took my gmat test today; need gmat prep advice urgently

Hello

I m also preparing for GMAT and hopefully next month I m gonna face my test. U took the right decision. I think with 8 strategy guides of MGMAT, u will get the proper guideline how to proceed. I spent around two months just trying to solve OG without any other material and I feel I wasted that time.

Now I m preparing with MGMAT guides. GMAT Club tests r also very helpful especially for Quant.

Good luck. Hope u can reach to your goal.

ZobayerZahid,

thanks for the advise and the link to the math questions. I am new to this website and thus will need to spend some time with it! I will definetely check the sections out and prepare accordingly. Yes, I know how you feel. I did the OG 11th guide with no strategy books either and wasted time that way.....The Kaplan books didn't really help me to tackle the OG 12th edition. I hope this time I will be on the right track with MGMAT, though....

Good luck and all the best for your test next month!!

If you have other GMAT suggestions and useful learning strategies, please feel free to share them with me...

Take care

Mimi

Don't feel bad, pressure adds additional stress to you while you're taking the test. If you've never been in that type of environment before (testing center), it's natural that you will feel the pressure/stress; hence, it will definitely show on your score. I would say practice hard, do a tons of questions, and just keep at it. Here's a positive story (true as well): My cousin scored a low 500 as well the first time he took it. He was, of course, depressed. It's not his normal score to score lower than 600, but the pressure from just the fact that you're taking the ACTUAL GMAT is overwhelming. Anyways, he kept at it and did more questions, he scored a 720 second time and got in Columbia. So keep at it and you'll be fine. Be honest to yourself when you're studying and you'll get what you deserve.

I (almost) know how you feel. I haven't taken the GMAT yet, hence the "almost". But in my studying the first test I took for the GMATPrep. I scored a 610 and was reasonably happy with my score. That was without any prep. Then I took the Kaplan paper and pencil diagnostic. I got a 660. I was through the roof. I thought that I'll easily get a 700. Now a couple of tests later and it seems like I have a better chance of winning the lottery than getting a 700. I took another GMATPrep, when I was still feeling high after the 660. Granted for the English I was pretty tired and had a hard time keeping my eyes open, I got a 590. Then I did a bunch of problems in the GMAT guide and didn't do that great in math. Did decently in English. But the math really had me down. I always thought I was good in math. I took the CAT 1 for Kaplan today and BOMBED. I ran out of time in both sections. I even started guessing early for quant when I saw I had little time, but then got stuck on a question that I thought I could solve and time ran out and I didn't even answer on 4 questions. For verbal, although I attribute part if my slowness to my dejection over the quant (my mind was blank for like 2 minutes, until I paused it), I bombed again. For a while it seemed fine. But the damn reading comp was ridiculous. I'm not going for a PHD in natural science, stop giving me these ridiculous passages that might as well be in a different language! There's a reason I went for business. No science. My worst subject. I hate it. I don't understand a word. They use technical terms. I read the 2 scientific passages and had zero idea what I read. I was completely blank. At one point I just started guessing. I didn't even read the question and just I picked a choice randomly. I STILL didn't have time to guess on 5. My grade was a 510. I was actually shocked it was that good. I have not felt lower in a long time. I always figured I was pretty smart. Now I feel quite stupid frankly. A huge reality check.

The Kaplan CATs aren't very good imo. Everyone scores poorly and it contorts the way you practice the test. With the exception of doing some of the Kaplan 800 book problems to get a feel for some more challenging problems, I'm not sure if any of the Kaplan content is useful.

I hadn't done the relevant math in a decade.

I bought a lot of books. Were I starting over, I would do the following:

1. Get the MGMAT strategy guides. I found all of them to be good except for maybe RC.
2. Buy the GMAT Hacks Math Bible
3. Buy the MGMAT CATs
4. Buy the OG

Then I'd proceed as follows. Jumping around is fine, but you need the fundamentals to practice the OG the right way, imo (focus on timing and execution, not problem solving):

• Work through the MGMAT SGs, do their problems. Now you have the basic techniques and tricks required (particularly for Q)
• Work through the GMAT Hacks Math Bible - more good Q practice
• Start pounding out the OG questions. If you need more to practice, GMAT Hacks some and there are the OG supplements for Q/V.
• Start doing the MGMAT CATs about once a week. Work back through every wrong and right questions, the explanations are good.
• If you're testing well at this level and having problems with the 700-800 level questions, the GMAT Club challenge questions are indeed challenging and will work you over well.

Hunt around here, there's virtually more good tips than you'll be able to leverage. Two key things to keep in mind:

1. Quality practice > quantity practice. Work small sets but know everything you did right and wrong therein. Blasting through 50 OG questions without understanding if you got it right intentionally or why you got it wrong... well that's sort of useless.

2. Be mindful of your energy levels/frame of mind when taking CATs. Test day has a stamina/energy component. It has a mindset component. You want to be rested and relaxed when you start, the test will make sure that's not the case later. So don't practice when you're tired--it will impact your score, and then you get a confidence hit, etc. Being at your mental best has to be a given to practice well.

scorcho,

are you referring to the GMAT hack bible by Jeff Sackmann or something like that? Just wanted to make sure it's the right book...Never have heard about it before and don't want to buy the wrong book.

Thanks for sharing a possible gmat prep plan. I like it a lot, and will incorporate your ideas into my new study plan. You are a great source of wisdom and I appreciate you sharing your GMAT knowledge with me. I feel the same way about Kaplan, and I believe a wasted too much time on Kaplan, thinking it would help me score high.....

All,

thanks for your positive stories and GMAT experiences. I am happy to read your stories as I was really feeling lonely and depressed last Saturday. I need to be rested, relaxed and motivated for this second round and will try to be most efficient in my studies. It is good to know that I am not the only one feeling bad about this GMAT experience....I just want to go back to school!!

I am glad I have found this forum......Thank you all.....

Mimi

That's the one, Mimi. It looks like he's revised/repackaged it.

https://totalgmatmath.com/

You can read a bit of what I thought about his book vs. MGMAT SGs here:

690-q39-v45-surprised-likely-retake-73916.html#p573973

The nutshell version is the MGMAT SGs were good synopses, but for my retake Sackmann's book seem to line up more with the types of problems I saw on both my GMATs. Not specifically the type of question, but the actual question content (the specific math domain area) seemed more aligned. I think both are good tools.

thank you, I've read your post. it is very helpful. I just ordered the total gmat math book....

One more question: As I was navigating and reading different posts, I realized it is probably not useful buying the verbal powerscore books since I already bought the MGMAT series....

but I really need to improve my CR and RC. I am good at SC for some reason, but weak at CR and RC...do you think that the MGMAT verbal books will suffice or should I buy particular books for CR and RC? I see that you didn't think MGMAT RC was very useful.....

have a good evening

Mimi

The MGMAT CR study guide was pretty decent. I didn't get much use out of RC and I didn't end up using their approach.

Others may have better recommendations on the V side for books--I was in decent shape to begin with on verbal, so I put probably 80% of my effort into Q.