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GMAT Debrief:
1. Gather your thoughts
I took my GMAT today and scored 750/Q50/V41/IR7.
Here is my esoteric not-so-brief debrief after preparing for GMAT for last couple of months. It will be found especially helpful by those non-native speakers who invariably seek help from several places and sources. I had a very odd way of preparation, and after you read it, you might gasp in absolute horror and feel mortified. It might also be a bit scattered, because that is the state of mind I am in right now!
It has been an adventure ride and I did learn a lot. Towards the end, I did end up burning myself out and I under-performed during the exam, and it may seem to some a very parochial assertion that I was quite unhappy with my score; but at the end of the day, I'm unaffected because my takeaway has been the learning and improvements that I have made (translating the GMAT preparation experience into real-life skills)
I'm writing to help you all how to NOT OVERDO things. Because I did so, and my head remained obscured during the exam : i was unable to even understand basic questions that the exam was asking of me. Burn out and such things are real, yet I had been taking them for granted. In fact, I never even optimized my performance : I took practice exams at night, instead of the time my GMAT exam was at; I never took breaks during practice exams, breaks that I should have taken to get myself into the zone and make them a habit. I look back on these things now and realize how many stupid mistakes I made, and how important these tiny things really were.
2. The Meat of the Debrief
GMAT is a game! Really it is!!! The more you consider it as a game and begin enjoying it, the more likely you're to benefit from the process. I zealously prepared for the exam - doing over 5000 questions! Yes, you got that right! Having been sufficiently skilled in the quantitative section, I dedicated 80-85% of my preparation towards the verbal section. I did it to work on myself, to improve my skills - at both reading and writing. The GMAT somehow gave me an excuse, the right kind too, to work hard on my verbal ability, because it does indeed matter a lot. I was in the GMAT for improving my human skills, though at the end I ended up wavering my idealistic approach and burning myself out.
You DO NOT need to do so much, you'll be better off at analyzing your mistakes and strengthening your skills instead of blatantly burning yourself out. AVOID OVERPREPARING AT ALL COSTS. Keep your cool! GMAT needs it the most.
Books & materials used:
PS/DS : Official Guides, Official Guide Quantitative Review, Manhattan Math Guides, Advanced Manhattan Quant, GMATClub Math Book
RC : Official Guide, Official Guide Quantitative Review, Powerscore RC Bible, Manhattan RC Bible, LSAT RC (25 Sets)
CR : Official Guide, Official Guide Quantitative Review, Powerscore CR Bible, LSAT CR (25 Sets)
SC : Wait for it!!!
Manhattan Foundations of GMAT Verbal, Aristotle SC, Ron's SC Videos, Elements of Style, Doing Grammar, Manhattan SC
Along with these, I also did the GMATPrep Question Bank, for all sections, GPrep SC documents (by Souvik & Whiplash), GPrep CR document (Whiplash)
Since majority of people here always relied upon quantitative analysis of progress, let me show you some statistics -
Before preparation/ After preparation
CR :
LSAT Set 1 - 76% accuracy, average time : 2 minutes 25 seconds
LSAT Set 25 - 94% accuracy, average time : 1 minute 15 seconds
RC :
LSAT Set 1 - 73% accuracy, average time : 4 minutes to read an passage, another 15 minutes to answer 7-8 questions
LSAT Set 25 - 92% accuracy, average time : 2:15 minutes to read an passage, another 7-8 minutes to answer 7-8 questions.
SC :
Starting Preparation : 60-70%, average time : i would keep staring at the problems wondering what is really wrong with the stem and choices
End phase : 95+% accuracy, average time : <1 minute
These are to show you that IMPROVEMENTS ARE INDEED POSSIBLE IF YOU GIVE THEM DUE TIME!!!!
Quant :
I had a natural affinity for quant, and whatever mistakes I ever got were because of careless mistakes. I finished OG and OG supplement with 92% accuracy and 1-1:15 minute average time.
Test scores you received along the way:
My first diagnostic test in OG:
PS/DS : 23/24, 23/24 (Excellent)
CR : 13/17 (Above Average)
SC : 12/17 (Above Average)
RC : 10/17 (Average)
Manhattan GMAT#1 : 680 Q48 V35
Manhattan GMAT#2 : 650 Q45 V34
At this point, I was very pissed off with Manhattan exams, and after reading the forums I did come to know that quantitative was substantially difficult than GMAT exams. I decided to chuck Manhattan exams, because I would always feel grinded by the end of quantitative section to move onto verbal. Guess what? I was wrong, stamina does matter a lot!
Aug.30 GMATPrep1 730 (Q50V38) Wrong: Q(6),CR(1),RC(1),SC(9)
Oct.12 GMATPrep2 780 (Q51V46) Wrong: Q(4),CR(2),RC(0),SC(2)
Oct.19 GMATPrep ExamPack1-1 770 (Q50V44) Wrong: Q(3),CR(4),RC(1),SC(2)
Oct.22 GMATPrep ExamPack1-2 780 (Q51V47) Wrong: Q(1),CR(0),RC(1),SC(0)
Oct.26 GMATPrep 1(Repeat) 770 (Q51V45) Wrong: Q(5),RC(5) - I wanted to fall off to sleep in RC
Oct.26 GMATPrep 2(Repeat) 770 (Q50V45) Wrong: Q(4),CR(2),RC(1)
Background information (education, employment, etc.) :
I've just graduated this year, and had a large chunk of time spare that I could dedicate for studying. I graduated at top of my class (top 4%) from an IIT in India. I'll soon join a firm in Singapore, and hopefully that will help me provide an international exposure. I have a good deal of extra-curriculars and I thought a 770 would make a splendid case for me in next 2-3 years, given I have zero work experience at the moment and higher GMAT scores are needed the lesser work-experience one has, but seems like the day wasn't set out right. Given my progressive scores, you'll understand my case.
My aspirations are for Top 5 Ivy (as a matter of fact, I submitted H/S/W/MIT/Columbia as schools to send score report to! - how optimistic of me). I don't think this score is worth a retake at all, except that it might end up raising eye-brows from adcoms about my lack of judgement. Although views about the same are welcome. I intend to apply with 2-3 years of workex, whereby 750 might not be as exciting a case to form.
Length of study :
2 months - almost full time, and ended up burning myself out in the process!
General strategy :
My general strategy revolves around the verbal section, since I had no problems in Quant section whatsoever.
August :
* Sometime in August, I started teaching GRE math to my girlfriend, and in the process ended up memorizing hundreds of words alongwith. Verbal skills and knowledge somehow started intriguing me. In the same time, I happened to have read two books that did really help me - How to Read Better & Faster by Norman Lewis, and Elements of Style by Strunk & White. One helped me pace up with my general reading ability, and the other helped me improve my way of writing. Concision is the key, and if you can write something in 5 words instead of 7, you should learn to do that - Strunk & White says.
I will quote the book :
"A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts."
* I was becoming fascinated by the English language and how beautiful it could be (this kind of aesthetic praise by a non-native is not usually expected though!!! :D ). So now, while my girlfriend was set to giving the GRE, I decided to take a shot at GMAT - to further my goals of manufacturing segment leadership career later in life, and really grasp the English language holistically, rather than a vocabulary centric Verbal section that the GRE has.
Before the start of preparation - I wasn't even aware of tiny things such as:
I am running - running is a verb.
I like running - running is a noun.
He came towards me, running steadily - running is a verb modifier.
The more I began to grasp these things - the more I developed an admiration for the functionality of the language. (I swear, if anything I want to retake the exam for is not for the narcissism but for the simple aspect of falling in love with how playful you can get with these things!!!!)
September :
* I spent all the time doing CR questions from LSAT exams, watching Ron's videos (which are informative and give you a way how to think and approach problems)
* The TWO MOST IMPORTANT BOOKS to improve SC: Manhattan Sentence Correction and Doing Grammar. One is not possible to do without the other. Start with Doing Grammar first. Morenberg will entice you and make you fall in love!!
I found Doing Grammar on an online ads site and bought it immediately. I read Doing Grammar thrice, spending over total 40-50 hours reading through it, absorbing it, and then doing all the practice sentences at the end of it. I promise, if you really follow the book like a gospel, there will never be any doubt about problems in structures, nouns, or sentence constructions EVER!!!! Only thing that will ever remain for you to practice will then be to focus on meaning of sentences. After this book, Manhattan Sentence Correction will seem like a breeze read, and more exciting instead of bland rules alone!
October :
* I finished OG and Manhattan SC and took GMATPrep 2, scoring a 780 with just 2 mistakes in SC, after my last practice exam where I scored 730 with 9 mistakes in SC.
* I also did GMATPrep SC documents, CR documents, and all these questions while I referred to ManahattanGMAT forums for answers. You'll go gaga over Ron's way of approaching problems. For practice, I would often search 700+ tagged questions on GMATClub and do them time to time.
Words of Advice:
* Love what you're trying to accomplish. Thing of the bigger picture, rather than simply trying to achieve a solid score. Even if you get that score, it will be half the success if you don't translate what you learn into everyday skills (for example, I now can pinpoint mistakes in text - though mine contains several many - and I developed a reading speed at 600+ wpm, which enables me to read more books in the same time, and get more from time I have)
Things you wish you knew:
* Importance of building up to the day and keeping your cool. I ran a marathon last December, and straightaway ran a full marathon by training for a month without ever running trained 10k or half-marathons before. But GMAT is tougher than that. You'll have to build resilience and work your way slowly and steadily. Doing too much does not really help, learning to enjoy it does. And when you do the latter, you really don't feel like as if you did anything at all, because you'd keep wanting more!
Finally, your test experience:
* Just two days before my exam, I took two GMATPrep exams consecutively - scoring 770 in each. The day before my exam, I still decided to read two manhattan SC chapters. All of which did much bad to my score and exam temperament than I thought.
* Relax and chill when you write your exam. I was feeling burnt out: I was totally clouded in my mind, and I simply could not figure even basic things the exam was asking. I literally read several prompts twice-thrice. It seemed as if my vision had totally detracted itself from my thought process, and both were not even willing to cooperate. This is bad. Really bad. I would suggest you to be laidback and chilled, atleast 2-3 days before the exam. Develop yourself into the routine of waking up on time at least a week before. These tiny things add upto a lot. Moreover GMAT has 30 points standard deviation, guess what, these things can turn the meter to the upper end if done well.
I've been a long silent lurker on GMATClub and signed up only today. If anyone needs any help or guidance, I'd love to help you around, having gone through the ordeal and pangs of fortunate misfortunes!
1. Gather your thoughts
I took my GMAT today and scored 750/Q50/V41/IR7.
Here is my esoteric not-so-brief debrief after preparing for GMAT for last couple of months. It will be found especially helpful by those non-native speakers who invariably seek help from several places and sources. I had a very odd way of preparation, and after you read it, you might gasp in absolute horror and feel mortified. It might also be a bit scattered, because that is the state of mind I am in right now!
It has been an adventure ride and I did learn a lot. Towards the end, I did end up burning myself out and I under-performed during the exam, and it may seem to some a very parochial assertion that I was quite unhappy with my score; but at the end of the day, I'm unaffected because my takeaway has been the learning and improvements that I have made (translating the GMAT preparation experience into real-life skills)
I'm writing to help you all how to NOT OVERDO things. Because I did so, and my head remained obscured during the exam : i was unable to even understand basic questions that the exam was asking of me. Burn out and such things are real, yet I had been taking them for granted. In fact, I never even optimized my performance : I took practice exams at night, instead of the time my GMAT exam was at; I never took breaks during practice exams, breaks that I should have taken to get myself into the zone and make them a habit. I look back on these things now and realize how many stupid mistakes I made, and how important these tiny things really were.
2. The Meat of the Debrief
GMAT is a game! Really it is!!! The more you consider it as a game and begin enjoying it, the more likely you're to benefit from the process. I zealously prepared for the exam - doing over 5000 questions! Yes, you got that right! Having been sufficiently skilled in the quantitative section, I dedicated 80-85% of my preparation towards the verbal section. I did it to work on myself, to improve my skills - at both reading and writing. The GMAT somehow gave me an excuse, the right kind too, to work hard on my verbal ability, because it does indeed matter a lot. I was in the GMAT for improving my human skills, though at the end I ended up wavering my idealistic approach and burning myself out.
You DO NOT need to do so much, you'll be better off at analyzing your mistakes and strengthening your skills instead of blatantly burning yourself out. AVOID OVERPREPARING AT ALL COSTS. Keep your cool! GMAT needs it the most.
Books & materials used:
PS/DS : Official Guides, Official Guide Quantitative Review, Manhattan Math Guides, Advanced Manhattan Quant, GMATClub Math Book
RC : Official Guide, Official Guide Quantitative Review, Powerscore RC Bible, Manhattan RC Bible, LSAT RC (25 Sets)
CR : Official Guide, Official Guide Quantitative Review, Powerscore CR Bible, LSAT CR (25 Sets)
SC : Wait for it!!!
Manhattan Foundations of GMAT Verbal, Aristotle SC, Ron's SC Videos, Elements of Style, Doing Grammar, Manhattan SC
Along with these, I also did the GMATPrep Question Bank, for all sections, GPrep SC documents (by Souvik & Whiplash), GPrep CR document (Whiplash)
Since majority of people here always relied upon quantitative analysis of progress, let me show you some statistics -
Before preparation/ After preparation
CR :
LSAT Set 1 - 76% accuracy, average time : 2 minutes 25 seconds
LSAT Set 25 - 94% accuracy, average time : 1 minute 15 seconds
RC :
LSAT Set 1 - 73% accuracy, average time : 4 minutes to read an passage, another 15 minutes to answer 7-8 questions
LSAT Set 25 - 92% accuracy, average time : 2:15 minutes to read an passage, another 7-8 minutes to answer 7-8 questions.
SC :
Starting Preparation : 60-70%, average time : i would keep staring at the problems wondering what is really wrong with the stem and choices
End phase : 95+% accuracy, average time : <1 minute
These are to show you that IMPROVEMENTS ARE INDEED POSSIBLE IF YOU GIVE THEM DUE TIME!!!!
Quant :
I had a natural affinity for quant, and whatever mistakes I ever got were because of careless mistakes. I finished OG and OG supplement with 92% accuracy and 1-1:15 minute average time.
Test scores you received along the way:
My first diagnostic test in OG:
PS/DS : 23/24, 23/24 (Excellent)
CR : 13/17 (Above Average)
SC : 12/17 (Above Average)
RC : 10/17 (Average)
Manhattan GMAT#1 : 680 Q48 V35
Manhattan GMAT#2 : 650 Q45 V34
At this point, I was very pissed off with Manhattan exams, and after reading the forums I did come to know that quantitative was substantially difficult than GMAT exams. I decided to chuck Manhattan exams, because I would always feel grinded by the end of quantitative section to move onto verbal. Guess what? I was wrong, stamina does matter a lot!
Aug.30 GMATPrep1 730 (Q50V38) Wrong: Q(6),CR(1),RC(1),SC(9)
Oct.12 GMATPrep2 780 (Q51V46) Wrong: Q(4),CR(2),RC(0),SC(2)
Oct.19 GMATPrep ExamPack1-1 770 (Q50V44) Wrong: Q(3),CR(4),RC(1),SC(2)
Oct.22 GMATPrep ExamPack1-2 780 (Q51V47) Wrong: Q(1),CR(0),RC(1),SC(0)
Oct.26 GMATPrep 1(Repeat) 770 (Q51V45) Wrong: Q(5),RC(5) - I wanted to fall off to sleep in RC
Oct.26 GMATPrep 2(Repeat) 770 (Q50V45) Wrong: Q(4),CR(2),RC(1)
Background information (education, employment, etc.) :
I've just graduated this year, and had a large chunk of time spare that I could dedicate for studying. I graduated at top of my class (top 4%) from an IIT in India. I'll soon join a firm in Singapore, and hopefully that will help me provide an international exposure. I have a good deal of extra-curriculars and I thought a 770 would make a splendid case for me in next 2-3 years, given I have zero work experience at the moment and higher GMAT scores are needed the lesser work-experience one has, but seems like the day wasn't set out right. Given my progressive scores, you'll understand my case.
My aspirations are for Top 5 Ivy (as a matter of fact, I submitted H/S/W/MIT/Columbia as schools to send score report to! - how optimistic of me). I don't think this score is worth a retake at all, except that it might end up raising eye-brows from adcoms about my lack of judgement. Although views about the same are welcome. I intend to apply with 2-3 years of workex, whereby 750 might not be as exciting a case to form.
Length of study :
2 months - almost full time, and ended up burning myself out in the process!
General strategy :
My general strategy revolves around the verbal section, since I had no problems in Quant section whatsoever.
August :
* Sometime in August, I started teaching GRE math to my girlfriend, and in the process ended up memorizing hundreds of words alongwith. Verbal skills and knowledge somehow started intriguing me. In the same time, I happened to have read two books that did really help me - How to Read Better & Faster by Norman Lewis, and Elements of Style by Strunk & White. One helped me pace up with my general reading ability, and the other helped me improve my way of writing. Concision is the key, and if you can write something in 5 words instead of 7, you should learn to do that - Strunk & White says.
I will quote the book :
"A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts."
* I was becoming fascinated by the English language and how beautiful it could be (this kind of aesthetic praise by a non-native is not usually expected though!!! :D ). So now, while my girlfriend was set to giving the GRE, I decided to take a shot at GMAT - to further my goals of manufacturing segment leadership career later in life, and really grasp the English language holistically, rather than a vocabulary centric Verbal section that the GRE has.
Before the start of preparation - I wasn't even aware of tiny things such as:
I am running - running is a verb.
I like running - running is a noun.
He came towards me, running steadily - running is a verb modifier.
The more I began to grasp these things - the more I developed an admiration for the functionality of the language. (I swear, if anything I want to retake the exam for is not for the narcissism but for the simple aspect of falling in love with how playful you can get with these things!!!!)
September :
* I spent all the time doing CR questions from LSAT exams, watching Ron's videos (which are informative and give you a way how to think and approach problems)
* The TWO MOST IMPORTANT BOOKS to improve SC: Manhattan Sentence Correction and Doing Grammar. One is not possible to do without the other. Start with Doing Grammar first. Morenberg will entice you and make you fall in love!!
I found Doing Grammar on an online ads site and bought it immediately. I read Doing Grammar thrice, spending over total 40-50 hours reading through it, absorbing it, and then doing all the practice sentences at the end of it. I promise, if you really follow the book like a gospel, there will never be any doubt about problems in structures, nouns, or sentence constructions EVER!!!! Only thing that will ever remain for you to practice will then be to focus on meaning of sentences. After this book, Manhattan Sentence Correction will seem like a breeze read, and more exciting instead of bland rules alone!
October :
* I finished OG and Manhattan SC and took GMATPrep 2, scoring a 780 with just 2 mistakes in SC, after my last practice exam where I scored 730 with 9 mistakes in SC.
* I also did GMATPrep SC documents, CR documents, and all these questions while I referred to ManahattanGMAT forums for answers. You'll go gaga over Ron's way of approaching problems. For practice, I would often search 700+ tagged questions on GMATClub and do them time to time.
Words of Advice:
* Love what you're trying to accomplish. Thing of the bigger picture, rather than simply trying to achieve a solid score. Even if you get that score, it will be half the success if you don't translate what you learn into everyday skills (for example, I now can pinpoint mistakes in text - though mine contains several many - and I developed a reading speed at 600+ wpm, which enables me to read more books in the same time, and get more from time I have)
Things you wish you knew:
* Importance of building up to the day and keeping your cool. I ran a marathon last December, and straightaway ran a full marathon by training for a month without ever running trained 10k or half-marathons before. But GMAT is tougher than that. You'll have to build resilience and work your way slowly and steadily. Doing too much does not really help, learning to enjoy it does. And when you do the latter, you really don't feel like as if you did anything at all, because you'd keep wanting more!
Finally, your test experience:
* Just two days before my exam, I took two GMATPrep exams consecutively - scoring 770 in each. The day before my exam, I still decided to read two manhattan SC chapters. All of which did much bad to my score and exam temperament than I thought.
* Relax and chill when you write your exam. I was feeling burnt out: I was totally clouded in my mind, and I simply could not figure even basic things the exam was asking. I literally read several prompts twice-thrice. It seemed as if my vision had totally detracted itself from my thought process, and both were not even willing to cooperate. This is bad. Really bad. I would suggest you to be laidback and chilled, atleast 2-3 days before the exam. Develop yourself into the routine of waking up on time at least a week before. These tiny things add upto a lot. Moreover GMAT has 30 points standard deviation, guess what, these things can turn the meter to the upper end if done well.
I've been a long silent lurker on GMATClub and signed up only today. If anyone needs any help or guidance, I'd love to help you around, having gone through the ordeal and pangs of fortunate misfortunes!
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