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Tarmac
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Dissapointed! scored 550 AGAIN (Q41 V25) Updated on: 18 Dec 2007, 07:17
Originally posted by Tarmac on 18 Dec 2007, 07:07.
Last edited by Tarmac on 18 Dec 2007, 07:17, edited 1 time in total.
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i sincerely doubt the GMAT deducts points for guessing right (some people are so smart they know they answer in 10 seconds, other people take 10 seconds to guess, the GMAT cannot make this distinction), but personally I believe YOU MUST FINISH. I cut it really close, I had about 1:20 left for the last 2 questions in Quant, I had to make educated guesses, in retrospect I think I got both of them right but it was not an ideal situation. You must finish.
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Dissapointed! scored 550 AGAIN (Q41 V25) 18 Dec 2007, 07:13
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NY Times and WSJ are good for reading comprehension. You can usually find articles on topics which you find boring or not an expert. NY Times website has a weekly review on Sunday with long articles, 2-10 pages, try reading it and understanding it. That should help
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Dissapointed! scored 550 AGAIN (Q41 V25) 18 Dec 2007, 10:48
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I found that the reading the Economist and the Wall Street Journal is good for business and some of the political passages. National Geographic is supposed to be good for the biology passages.

Reading those everyday should help a bit.
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Dissapointed! scored 550 AGAIN (Q41 V25) 18 Dec 2007, 11:13
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Personally I don't think the Wall Street Journal or NG are similar to the passages in GMAT. the GMAT, if you look closely, uses very opinionated passages, someone is always giving their opinion about something or pointing out how another viewpoint is wrong, no matter how dull the topic. News articles and nature travelogues do not typically have this structure.

Don't get fooled by the words in the passages - you are not supposed to previously know the weird topics that come up on GMAT, and in fact you don't need to. There is no way you are going to be able to learn enough economics, sociology, and pure hardcore science to be able to learn all the words that might come up. The GMAT tests what you can ascertain about a passage without knowing anything except what is shown in the passage, i.e. are they opinionated, do they use coherent arguments, do they contradict themselves, what further fact would help you validate?

IMHO I think academic film criticism, literary criticism is a better example of the type of structure in GMAT passages.
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Dissapointed! scored 550 AGAIN (Q41 V25) 19 Dec 2007, 11:49
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Tarmac
i sincerely doubt the GMAT deducts points for guessing right (some people are so smart they know they answer in 10 seconds, other people take 10 seconds to guess, the GMAT cannot make this distinction), but personally I believe YOU MUST FINISH. I cut it really close, I had about 1:20 left for the last 2 questions in Quant, I had to make educated guesses, in retrospect I think I got both of them right but it was not an ideal situation. You must finish.
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Tarmac: dude, its just a myth, but the source came from my gmat tutor. This kid is the granddaddy in developing strats for gmat. Being in China, a great advantage is that we take our cram schools dead serious. This dude, no joke, took the exam 18 times, each time getting 780+, and was BANNED by the GMAC. This dude is on their blacklist. He and a few other tutors takes the gmat FOR FUN. These guys have tried almost anything imaginable on the exam, e.g. kicking the computer during the exam to see wherever what would happen, wasting 10 mins on the 1st q, etc.

The difference in marks is not that u're penalised for guessing right, but on a relative scale. i.e. if u got the 1st q right within 2 mins (550)and u spend 10 mins on the 2nd q, and still get it right, u'll probably end up with 600, instead of 620 if u actually done the q in 2 mins. THIS strat only applies to if you want to average out ur time and serves as a reminder NOT to indulge urself too much on a question, but if u could make 2 guesses with a minute to go and get it right, the gmat would still grade it accordingly, its when you take TOO LONG that starts to hurt ur marks.
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Dissapointed! scored 550 AGAIN (Q41 V25) 26 Dec 2007, 05:02
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rw6183
Tarmac
i sincerely doubt the GMAT deducts points for guessing right (some people are so smart they know they answer in 10 seconds, other people take 10 seconds to guess, the GMAT cannot make this distinction), but personally I believe YOU MUST FINISH. I cut it really close, I had about 1:20 left for the last 2 questions in Quant, I had to make educated guesses, in retrospect I think I got both of them right but it was not an ideal situation. You must finish.

Tarmac: dude, its just a myth, but the source came from my gmat tutor. This kid is the granddaddy in developing strats for gmat. Being in China, a great advantage is that we take our cram schools dead serious. This dude, no joke, took the exam 18 times, each time getting 780+, and was BANNED by the GMAC. This dude is on their blacklist. He and a few other tutors takes the gmat FOR FUN. These guys have tried almost anything imaginable on the exam, e.g. kicking the computer during the exam to see wherever what would happen, wasting 10 mins on the 1st q, etc.

The difference in marks is not that u're penalised for guessing right, but on a relative scale. i.e. if u got the 1st q right within 2 mins (550)and u spend 10 mins on the 2nd q, and still get it right, u'll probably end up with 600, instead of 620 if u actually done the q in 2 mins. THIS strat only applies to if you want to average out ur time and serves as a reminder NOT to indulge urself too much on a question, but if u could make 2 guesses with a minute to go and get it right, the gmat would still grade it accordingly, its when you take TOO LONG that starts to hurt ur marks.
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that is really interesting....that was sooo me in my exam. I remember the second question from quant took me way too long to answer (like probably 5 mins) because i was making careless mistake in my calculations. I know I ended up with the correct answer, but i did waste time unnecessarily. so getting a question correct is not enough to earn a complete point on a question....wow, isn't that mean? so even if you completely understand how to solve the problem, your timing on that question could still cost you points...really, what an evil exam...lol
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