710 first try (q44, v44)

Hello all,
I only discovered this fabulous forum 3 weeks before my test, but it was still immensely helpful in my prep. I figure the best way to show my appreciation is to write a debrief that might be helpful to other members in the future. I did well (44 quant, 44 verbal, 710 total), but I know I could have done better if I had used the suggestions in this forum from the beginning. I might consider a re-test b/c of the weak quant, but for now, here’s some stuff I’ve learned that might be helpful.


About me:
Canadian business undergrad, currently a business analyst, native English speaker, female <<(don’t think there’s too many of us around here )

I started studying 3 months before the test. I only did a couple hours a week at first, but really knuckled down the last three weeks where I averaged 3-4 hours each day.

Study Material
Princeton review- It’s good for learning basic strategies, but does not cover any topics in depth. Also, their diagnostic and test questions were too easy.

Official Guide 12

Nova’s GMAT Math bible- Good resource for learning math concepts, and good practice questions to help you remember them. I didn’t read the whole book, only the topics I was unfamiliar with.

MGMAT Verbal Strategy-(sentence correction) and Word Translation- the MGMAT books were highly recommended in this forum and I couldn’t agree more.

Lessons learned

Studying:

1. Have a study plan- this is the big thing I missed from the start. I didn’t sit down after my first diagnostic test and think about what areas I need to study, and how I much I want to improve. Consequently, I spent way too much time practicing sentence correction and not enough time on quant.

2. Break up studying into chunks- I find that if I study for more than 2 hours at a time, my brain become like noodles. The most I could do is 6 hours a day broken up, into 3 sessions. Any more was a total waste of time.

3. Do lot’s of practice problems- the tried and true piece of advise. I found this most helpful for recognizing errors in sentence correction.

4. Practice timing- Timing was the biggest problem I had on quant. I knew how to do almost all the problems, but couldn’t solve them within 2 minutes. There were two things I found important to practice:

a. Doing calculations by hand- I was too slow in doing basic operations and I made stupid mistakes under pressure. Practice until you can do long division in your sleep.

b. Knowing when to skip problems- You look at the problem for 10 secs and don’t have a clue how to do it, skip. Don’t panic, and don’t waste time trying to figure it out.

5.Review all concepts before doing the official practice questions- Sounds obvious, I know. But I started doing questions before I reviewed all my quant. I didn’t get all I could out of the practice questions and couldn’t get a feel for my level in quant until a few days before the exam.

6.Don’t bother with hard questions- unless you have a lot of spare time and are aiming for 750+, hard questions are probably a waste of time. I barely did any.

7.Always write out the equations and work out each option on paper for Data sufficiency- Again, kind of obvious, but a mistake I made as a newbie was to try to do DS in my head, thinking I knew the answer. That was a really easy way to fall into traps.

Test day:

1. Use the time given to read test instruction to write down formulas/grammer rules/awa templates- I picked up this piece of advice from a post in this forum, and it helped me immensely. Writing down critical pieces of information ensures you won’t forget them in the midst of the test, and calms and centers your mind before the start of each section.

2. Don’t study the night before the test- I felt very stressed the few days before the test, so I watched a movie the night before. It helped me relax and get a restful night’s sleep. The next morning, I ate a good breakfast and did a quick review of key concepts to refresh my memory.

That's all for now, if I do re-test, I'll add to this