Can you make anything from these stats?

[achilies]

Not sure what is going on with my GMAT score:

When I review my tests and the things I got wrong I understand 95% of the errors, most careless, and often in the verbal section see the answer 100% clearly on the second read. Only 1 quant question per round I will have no idea on. I get 1-2 errors a round by copying the wrong question to my paper, and another 1-2 for errors in addition from working too quickly.

As indicated by my 2 tests, that everything is really hit or miss for me. I know I understand all the material and what they want, I just find I am not executing and panicking when doing SC.

Test 1



Test 2



I feel as if I lose my mind during some parts of the test for some odd reason. Also I end up reading an SC sentence like 4 times and really just losing focus an a general overall attacking strategy to the question.

Input would be great!!!

Really trying to hit my target score of 720! And i will Not stop until i get there.

[DavidG@VeritasPrep]

If two of your issues are panicking when you see certain Q-types and losing focus at other times, it isn't a bad idea to try mindfulness meditation, which has been shown to help with both issues on standardized tests: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archi ... on/275564/

[achilies]

If two of your issues are panicking when you see certain Q-types and losing focus at other times, it isn't a bad idea to try mindfulness meditation, which has been shown to help with both issues on standardized tests: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archi ... on/275564/

Thanks will try that before my next one,

If you were to consider the 2 tests, and if I hit where I can on each section where would my score be at? around 680?

In the past exams have never been an issue for me (crushed the CA exams for accounting). Not sure what is going on here. May be a confidence issue in the material and the large array of questions that can be asked.

[MartyMurray]

Sometimes people get smoked on verbal when they are too strategy oriented or technical about how they handle the questions.

If the strategies they are using fit the questions they see, they do well. If the strategies don't fit, they get smoked. This overuse of strategies can also cause people to have trouble focusing on questions, because the strategies add an extra layer of thinking between the test taker, or GMAT gamer, and the questions being handled.

So there is something to consider. Are you directly connecting with the logic of the questions, or are you putting everything through some kind of strategy filter?

Regarding how you are preparing, are you only giving yourself about two minutes per question in practice? Doing that can prevent a person from ever developing the form necessary for getting questions right consistently. If you are doing that, try doing questions untimed. If you are not seeing a hit rate of 90 - 100% when doing question untimed, then figure out why. What are you not seeing or doing that you need to be seeing or doing? For instance, you said you see the right answers to questions the second time around. So what to you need to see to see the answers the first time around? Slowing down may help you find the answer to that question.

Another thing to consider it what you said about "careless" errors. It may be that you need to develop greater depth of understanding of how to answer questions. It's easy enough to go back and say like, "I know how to do this. I understand these concepts I just made a careless error." but the point is to get right answers. So if you are not getting right answers, there is something you need to learn and that something may go beyond just making fewer "careless errors". On thing you could do for quant is using the BellCurves question bank. There are so many problems in each category that you can drill until you really get how to get the right answers to the questions. I bet you won't make even close to as many "careless errors" if you attain one of the higher ratings in each of the quant categories there. To access the question bank, go to the GMAT section of https://bellcurves.com/ and set up a practice account.

People talk about confidence and stuff like that, and obviously these things play a part. At the same time, when you really get skilled at this GMAT game, you REALLY see what is going on with questions, passages, argument and sentences. It tends to be clear as day. So develop form, learn to notice details, learn to recognize the tricks they throw at you, and in general become a better GMAT question hacker.

Right now, were you to hit on all cylinders, I guess you would be at around 660 to 680.

As you indicated, it's only a matter of time before you achieve more consistent and higher hit rates and attain your score goal.

[achilies]

Sometimes people get smoked on verbal when they are too strategy oriented or technical about how they handle the questions.

If the strategies they are using fit the questions they see, they do well. If the strategies don't fit, they get smoked. This overuse of strategies can also cause people to have trouble focusing on questions, because the strategies add an extra layer of thinking between the test taker, or GMAT gamer, and the questions being handled.

So this kind of hit home,

I notice what when i DO SC on the actual CAT i am trying to right pointers down, but when i look at questions without trying to mark anything down and just eliminate by reading and logic the answer pops out quickly. But I feel like if I were to do this on the test, it is such a nonchalant approach.

Any advise there?

The same thing for CR, I find sometimes I am writing notes and kind of lose scope of the question at hand. And then when i read through again when going through the test the answer is 100% clear.

For RC i find the notes really helpful to attain some comprehension of the passage.

[MartyMurray]

I notice what when i DO SC on the actual CAT i am trying to write pointers down, but when i look at questions without trying to mark anything down and just eliminate by reading and logic the answer pops out quickly. But I feel like if I were to do this on the test, it is such a nonchalant approach.

Any advise there?

While I do use my fingers to track eliminated answers, I have never taken notes, not one, when doing verbal questions, and I rarely to never do not get the right answer to an official verbal question.

Reading SC questions and seeing the logic of what is going on is everything that SC is about. Writing things down does not necessarily increase the quality or intensity of what you are doing. If you feel as if you are being too nonchalant, then maybe be more careful, but writing notes or using some standard strategy may take away from what you are doing if using those approaches is not optimal for you personally.

The same thing for CR, I find sometimes I am writing notes and kind of lose scope of the question at hand. And then when i read through again when going through the test the answer is 100% clear.

Notes or no notes the problem is that you are losing sight of what's going on in the questions. So whether reducing your use of notes or doing something else will help, you need to figure out how to make sure that you are keeping track of what is going on in the questions and answer choices rather than thinking that a crutch consisting of notes or some strategy is going to somehow guide you to the right answers without your really being clear about things. Wow, the things I have seen people do in their quests for correct CR answers. The truth is that if a person does not understand the logic of what's going on in CR questions, no matter what the person does, he is pretty much toast.

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Hi achilies,

I'm hoping that you can clarify a few things:

1) In an old post, you stated that you were planning to take the GMAT around the end of August - did you actually take it? And if you did, then how did you score?
2) What CATs are these score results from?
3) Did you take the FULL CAT each time (including the Essay and IR sections)?

4) How have you been studying for the last two months? What materials have you been working on?
5) When are you scheduled to take the GMAT?

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

[achilies]

Notes or no notes the problem is that you are losing sight of what's going on in the questions. So whether reducing your use of notes or doing something else will help, you need to figure out how to make sure that you are keeping track of what is going on in the questions and answer choices rather than thinking that a crutch consisting of notes or some strategy is going to somehow guide you to the right answers without your really being clear about things. Wow, the things I have seen people do in their quests for correct CR answers. The truth is that if a person does not understand the logic of what's going on in CR questions, no matter what the person does, he is pretty much toast.

Thanks

I think I am going to try some question banks with a new strategy of reading, comprehending and answering without looking back to a paper and without making notes and losing focus.


Do you make any notes for RC? Or Just read carefully and answer?

I think the notes may be a time killer.

[MartyMurray]

Notes or no notes the problem is that you are losing sight of what's going on in the questions. So whether reducing your use of notes or doing something else will help, you need to figure out how to make sure that you are keeping track of what is going on in the questions and answer choices rather than thinking that a crutch consisting of notes or some strategy is going to somehow guide you to the right answers without your really being clear about things.

Do you make any notes for RC? Or Just read carefully and answer?

I think the notes may be a time killer.

For RC I read fairly carefully, but if there are many little details I do not seek to remember them all; rather I just note where they are in the passage, and maybe I notice how the passage works in general. Then I go to the questions and refer back to the passage as necessary. Why bother taking notes when I don't know whether what I am noting will even be applicable in answering a question? It's pretty easy to just quickly look over the passage to determine which answer choice is correct.

I pretty much always refer back to the passage when answering RC questions, as GMAT RC trick answer choices tend to sound so much like something that I read when actually what they say does not match what the passage says. One key question for RC is "What does the passage actually say?"

[achilies]

Thanks, good pointers

I started trying some questions on the bell curve site. Are the "very hard" questions more advanced than what I would see on the gmat? They seems to be much harder then anything in the OG.

[MartyMurray]

I started trying some questions on the bell curve site. Are the "very hard" questions more advanced than what I would see on the gmat? They seems to be much harder then anything in the OG.

Some of the Very Hard questions are more advanced than any questions you would see on the actual GMAT. Other Very Hard questions are only rated that way because they are not well written or have errors. So many people get them wrong even though they are not really very advanced.

Many of the BellCurves questions are not quite like what you would see on the actual test. Still, other than those in the standard deviation section, which is weak, they are very good for drilling on concepts until you are expert in handling them.

Another thing to realize is that the questions in the Official Guide are not for the most part as challenging as questions one would see on that actual test were one to be getting many questions right and so seeing high level questions. So if you want to score above 700 be ready to see questions on the test that are somewhat more challenging, though not drastically more challenging, than those in the Official Guide.

[DavidG@VeritasPrep]

One more thing to consider: there was a large variation in your performance on Sentence Correction: this is a section that's well worth devoting time to in the Official Guide. I'd strongly encourage you to do all of those questions and then post here if you encounter any difficulties.