what approach do you follow for RC section ??

Your approach makes sense. I found reading to be the hardest part as well.

My problem was taking too much time to read and not remembering ANYTHING. What I did instead - read through passage and stop after each paragraph and paraphrase it - that made me remember it. Don't rush - read and then summarize it in 1 sentence.

The obvious approach of reading the first question before reading the passage.

Then I would try to answer RC questions without looking at answer choices - not as efficient as CR, but it worked for me.

I still found that I would spend 10-12 mins on a passage or up to 15 mins and I could not cut it down, so instead I would study SC and CR harder to to cut time down on SC questions and use it on RC.

My goal was 1 min on SC; 1:30 on CR; Remaining time on RC. That translates into 15 mins on SC; 25 mins on CR, and 35 mins on 3-4 RC passages.

Finally, I also read as much quality fiction as I could and I put a basic list here - it was much more effective (for me) than newspapers:
https://gmatclub.com/forum/t76079-books-to-read-improve-verbal-score-and-enjoy-a-good-read

+1 to bb
totally agreed.
My problem is I am unable to cut down the "Av time taken in CR Qs"
I always take more than 2 mins/Q. Thats killing me.
I know I need lots of Practice on Quality New Qs (I recall the OAs of old Qs)

In the exam, I got first RC on astronomy(35 lines)-a simple one
then came the 65 lines on simple theme like "Dam and environment". It killed my time as it had only 5 Qs.
next--v simple on Wind energy in Norway etc

i had no time for the 4th--which was on paleontology(my fav)

so its absolutely essential to practice more(daily basis)
Infact More Practice in RC will improve reading skills in CR also. Its happening.
Also, PoE is a MUST in CR/SC/RC
this way we can increase the probability of Correctness

thanks bb and nitya
I definately use POE
I need to practice more n more , BB's idea is nice a more "precise" mind map approach

wish me luck with my practices

dnt worry lav, u r not the only one who is scared by RC. To tell u the truth,some time back, i used to dread RCs. But i nev did anyting to improve it. This played havoc in my final exam. I got 49 in quant but only 31 in verbal oly bcos of RC. but then the first thing i did was take up OG11. i did all passages. after every passage i read complete explanation given in the answer. Thats very important. U get to learn a lot from analysis part.
Rest participate in this forum. Believe me , it will pay u a lot.
All the best!

Thanks - I believe it came from Kaplan Verbal Workbook, and was one of their strategies.

That's the only strategy I used for Reading. No other checklists or things to clutter my head.
I was not a strong believer in check lists, so I only used checklists for SC (if I could not identify the incorrect/correct answer).

The only problem I have with this approach (in color) is one has be almost next to GOD, Just like Rafael Nadal is these days, in SC and CR. I agree that if we have more time for RC, we will score better in RC. How ever, it should not come at the cost of some thing else.

A 700 level test taker might knock out the first 3/4 SC's in a minute or even less. How ever, the curve becomes a little bit steep from there as all the Q's will become tough except for the occasional placebo. Unless we have a well rounded knowledge/stamina in all sections we cannot sustain the adaptivity of the CAT. Practice, Practice Practice is the only key to success in Verbal.

Cant agree more with you
As the game(Exam) progresses and we perform well, the Qs become tougher and we tend to falter at that point

Thats why we get so un-palatable Verbal score(V 17 to V 28)

Practice will make us Semi-Perfect to tackle this CAT pattern of GMAT
Had it been a "paper test" of yester years, we could have easily saved time in one Q.
Its not possible any more
We need to show more interest in CR and RC sections before we face the Monster

in all forums, I have seen SC is the most popular of all
we need to reverse it

Thank you for the compliment

However, let me "defend" my strategy a bit. I am not saying this should be everyone's strategy, but I just looked at it realistically and figured that I had a better chance of cutting down my timing on SC's than on RC's - better investment of study time. SC was my favorite type of questions - I enjoyed cracking them, RC's were hated as there was no clear rule to RC's and no clear strategy to improve really.

Here is what I found:
With SC's, in more than 50%, I could pick out the mistake and how to fix it just from reading the original sentence without having to read another answer choice.
In 25% of cases, I could spot one after reading a series of answer choices or validate that "A" was the best answer. In either of these cases, I could do an SC in about 30-45 seconds. Of course these are 75% of easier questions.

In yet another 25%, I had to actually look for the mistake through answer choices, noticing differences, and checking what the trap may be. Also I would always get caught with parallel structures, so I had to doublecheck at the end just in case.

however, I do think that after question 15 or 17, the difficulty stabilizes and stops going up/down significantly - at least that's my personal experience. This goes a bit towards the test format and algorithm rather than strategy but I think the two are related.

I am a non-native speaker, so I do have a bit of an advantage in terms of grammar, since I had to learn it rule by rule rather than just intuitively figure out at the age of 5. (I am a grammar mess in my native language though )

I ma looking for some strategies on how to tackle each of GMAT question on RC. I found PowerScore book helpful but not very GMAt specific(treats GMAT as step brother) . Could ppl good in RC throw some light on there approach on reading RC and attacking each kind of ques...