Hello everyone I took the GMAT yesterday and scored a respectable 730 (51/40) . This was my 2nd shot at the test and I'll discuss my strategies at the end of this post; before that here's a quick summary of the books i used and my practice test scores: Books used: OGs 10, 11 & 12 SC - MGMAT SC Guide, Aristotle SC Grail , 1000 SCs (did around 300) CR - Powerscore CR Bible, LSAT questions RC - Aristotle RC Practice Test Scores (over the period Nov. 20th - Dec 14th) MGMAT 1 - 690 MGMAT 2 - 720 MGMAT 3 - 680 MGMAT 4 - 730 MGMAT 5 - 750 MGMAT 6 - 730 Kaplan Free Test - 750 Princeton Free Test - 710 Knewton Free Test - 720 GMATPrep 1 - 770 (not representative since I remembered a lot of the answers from my earlier attempt) GMATPrep 2 - 780 (not representative since I remembered a lot of the answers from my earlier attempt) Detailed Debrief & Strategies: Background - I had taken the GMAT in Sept 2010 and scored a dismal 630 (50/28). My target score was 700+ so I was definitely going to retake but before that I wanted to make sure I figured out what aspects of the test to approach differently. Quant was never a problem for me and in verbal I was quite comfortable with CR. My two problem areas were SC & RC. In my first attempt my one major weakness had been timing in the verbal section since I could just attempt around 35 questions and guess on the remaining 5-6. Specially in SC I was taking an average of around 2 minutes to get to the answer. I had primarily used MGMAT SC Guide for my SC prep the first time around and while it is an excellent book in my case it made me too conscious of trying to find out what was wrong with every option. This obviously meant i was taking too much time on SC and combined with my lack of practice in RC, this spelled disaster for me. SC Strategy - During my 2nd attempt I decided to refer to some other material as well for SC and came across two options on the GMATclub forums- egmat and Aristotle SC Grail . I was on a tight budget having to take the test twice and i had read good things abt the SC Grail book (and it was cheap at $15 ) so i thought i would give it a try. Turned out to be a great decision 'coz this bok summarizes what the GMAT will test you on in a very crisp manner and provides you with shortcuts to get to the answer in less than a minute. Overall I think MGMAT and SC Grail are more than enough for your SC prep. CR Strategy - Nothing specific since I never really had any problems in CR. Since I had already finished the OGs in my first attempt, I did a lot of LSAT practice questions though I am not a big fan of these. RC Strategy - The other problem area for me (and most students) and simply because its too boring and one just doesn't feel like practicing it. But as I have realised the only way to improve RC is by doing as many practice passages as you can, specially the long boring ones. Here I have a major grouse with most test prep companies because they spend pages discussing RC strategy but don't give you enough practice passages. The ones that do (like the OGs) ask too many questions whereas on the GMAT the idea is to skim through the passages since there won't be more than 3-4 questions from each. The only decent practice material i have come across is the Aristotle RC which provides you with good quality passages (avg. 3-4 questions each) some of which are really difficult. I religiously did each one of these passages and this has a numbing effect on me in the sense that i stopped bothering abt the 'boring' part of it and started approaching the questions in a very practical (almost mechanical) manner. Helped me big time and I recommend it to everyone. If you can do these you won't need anything else for RC believe me. I spent the last 3-4 weeks only doing full length tests (had bought the Manhattan 6-test package for this and some other free tests). Another mistake that I had made the first time around was not spending enough time analysing the tests; this time i spent more time analysing the tests than taking them and this actually helps specially by revealing trends in the questions that you are getting wrong. For example after 3-4 tests I realised that i was consistently making mistakes on 'Modification' questions in SC so I went back to Manhattan and refreshed my knowledge of Modifiers. One final word on mental strength - Test day 'nerves' play a major role in pulling down your score as no matter how confident you are the occassion does tend to get to you. Don't know how you can avoid this except to be prepared for it, though this gets better in the 2nd attempt (at least it did for me), probably because you've been there once so you know what to expect. All in all it turned out well for me in the end . Would love to address any specific queries. Cheers!

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From 630 -> 730 - Mission Accomplished....Detailed Debrief

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vivesomnium

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21 Feb 2011, 03:22

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Congratulations

Rux10

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21 Feb 2011, 07:49

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Firstly, well done! Awesome result.

Secondly, with regards to how you actually approached individual RC questions - what was your method?

For instance, did you
- Just read through once and go for the questions referring back when necessary?
- Read the question then search for answers?
- Use short hand to summarise each paragraph then go to the questions?
- Use a 'MAPS' method where you would jot down the: Main Idea, Attitude of author, Purpose of the passage, and Structure - then go to the questions?

I bough the 99RC a few minutes ago after reading your post. However at first glance there's no mention of how to approach the questions. Doing 99 questions and cementing bad/inefficient habits throughout could prove to be a big hindrance to a novice candidate's prep. If I go to the driving range and hit 1,000 golf balls without proper instruction, I might get a bit better. But after those 1,000 balls i'm going to have the same inefficient/incorrect swing and perhaps only marginally better results.

Obviously this isn't your problem and i'm happy to have those 99 questions because i'm doing a prep course that helps me with RC strategy. It just may not be the best idea for beginners to get stuck into this document without researching and adopting a decent RC strategy beforehand. Then again, I had a really bad 1st GMAT attempt so maybe I should shut up! haha

Great debrief by the way. Thanks.

Rux10

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22 Feb 2011, 00:36

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Great story and inspiring... My initial is around your base. Well done!!

mbadilemma

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22 Feb 2011, 19:27

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Congratulations on your score. Awesome Quants. I saw that you posted extensively about your Verbal prep. What about Quants?
- How much effort did you have to put in for the near perfect score?
- Also how did you pace yourself in actual test? Did you have a lot of time to spare when you were done with Q?

shovitdhar

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24 Feb 2011, 00:14

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Thanks guys for your good wishes :-D

@ Rux 10 - I had replied to this question earlier. Check out the first page of this thread

@ mbadilemma - I was always good in Quant and even in my first attempt I had got a 50. I primarily used the Manhattan Quant guides and the Kaplan Advanced book, apart from the OGs.

target2010

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27 Feb 2011, 02:26

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@Shovit
I've hit the wall in Critical Reasoning. In most of the tests, I am getting an accuracy of 70% but am unable to move beyond that. I have become pretty good at sentence correction after going through the SC Grail and Manhattan SC book,but CR is still giving me problems. I have registered for the GMAT on 16th March and am a little scared that CR may bring me down. Any suggestions ?

mbadilemma

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28 Feb 2011, 22:27

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Thanks Shovit.

shovitdhar

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02 Mar 2011, 04:59

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target2010

Did you use PowerScore CR Bible ? Secondly, did you practise enough number of questions from one question type. For example, if you were doing Assumptions, did you practice 15-20 assumption questions before moving on to other type of questions. Practising questions in blocks will really help you master that particular concept. If you're looking for additional practice questions, you may wanna use Aristotle LSAT Questionbank. However, at this point of time ,as you don't have much time left, you should focus more on test taking rather on doing new stuff. All the best.

target2010

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07 Mar 2011, 11:13

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target2010

No, I didn't use Powerscore CR Bible. I rather used Mahattan CR Guide. It was good but not all that great. Now after reading the reviews of Powerscore CR Bible ,I think I should have rather referred that book. While practising questions, I did use the strategy you have talked about. Have downloaded the Aristotle LSAT CR questionbank and started the practice.

Mongolia2HBS

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08 Mar 2011, 17:27

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Awesome improvement,
This is my mark for this thread! will read through this again.

shovitdhar

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11 Mar 2011, 07:54

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Mongolia2HBS

Awesome improvement,
This is my mark for this thread! will read through this again.

Thank you. Am glad that you found the post helpful. Wish you all the best!

deepak123gmat

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16 Mar 2011, 01:05

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Congrats shovitdhar,
Prior to GMAT, I took MGMAT un-timed tests(major mistake i made, i guess).
MGMAT CAT 1 - 660(Q42, V38)
MGMAT CAT 2 - 690(Q47, V37),
MGMAT CAT 3 - 680(Q47, 35) and
MGMAT CAT 4 - 680(Q47, Q36).

I took GMAT for the first time in November 2010 and then December 2010.
I scored 620(Q46, V29) in Nov but my score came down on second attempt to 570(Q46, V22).

During first test I realised that i was slow at solving verbal. I had only eight minutes left for last eight questions. I guessed some of them and scored 29.

So during second test I hurried during verbal. I paid more attention to time and scored even less, 22.
SC took more time than usual and i could not concentrate on RC.

Please advice how i should go about improving speed while getting more correct answers.
Thanks

shovitdhar

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18 Mar 2011, 09:55

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@deepak123gmat
If you are facing timing issues on the Verbal section,then it indicates that you SHOULD NOT be working on timing . Rather you should be working on the concepts. If your concepts are good and you have mastered the art of applying those concepts in questions, then timing would no longer remain an issue.
Think of it this way: If you ask a 1 year old kid to start running ,would he be able to do that. No. Why not ? Because he has not become strong enough ,capable enough to walk properly, let alone run.
Drawing a similar analogy here, even though you might feel that you prepared for Verbal well, ask yourself was it really the best way to prepare ? Did you prepare for each of the three areas equally well and know all the requisite strategies inside out to tackle the different time of problems ?

bob75

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22 Mar 2011, 09:06

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Thanks for helping out the folks here. Can you tell me what is the right way to do OG12 ? Should I just start with the questions sequentially or should I do them topic wise especially CR questions ?

deepak123gmat

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29 Mar 2011, 01:17

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Thanks shovitdhar.
All the best.

gmatgunner

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05 Apr 2011, 23:05

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@Shovitdhar
I have two questions
1. How do you decide when you're ready to take the GMAT ? I have been preparing for the last 2 months and am thinking of booking an appointment .
2. Most of the quant questions in OG are quite easy, what additional material can I use for practising quant (I'm already done with the concepts) ?

shovitdhar

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11 Apr 2011, 08:25

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gmatgunner

1. When you start getting scores in your practice tests close to the actual ones, then it is an indication that you're probably on the right way.
2. You can try the gmatclub Maths tests. I have heard that they have good difficulty level.

gmatgunner

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21 Apr 2011, 05:20

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Quote:

Thanks bro. Currently I'm getting around 660-680 on MGMAT CATs. Let's see hopefully this should go above 700 soon. RC is my bane

therock

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01 May 2011, 04:24

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gmatgunner

Quote:

Thanks bro. Currently I'm getting around 660-680 on MGMAT CATs. Let's see hopefully this should go above 700 soon. RC is my bane

I'm in a similar boat. I took two MGMAT CATs to see how much prepared I am and was shocked to see a 600 and a 630 on the two CATs. The quant on both the tests was inordinately difficult. I don't know whether the Quant section at least in representative of the actual GMAT. I had bad accuracy on RCs also. Planning to practice the medium level difficulty questions in RC99. Let's how much how much of improvement does doing so make ?

shovitdhar

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05 May 2011, 03:16

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therock

gmatgunner

Quote:

Thanks bro. Currently I'm getting around 660-680 on MGMAT CATs. Let's see hopefully this should go above 700 soon. RC is my bane

Don't worry the quant on the actual GMAT is not as difficult as the quant sections you're likely to see on MGMAT CATs . The questions on the actual GMAT aren't very difficult as they're in the quant section of MGMAT but rather they're tricky.

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