mashi wrote:
I have been using Kaplan materials for almost 1 month now. I took several CATs and all my verbal score came out to be around 30s. I'm doing well on Quant Section so far, and I plan to take the exam in mid-Sept.
Can everyone out there recommend me some good verbal studying materials?
Is it possible to boost up my verbal from 30s to 45? (45 is my goal)
Thanks so much!
to get to 45 you are going to need to rely more on a solid basis of actual knowledge vs. tips and tricks in books... and you are going to need to score high across RC, CR , and SC. it is 100% possible for you to achieve,
many people on these boards think a 40 in verbal is like the holy grail; but i think that is become many folks aren't native speakers.
If you can afford it, I don't recoomend following Mashi's advice to the letter vis a vis prep material. The SC 1000 (and others of their ilk) is nothing more than a massive copyright infringement (not that I necessarily care about that...) but its just questions copied out of every
official guide, Kaplan book, PR, every CAT available... etc.. and there are NO explanations what so ever. To me that fact alone is why I have stayed away from those files... yeah you can post a question on the boards here, and hope for an explanation but at the end of the day its not the same as a professional explanation. Verbal is different than Math in this respect.
There is no substitute for
the Official Guide as far as verbal is concerned. PERIOD. Go out and buy it, as well as the separate
Official Guide Verbal book. Manhattan SC is a good book; I'd reccomend the Elements of Style as a complement to it (even though it is out of scope of the GMAT)
Finally, RC is difficult for many people, so start reading the WSJ, science or academic journals (if you are still in college you can get them at the library...) Also keep in mind the Kaplan CATS are dog crap as far as estimating your score; they tend to underestimate your score... so it is entirely possible you are already scoring a 40 and just don't know it.