Need some advice 4 months of prep - still at 600

[aashishneelkant]

Hello ,

Not sure whats the problem after 4 months of preparing i am still hanging near 580 - 600 score.
My recent Princeton CAT score was 580 (40Q - 31 questions correct , 29V - 31 questions correct).
And i have my GMAT exam on 17th Aug.
My desired score = 700+
Could you please suggest something?

Regards,
Aashish

[Brent@GMATPrepNow]

Your score breakdowns don't provide much information regarding what's needed to increase your score.

Have you been analyzing your practice tests to identify remaining area(s) of weakness? While CAREFULLY analyzing your practice tests, there are four main types of weakness to watch out for:
1. specific Quant skills/concepts (e.g., algebra, standard deviation, etc.)
2. specific Verbal skills/concepts (e.g., verb tenses, assumption CR questions, etc.)
3. test-taking skills (time management, endurance, anxiety etc.)
4. silly mistakes

For the first two weaknesses, the fix is pretty straightforward. Learn the concept/skill and find some practice questions to strengthen that weakness. To focus on one topic at a time, you can use BTG's tagging feature to isolate one concept. For example, here are all of the questions tagged as statistics questions: https://www.beatthegmat.com/forums/tags/ ... statistics
See the left side of that linked page for more tag options.

If your test-taking skills are holding you back, then you need to work on these. For example, we have a free GMAT time management video at https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gener ... es?id=1244.

Finally, if silly mistakes are hurting your score, then it's important that you identify and categorize these mistakes so that, during tests, you can easily spot situations in which you're prone to making errors. I write about this and other strategies in the following article for BTG: https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2012/09/ ... n-the-gmat

If you need additional practice tests, I suggest that you purchase the GMATPrep Exam Pack #1 (https://www.mba.com/global/store/store-c ... ack-1.aspx), which has two more practice tests.

Cheers,
Brent

[[email protected]]

Hi aashishneelkant,

Do you have the flexibility to push back your Test Date? I ask because if you've been 'stuck' at this scoring level for some time, then raising your score 100+ points in 3 weeks is not likely to happen.

I'd like to know a bit more about your studies so far:

1) What resources have you been studying with?
2) When you took your CATs, did you take the ENTIRE CAT each time (including the Essay and IR sections)?
3) What were your scores on each CAT (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores)?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

[aashishneelkant]

Your score breakdowns don't provide much information regarding what's needed to increase your score.

Have you been analyzing your practice tests to identify remaining area(s) of weakness? While CAREFULLY analyzing your practice tests, there are four main types of weakness to watch out for:
1. specific Quant skills/concepts (e.g., algebra, standard deviation, etc.)
2. specific Verbal skills/concepts (e.g., verb tenses, assumption CR questions, etc.)
3. test-taking skills (time management, endurance, anxiety etc.)
4. silly mistakes

For the first two weaknesses, the fix is pretty straightforward. Learn the concept/skill and find some practice questions to strengthen that weakness. To focus on one topic at a time, you can use BTG's tagging feature to isolate one concept. For example, here are all of the questions tagged as statistics questions: https://www.beatthegmat.com/forums/tags/ ... statistics
See the left side of that linked page for more tag options.

If your test-taking skills are holding you back, then you need to work on these. For example, we have a free GMAT time management video at https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gener ... es?id=1244.

Finally, if silly mistakes are hurting your score, then it's important that you identify and categorize these mistakes so that, during tests, you can easily spot situations in which you're prone to making errors. I write about this and other strategies in the following article for BTG: https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2012/09/ ... n-the-gmat

If you need additional practice tests, I suggest that you purchase the GMATPrep Exam Pack #1 (https://www.mba.com/global/store/store-c ... ack-1.aspx), which has two more practice tests.

Cheers,
Brent

Thanks a lot Brent...Mostly my mistakes fall into 3rd and 4th test taking skills and Silly mistakes.. I should work on these skills to improve my score. I am hopeful that your suggestions would work.

Regards,
Aashish

[aashishneelkant]

Hi aashishneelkant,

Do you have the flexibility to push back your Test Date? I ask because if you've been 'stuck' at this scoring level for some time, then raising your score 100+ points in 3 weeks is not likely to happen.

I'd like to know a bit more about your studies so far:

1) What resources have you been studying with?
2) When you took your CATs, did you take the ENTIRE CAT each time (including the Essay and IR sections)?
3) What were your scores on each CAT (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores)?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hello Rich,

Not sure if i can push back my test date. I was thinking to take that decision after the next CAT.
However following are the answers for your questions :-

1) What resources have you been studying with?
Quant:
Princeton Quant Review
Princeton Online Math
GMAT prep Mobile app
Manhattan - Advanced Math
OG-13

Verbal:
Princeton Online Verbal
GMAT prep mobile app
Powerscore Bible for CR.
OG-13

2) When you took your CATs, did you take the ENTIRE CAT each time (including the Essay and IR sections)?
I took the Entire CAT each time with Essay and IR Sections.

3) What were your scores on each CAT (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores)?
My latest scores:
CAT1 - 600 (41Q , 32V , IR - 5 , AWA - 3.5)
Quant - 29 correct , Verbal - 24 correct
Analysis : I had observed that i was making lot of conceptual and careless mistakes in CR and RC.
I worked on those sections for a week and could improve considerably in both the sections in next exam.

CAT2 - 580(40Q , 29V , IR - 4 , AWA - 4.5)
Quant - 31 correct , Verbal - 31 correct
In this test , I had more correct questions than my previous tests still my score is less.
Its probably because i made 2nd question wrong in Quant and 1st question wrong in verbal.

Following is the detailed breakdown of the latest exam

Verbal :-
Critical Reasoning 7/11
Reading Comprehension 12/13
Sentence Correction 12/17

Quant:-
Algebra 8/9
Arithmetic 15/18
Geometry 6/7
Other 2/3


Also could you please suggest good reading material for RC and CR.
Kindly need your thoughts.

Regards,
Aashish