am sure doing other material recommended by folks here on this forum will definitely help me achieve a target score of 700+.

Guys, this is the best forum available for GMAT - and people here are very helping, and honest. So, trust their advice and follow their suggestion and put your best effort - you'll be in good shape.

Just like I took so much inspiration from other's stories here in this section of the forum to build my shattered confidence, I hope with this not so inspiration write up, I may help those who might have lost their confidence .... Dont Give Up .... there is a way to score how much you desire .. the light is here in this forum -- use it to guide your dreams ...

cheers !

[California4jx]

Someone on this forum asked me following questions. Sharing it here w/o revealing identity.

congratz for 650! that's a gud score!

cud u plzz let me know how was Reading Comprehension and Quant in the actual gmat exam? I heard now they r giving around big 4-5 passages in RC and quant is getting v v tough....

i seriously need some suggestions on:-

A)Quant - how u prepared for maths and whats the best book to study for quant after og-11? did u get any probab/permutations ques in actual gmat?

B) Verbal - i need ur suggestion on how u prepared etc for Reading comprehension ....
C)what was ur success rate on OG-11 Reading Comprehension questions?

D) TIME MANAGEMENT - ....Plz let me know how u worked on it and how many tests u gave?

RC and Quant: I've got 2 small passages, 1 big passage and 1 medium with classic narration that was really hard to grasp atleast for me. That is true, that Quant was very tough - I was stuck right at the first question - but I dont want to guess at my first question since your score tree depends a lot how you answer your first 10 questions so I literally spent 7 minutes on the first question to nail it down.

Suggestions

As far as Quant goes, find out your weaknesses, i.e. do you have problems doing math (computation) or do you have problems breaking the question (analysis, understanding the question). I spent lot of time focuing how best to break the question, that required lot of practice and time (give yourself 2-3 months doing practice). After that you'll get the hold of a pattern for these questions and will become quick in breaking (approaching, tackling) a question. I started with Kaplan - but didnt find much useful since they dont focus on making questions more tricky, their focus is to make questions more number crunching. My experience tells me that real GMAT question doesnt involve much computation, the hardest part is how you approach/break the question - the rest goes pretty straight ( sure by that I assume you should already have a good grasp of handling computation fast, i.e. finding percentages, ratios, etc). After I finished Kaplan once, I moved to OG-11 and did that atleast twice.

Yes, I got just one very easy combination question.

Verbal - RC - Go over each reading comp paragraphs from OG-11 and read the explanation of each question at the end regardless you got right or wrong. The idea is to get a handle of structure and expectations of the nature, type, and kinds of questions you get and how you respond. In the end, its a game of practice and teaching your subconcious that you can do it --- each of us are no genius or experts - but those who have propelled have just worked a little harder with more patience, steadiness and persistence. With time and practice, your mind learns how to respond. If you have never done much reading in past , it will take more time than rest of the people, but you'll for sure get it at somepoint ! - So never blame yourself that you are weak or whatever -- no one is ! - its just that we dont have that experience, we've never indulge ourself in those type of situation that demands specialized focus and attention - that is how you need to approach things as you are grappling with new stuff - there is always a learning curve involved for each of us - so be aware of that and never under-estimate yourself - each of us is blessed with a beautiful mind that have enormous capability of doing almost anything - you just need to recognize that - and be aware of that - work consistently - the rest is assured - You'll get there.

My Rate of Success - I was there too when I started ! - so you are not alone.

GMAT TESTS - none of us are great time managers - people work on that - and slowly and gradually they get there. I used to do 40 problems (verbal OR quant) in 75 mints from OG-11 - but that was the second stage. At first, I started doing problems of each type, say SC in about 1 mint. I trained myself for each type of questions as follows:

SC - 1 mint
RC - 1 paragraph regardless of its length + 5 questions in about 9 mints
CR - 2 mints

expect roughly around 16 SC, 11 CR, and 4 paragraphs with total 14 questions

Once you become expert doing questions right in that time frame (expect that you'll pick wrong choices as you work on time management even though you used to do those questions right w/o time constraint) then start working on doing all 41/37 questions in 75 mints.

In real GMAT, dont try to solve all 37/41 questions with right answers. Dont fall in love with a question -- it happened a lot with me that I can see the answer is almost there - but I was doing some sort of mistake either during calculation or analysis that is hard to see under time pressure - so under these circumstances and after question 10 - take a guess and move on ... but dont guess with every question -- at least in Quant - you literally need to do a little war before you comprehend the question .... so its a balance of moving on, taking a guess and staging a war trying to understand the question at your best. You do get in mid 600's even if you answered around 9-10 questions wrong. But never leave a question unanswered and must answer all questions (either right or wrong) - penalty of leaving questions un-answered is very high -- you lose 50-60 points right a way.

I wrote all full blown Kaplan CATs, GMATPrep 1 and 2 with atleast 3/4 CATs done with essays - you need to build stamina to remain focus for 4 hours.

I dont know whether I've answered your questions or given a GMAT sermon - hope it helps -