770 (Q49, V46)

Great score! Congrats!! How did you feel about the verbal part? Any tips?

Some of us here that took the test this Saturday felt the verbal part was brutal compared to our usual performance on GMATPreps and the like. Look forward to hearing your debrief and best of luck going forward

top score!!!
well done.

Would like to hear about verbal experience too!!..

also what were your practice scores like?

Congrats. Great score.

Thank you all for the compliments…
I will try summarizing some of my thoughts regarding the verbal part; feel free to ask any question you like since I would probably miss a few things here:
The key point in the V part is TIME. The CR and RC questions are usually the question in which an extra 10-20 sec can make the difference
Time, to my thinking can be bought from several places with a key strategy at the base: SC question should take the least amount of time since a longer staring at them would not yield a better answer.

Having said that, the next step is to practice. I think the Official Guide gives the best insight to the way of thinking of the writers of the exam.

I started practicing “sets” – just like in running… 5 CR in 10 minutes, than 7 in 13 minutes and so on. The same with RC (3-4 minutes for reading and than less than 1 minute per question).
In SC I aimed at lowering the time per question to less than 1 minute – which means doing sets of 10 questions in 6-8 minutes. I had to tell my self constantly that even if I make a mistake in SC – if I do that in less than a minute I will probably get the RC and CR right.

The purposes of these practices:
1. buy the time to answer the CR and RC right
2. build the mental strength to deal with the verbal part

The final outcome was that I did not have to guess a single question and also had almost 2 minutes to complete the last question.

Great Score.

What were your practice test scores like? How long did you prepare?

This was the second time I took the exam - scored 630 the first time. I took a course with a subcontractor of KAPLAN (I am not from the US) and had access to the KAPLAN adaptive tests.
As my main practice material I used the Offical Guide and after that the KAPLAN book and questions bank. On the KAPLAN tests I did not score very well (640-690) and on my first round I scored 690, 700 on my two GMATprep tests.

when studying for the second time I practiced ONLY from the Official Guide (found too many questions not answered from the first round...) and dived into the answer when had a mistake in order to understand what exactly the writer wanted (my personal views were irrelevant). I found the Verbal questions from KAPLAN to be very different from what is required in the GMAT.

I took the GMATprep tests twice each and scored 740, 770, 760, 740. Took one Manhatten tests (you can register and get one for free) and scored 630. I think the Manhatten test was more similar to the GMAT than the KAPLAN tests, but more difficult.

Overall, I studied about 2.5 months - of which 2 months was about 10 hours a week and 2 weeks of intense studying - for the first exam, and than an extra month (3 weeks of 10-15 hours a week and a week of exams) for the last exam I took.

I hope this helps, and if more is needed just ask.
Gook luck!

Well Done !

Hey Joseph, great score!! ATB

Thanks!
Forgive my ignorance… but what is “ATB”?

Well done. Could you elaborate further on your verbal preparation ? What other sources than the OG11 did you use ?

Would you consider SC to be your strength ? How did you improve that ?


ps. ATB = all the best.

Nice!

[quote="bsd_lover"]Well done. Could you elaborate further on your verbal preparation ? What other sources than the OG11 did you use ?

Would you consider SC to be your strength ? How did you improve that ?

I took a course given in my country by a subcontractor of KAPLAN. The lessons were good and we’ve come up with a list of “red-flags” (in SC) that when ever you spot them you should do several things and if there is a mistake there go by a certain algorithm among the answers until you find the correct one.
I did not use it, but heard that the Manhattan SC guide is very good.
I used the Kaplan GMAT 800 (got it as a present…) – good for SC and math. Not so much for RC and negligible for CR.
Other than that I did the entire OG and made sure I understand why I was wrong when it happened.
As time went by I started focusing on the timing. As I wrote, I figured that given enough time, I’d probably sole most of the SC and RC questions. This rule did not apply for SC – whether 30sec or 3 minutes – I always had the same success rate. So:
1. I worked on solving the SC questions (or, more correctly, “let them go”) in less than a minute
2. RC: read the passage in 3-4 minutes, I took notes – the first sentence of each paragraph – just to stay sharp. After that less than a minute per question. Pay attention to “according to the passage” questions (the answer is written!), and inference. The OG questions had very good explanations.
3. CR: OG and more OG. Here you have to understand the way they think and think that way. Read the questions first (your mind will be set what to look for) and only then the argument. Do timed sets until you are comfortable in solving them in 2-2:15 minutes a question.
4. All together: the final goal, as I see it, is the pass through the AWA and the quantitative parts in one piece since the exam starts with the verbal part. It has the greatest influence on your score. Once you are comfortable with this part, you are there.

Good luck.

I approve of this quote. Many a 700 has been made or broken during the last hour of the exam.

That is an excellent insight +1

i totally agree..the question is how do maintain my focus after 3 hours???

any tips???

Congratulations on an awesome score, njosephy!

Congratulations!...please talk more about the verbal section of the exam...thanks!

bepositive