GMAT 600 Strategy, Verbal focus

Question

Hi guys,

I am currently prepping for the GMAT and with the goal of a 600+ score I though I was doing quite good, as after reviewing the MGMAT Strategy Guide series I took a test prep with the offical software and got a 570 Q 40 V 28 (1st of November) then I concentrated more on Verbal to brush myself especially in SC and got a month later a score of 630 Q 41 and Verbal 35 (3rd of December) also took another one with 2-3 similar questions which I had before in the Verbal part but also went for 660 Q46 and V 35 (8th of December)

Also practice wise I went trough the Official Guide 2016 as well as the Verbal and the Quantitative Review.

Meanwhile I also took MGMAt CATS Scoring 
600 Q 40 V 33 (beginning of November)
630 Q 40 V 36 (two weeks later)
630 Q44 V 32(one week later / end of November)
580 Q 42 V 29 (First week of December) Can't explain myself what happened here to my Verbal score, somehow foreshadowing...

for a better overview, the scores from the GMAT prep again
570 Q40 V 28 (1st of November)
630 Q41 V35 (3rd of December)
660 Q46 V35 (8th of December)

Now I took the real one in quite good hope to get the 600 done and what happened to me was that I ended up with 570 Q 44 V 25.
In the quantitative part I was quite confident that I was doing good, also in the Verbal part I didn't had the feeling to get stuck somewhere, I understood the texts in the RC, found mistakes in SC... 
Now I am really puzzled, what is just going wrong with my Verbal skills? I though I had them under control but somehow they really act out, what are your recommendation how to use the next month to finally go for the 600+?

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi m4nk,

I'm sorry to hear that Test Day didn't go as well as planned. Your score isn't actually that far from a 600+ (or any of your practice scores). When these types of score drops occur, the two likely "causes" involve either something that was unrealistic during practice or something that was surprising (or not accounted for) on Test Day.

If you can answer a few questions, then we should be able to figure this out:

When you took your CATs:
1) Did you take the ENTIRE CAT (including the Essay and IR sections)?
2) Did you take them at home?
3) Did you take them at the same time of day as your Official GMAT?
4) Did you ever do ANYTHING during your CATs that you couldn't do on Test Day (pause the CAT, skip sections, take longer breaks, etc.)? 
5) Did you ever take a CAT more than once?

With just a few more correct answers on Test Day, you would have likely hit your score goals, so you shouldn't wait too long to retest. Have you scheduled your next GMAT appointment yet?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

m4nk · Answer

Thanks for your fast replay EMPOWER,

Getting down on your questions:

When you took your CATs:
1) Did you take the ENTIRE CAT (including the Essay and IR sections)?
Yes I always took them the same as I would do on the test day

2) Did you take them at home?
I took tests at home, at an apartment of a friend, at my girlfriends, so various places

3) Did you take them at the same time of day as your Official GMAT?
Always took them in the morning, starting between 8:30 and 9:00 am, also my real GMAT was scheduled on 9:00 am

4) Did you ever do ANYTHING during your CATs that you couldn't do on Test Day (pause the CAT, skip sections, take longer breaks, etc.)? 
Never paused, never skipped, always tried to be as close as possible to the real conditions

5) Did you ever take a CAT more than once?
As described above only the last gmat prep test with the 660 score was kind of a repetition, as I got 3 verbal questions a second time

Also in general I would like to take it again in approx 4 weeks, as I think I don't have to put that much work into quant just try to keep my level get on top of some specific problems, and mainly concentrate on verbal, but here I am puzzeled how to approach this big mess....

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi m4nk,

GMAC has publicly stated that the score that you earn on your Official GMAT is within +-30 points of actual ability. Assuming a similar 'swing' in your practice CAT scores, you're scoring right around 600 (+-30 points). Since the 660 involved a CAT that you retook, that score result is likely 'inflated', so we have to ignore it. Your Official Score (570) is at the lower end of your range.

The good news is that you could have very easily scored 600+ on Test Day, so you really just need to hone your skills over the next 4 weeks and you should hit your score goals.

1) Other than the OG books, did you use any other study resources?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made, 
Rich

OptimusPrepJanielle · Answer

A 570 is very close to your Goal score. You should certainly go for the kill.
You can certainly grab some easy points both in Quants and Verbal sections. It might not be very useful, but an ESR will give you some pointers about the sections you need to work on.

Make sure that you complete all the Official Questions from the OG, Verbal Review. If you need additional practice, you can opt for the Question Pack1. 
Since you have already take the GMAT CATs, I would recommend you to buy the Exam Pack1 from mba.com
These tests will prepare you well for the actual GMAT.

Which resources (if any) you used to study for the concepts?

m4nk · Answer

Thanks for the answers,

I used the complete Manhattan GMAT series for the underlying concepts and strategies.
To study I went trough all questions available in the OG 2016 and the Quant + Verbal Review 2016. So no other questions than the OG ones, excluding the MGMAT CATS.

Therefore I need new questions to practice as I can almost always remember the answers in the verbal part, especially for CR.

Laying out a strategy how to prep, my plan is so far to either get an old OG as a new question base to hone my quant skills further or buy a questions pack. But for verbal I am not sure if I should go through the Manhattan books again as I think I really now the underlying concepts. But looking at my prep scores and my real score verbal is doing the deal for me, the big variance in there from 36 to 25 is the problem I have to work on.

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi m4nk,

After rereading your posts, I have a couple of follow-up questions:

1) On what date did you take the Official GMAT?
2) When is your next scheduled appointment?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made, 
Rich

m4nk · Answer

Hi Rich,

the date of my official gmat was the 10th of December, but I did not schedule another appointment yet, however I am thinking of scheduling one between the 10th of January and the 20th of January.

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi m4nk,

If everything that you've posted is accurate, then it looks like you took 3 CATs in the week leading up to your Official GMAT. That was NOT a good choice - taking a FULL CAT involves a lot of effort and energy and it takes time to properly review, practice and 'recover' before taking a next one. This is one of the reasons why we advise taking no more than one CAT per week. By taking 3 in the last 7 days before your GMAT, you likely experienced some 'burn out' and your performance on Test Day suffered as a result.

Regardless of when you schedule your next GMAT, you shouldn't plan to take more than 1 FULL CAT per week going forward. By extension, your last practice CAT should be about a week before you take the GMAT.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made, 
Rich

OptimusPrepJanielle · Answer

You need to go back to a preparatory course to revisit the fundamentals. Whether to go back to the books or opt for another course purely depends on you.
We offer a free trial of our on demand course that comes up with a 50 point guarantee. You can go through the course once and see if it suits your needs.

For the practice of official questions, you can buy the Question Pack1 from mba.com.

10th of January leaves you with a lot of time to achieve your target score.

m4nk · Answer

Thanks for the input.

rich , I was prepping full time, therefore I used always a whole day to get trough the test in the morning and review all questions in the afternoon and evening. That worked well so far. But now I will go for one test a week for the next 4 weeks and try not to overload myself with input and work.

@ Janielle I will get the gmat question pack 1 to get a new source of official questions, and will also go through the last 30-40 questions of the official gmat review, quant + verbal review, as I can solve the first three quarters of the questions without any problems... Will also have a look on your offers and take the MGMAT SC Correction book back in my hand however when I initially went through it I also created some kind of cheat sheets, on these I wrote down the important principles which I review twice a week, so I think reviewing the book will not be a big game changer

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