selines wrote:
Despite being not a native speaker I wouldn't have expected it that bad since I am going to college in the US and already scored 107 on the TOEFL before I started here.
I think the performance on the Verbal section is not much a function of being a native or a non-native speaker as long as you're comfortable with the English language, use English quite often,read fiction,non-fiction often and watch English movies.
Secondly, a good performance on the TOEFL doesn't essentially imply an equally good performance on the Verbal section on the GMAT because these are two different kind of exams. TOEFL basically tests your ability to speak,write ,listen and read English . On the other hand, the Verbal section on the GMAT is a lot about logic, about rules, analysis, application of strategies etc.
Quote:
I'm not sure how much time I need to go through the
MGMAT Guides and the
OG 12 at all. I want to work seriously with them and I think it's about 2000 pages and I doubt that the proposed 120-180 hours in the tutorial are enough to work on that pile of paper. Yet I would very much like to take the GMAT in April.
One of the deadly mistakes which people make while preparing for the GMAT is having something targets like "I have to do as many questions as possible in X amount of time". That is quite a fatal strategy and especially for the Verbal section.
You need to make sure that you learn from each question,and have definite takeaways from each question. The questions you are going to see on the GMAT are going to be different from the ones you're going to do in say the Official Guides. Hence, instead of targeting at the number of questions you should make sure that you spend as much time as possible with each question. And this especially holds true for Verbal which if not done in the right way can become a difficult mountain to scale.
The ideal way you should tackle the Verbal section is
1. Go through a particular topic,say Pronouns
2. Spend sometime understanding Pronouns.Research a bit on the internet
3. Practice a group of questions which test you on Pronouns.
4. Analyse each question well.Go through the explanations thoroughly. If needed, google the questions. You'll benefit from the years of expertise and discussions on the questions.
5. Move on to the next topic. This is the ideal way in which you should approach Verbal. In addition to this,I'd recommend participating on the forums here so that you're always on the right track.
Hope that helps! Stay tuned!