Hi, gmatyanis,
First off, understand that you are NOT ALONE. Non-native English speakers often find the reading comprehension section to be the most difficult on the test. While sentence correction can be learned through the rules of grammar, and CR arguments can often be unraveled through sheer force and mathematical precision, RC can be simply overwhelming in the quantity of language presented.
Knewton teaches online GMAT classes to test-takers all over the world, and this is something we work with students on every day. While we don't know what your exact issues are with the RC, here are some of the most common issues, and a quick summary of the basic strategies to deal with them. To learn more, please visit
www.Knewton.com and sign up for our 7-day free trial for access to dozens of reading comprehension concepts and hundreds of practice questions.
1) Some test-takers spend far too much time and energy trying to make perfect sense of the passage, rather than putting their focus where it truly belongs: on the questions! "Reading" the passage really entails making sense of the main ideas of the passage, noting how the passage is structured, and seeing both the author's point of view and that of others. Look for comparisons, too. But beyond that, you do NOT need to know what the passage truly says before going to the questions. Let the questions guide your reading!
2) Notice that you use different strategies and face different trap answer choices based on the question type!
Although I won't go in detail into the different types of RC questions you will see, make sure that you are able to immediately identify the question type and the associated trap answer choices and strategy. If you see a question that asks you for a detail, your strategy is to locate, prephrase and look for paraphrases, and your trap answer choices will involve distortions that use passage wording and extreme answer choices.
_________________
Alex
Knewton Verbal Developer
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