Well, it has been a rewarding experience towards the end. Not super excited, but writing this debrief with a hope that it will help at least one person.
Attempts:
GMAT 1 650 (Q49, V29) --> Feb'14
GMAT 2 690 (Q50, V34) --> Dec'14
GMAT 3 700 (Q50, V34) --> Sept'15
GMAT 4 700 (Q51, V32) --> Oct'15
GMAT 5 740 (Q50, V40) --> Dec'15
Foundation:I built foundation for GMAT from
Manhattan GMAT materials (SC, CR and RC). Found them really good for building concepts and getting to know all question types. However, I didn’t realize full potential of Manhattan SC until my second attempt.
First Attempt: My concepts were weak in all sections. During exam, I even ended up guessing 6 questions towards the end because of time constraint.
Second attempt: I enrolled for
e-GMAT Verbal online. They rock when it comes to SC. They didn’t have
Scholaranium at that time. However, the video lectures were sufficient enough for developing concepts in SC and CR. RC was still my weakest area. I did manage to boost my verbal score from V29 to 34.
Third attempt: At this point, I again enrolled for
e-GMAT Verbal Live. This time it came with
Scholaranium, Workshops and Live Sessions. I again revised concepts. I practiced a lot from all materials that I could find on GMATClub and elsewhere. This was the mistake!! It is okay to study less and focused vs to study from tons of material. Such unplanned study coupled with pressure to perform, as I was planning to apply in R1, didn’t move my score at all. I even got psyched the moment I switched to Verbal section. I scored V34 once again, with absolutely no improvement. CR was total disaster. I had no clue what CR option I was selecting and why.
For this attempt, members of GMATClub were really helpful. To name a few, I took help on CR from
VeritasPrepKarishma and
EMPOWERgmatRichC, and for general GMAT information from
Engr2012 occasionally.
suggestions-for-increasing-v34-to-v40-after-3rd-attempt-205661.htmlThe real challenge was that I had exhausted all Official materials: OG13,
OG Verbal, GMATPrep Tests (all 4) twice. Few of the GMATClub members guided me to overcome this issue.
Forth Attempt:Having exhausted all
OG materials, I focused on question sets that GMATClub has from free GMATPrep software. Instead of focusing on multiple materials, I now focused on this question set alone. I studied in reverse order.
i) Identified questions that I got wrong and studied its detailed solutions from GMATClub posts. Rather than going through all posts for that question, I focused on posts from users who has got kudos for that thread. This approach helped me minimize time taken for study and be very focused on right approach to answer a question. Only SC and CR were part of this strategy.
ii) For RC, it was simple formula: Do one RC a day, keep errors away. Ensuring that I distribute the limited RC passages (about 40) across entire month was the key. This helped me ensure that I have at least one RC to solve on any given day. Focused mostly on reading the passage and being able to comprehend it. I tested my comprehension capability by testing my understanding with “purpose of the passage” question
For some weird reason, I messed up SC badly- worst than my first practice test or first GMAT test or any other test ever- scored 700 again, with Q51, V32.
For final attempt, I was sure that SC disaster in prior attempt was merely bad luck or some other mysterious factor!! I kept solving random questions that I received from a friend or that I found on GMATClub. One mistake that I made in this attempt was that I didn’t revise Quant at all. May be that got me Q50 instead of Q51!! I saw couple of questions in quant that I thought, I could have solved without much stress had I just revised that concept for few mins.
Consolidation from all attempts- Learning:SC: SC is more about understanding meaning of the sentence. Spend most of the time in analyzing meaning of the sentence. There is no short cut to this. It is possible to skip this part and still score in V30s, but not higher.
In SC, understanding why an option is incorrect is really important.
e-GMAT is the best possible resource for this. They have dissected all fundamentals of SC and put it in a very clear and concise way. I used their videos to revise concepts and then solved each sub topic questions selectively from
Scholaranium.
In parallel, I worked on Manhattan SC guide. Treat this guide as a bible for SC. It is really important to get a detailed view about why an option is right or wrong.
CR: I found pre-thinking most important in CR. I think not to pre-think is as good as gambling. Pre-thinking coupled with the approach mentioned by Karishma worked really well for me.
VeritasPrepKarishma:
"I suggest you to start from the position of strength - the question stem. Read the question stem first and immediately classify the question as strengthen/weaken/inference/method etc. Then you know that no matter what the argument gives you, it is still just a ... question - a question with which you know how to deal. Then keep your focus on the concept - identifying the conclusion in strengthen/weaken questions, no new information in inference questions etc. Don't worry about the subject matter - the same framework will be applicable to all questions of a specific group."
e-GMAT CR is also good. Their 600 to 700 level CR is equivalent to 700+ level on real GMAT. The explanations for CR questions and the thought process given in solutions are really great. However, I did find few 700 level
e-GMAT questions bit odd. Couple of them even felt controversial, so I didn’t practice a lot from there for 700+ levels. However, below 700 level questions on
e-GMAT are really good for applying above mentioned pre-thinking and Karishma’s strategy.
RC: RC is more about practice. I tried multiple strategies: from
Kaplan,
e-GMAT, Manhattan and so on. But none of them worked for me. The most efficient strategy that worked was to read entire passage carefully, summarize it and then attempt each questions. At start, this approach was time consuming, but with practice, one can get up to the needed speed. Try to practice 150+ RC passages before attempting real GMAT. Most importantly, do these questions on a daily basis. If GMAT is in 2 months then do 3 passages a day.
I found
e-GMAT RC to be bit off the track. For each passage, they have 4 standard questions (1: primary purpose; 2: what would author agree with; 3: function of nth paragraph; 4: which of the following is mentioned in the passage). I could literally predict the next question for each passage. I used it more as a reading practice, as passage quality was really good.
Backward learning:In V30+ zone, one generally has almost all concepts clear. At this level, it is essential to focus on backward learning. In backward learning you don’t go through all concepts one by one but essentially work backward, learning concepts that you are weak at. Basically give a practice test. Analyze it for all questions, including correct ones. Find out which questions you answered wrong and why did you mark incorrect option and why did you miss the correct option. Identify this sub-topic and relearn the concept. For SC, I went back to Manhattan SC guide and
e-GMAT videos. I even tried GMATclub questions. For correct ones try to align your approach with the best solution for given question. Once all these steps are followed, then go for next practice test and repeat the process.
Practice Tests:With right approach these tests can be used very effectively for above mentioned “backward learning”. Most students try to compare one test with another or try to relate scoring algorithm with actual gmat algorithm. Yes, it’s exciting and unavoidable. I did that until my forth attempt. But doing this has zero value addition.
Practice tests should be used relatively, and that relativity should be within the same test provider. While doing any test series (say Manhattan tests) compare your performance on M1 with M2, M2 with M3 and so on. Focus just on errors that you made in subsequent test and the area of improvement. There I no point in comparing M tests with
Veritas tests or even GMATPrep tests. If one sees improvement across M1 to M6, then the purpose of taking practice test is fulfilled. Then if time permits, take upon next test series. To occasionally estimate your score, do GMATPrep Tests. Use these 4 tests very strategically.
Exam experience:GMAT score can literally be defined as (Exam factors)*(Concept clarity)*(Understanding the trick in question). No matter how clear your concepts are, if you are adversely affected by any unfavorable exam factor then you are done. Unfavorable factors can be lack of sleep, performance pressure, time pressure or anything similar. It is essential to sleep well before the exam, no matter how good you are at concepts tested in the exam. Try to avoid performance pressure, both before and during the exam. Treat each question independent of prior and next question. Think of each question as a mini test in itself. For example, quant is a set of 37 mini tests. This trick helps in avoiding time pressure. Avoid looking at the clock. If you practice this in practice tests, then it is possible to replicate it in real exam as well.
Quant:Has been my strongest area since beginning.
i) Avoid overconfidence and revise concepts at least once before exam, if you are an expert in quant
ii) Even when I got Q51, I got a question at around 15+ in real GMAT that raised questions: how can this question be here? Have I performed bad so far? The question was as simple as if sides of square are x, then what is the diagonal of the square.
I spent most of the time in this question to make sure that what I was reading was the right thing. So, take away is that one should avoid doubting his/her performance during exam, if all of a sudden an easy questions pops up.
18 Jan 2016, 10:48
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