Help! Stuck with a low Verbal score

I can understand that GMAT can be frustrating at times but you have to realize that if your score has been stagnant, it probably means that you are not doing the prep in the right way. GMAT is not like the other exams in which your accuracy improves as you practice more and more questions. The trick lies in learning the right methodology before you practice questions. Once you learn the methodology perfectly and apply it while solving questions, you will realize that your process of solving has become a lot more structured and you can see the results coming.

The path ahead:

So, the ideal thing to do would be to identify your weak areas and work on them. If you are struggling with the concept of a particular topic, then revisit the concept and make sure you learn perfectly this time. If it's the application part, make sure you learn the right approach to solve questions. Only after you are clear with these two, dive into practicing questions.

And deal with one topic at a time. Learning concepts, learning the methodology and practicing questions are to be done for each topic and you move to the next topic only after finishing the three steps and only if you get decent accuracy in the quiz. As you are mainly struggling with CR, I suggest you to follow a structured approach for the same. Most CR questions are based on a certain framework. Knowing the framework and thinking along the guidelines will help you solve CR questions with ease.

The test taking strategy:

Apart from your preparation, the test taking strategy plays a very important role in determining your score. GMAT uses a very complex algorithm to calculate your score. It makes sense to spend a little more time on the initial questions and get them right. This will help set your bar high and the algorithm will serve you with difficult questions.

Having said that, you need to be good enough to decide on seeing a question whether you can solve it under two minutes or not. If you wish to take a couple more minutes to solve, it's important that you spend that extra time only if you are confident that you can get the right answer. Spending 4 minutes on a single question and ultimately guessing it does not make any sense.



I'm not sure about the resource you used till now to study but if you aren't using any standard resource, then I suggest you to use one to learn the right methodology and to work on your weak areas. Instead of spending $250 on a GMAT attempt without preparing properly, it makes sense to invest the same on a good resource, prepare n the right way and then give the test.

Hope it helped. If you still need any help with the study strategy, you can get in touch with me using the below link.

Hi PiWorld17,

I’m sorry to hear how things went with your GMAT. Assuming that you took your official practice exams under realistic testing conditions, the results show that, on a good day, you are capable of scoring higher than 630. Thus, it’s quite possible that nerves, stress, tiredness, or a combination of all three negatively affected your test-day performance. However, it’s also possible that you have some lingering weaknesses that were exposed on test day. Although I’m unsure of how you prepared, it’s possible that, in your preparation, particularly in verbal, you did not really learn to do what you have to do in order to score high on the actual GMAT. Rather, you picked up on some patterns that were effective in getting you relatively high scores on practice tests. So, for you to hit your score goal, your preparation, particularly for verbal, probably needs to be more complete, meaning that you have to go through the various types of GMAT questions carefully to find your exact weaknesses, fill gaps in your knowledge, and strengthen your skills.

For verbal specifically, you have to become more skilled at clearly defining the differences between trap choices and correct answers. Otherwise, you will get stuck guessing between two choices or be surprised to find that you incorrectly answered questions that you thought you answered correctly. Becoming more skilled in this way takes carefully analyzing all of the answer choices to lots of verbal questions to develop an eye for the logical differences between the choices. In other words, you have to go beyond answering practice questions and reading explanations to doing deep analysis of questions to learn to see everything that is going on in them.

In order to follow the path described above, you may need some new quant and verbal materials, so take a look at the GMAT Club reviews for the best quant and verbal courses.

You also may find it helpful to read the following articles:

how to score a 700+ on the GMAT

Why Was My GMAT Score Lower Than My Practice Test Scores?

Hi all,

Thank you so much for your reply.

I did buy my ESR but I am not allowed to upload it. Anyway, my weakest area is RC (19th percentile). CR is pretty bad as well (38th percentile), while SC is pretty decent (81 percentile).

In terms of fundamental skills:
i) CR: Analysis / Critique 75% and Construction Plan (25%);
ii) RC: Identify Inferred Idea (50%) and Identify Stated Idea (25%);
iii) SC: Grammar (100%) and Communication (66%).

The average difficulty of the Verbal Section was medium. What I found worrying is that for the first 9-10 questions, my average time for the correct answers is 1:54 minutes and for the incorrect answers is 3:12 minutes. For the last 9-10 answers, my average time is 38 seconds, which is consistent with what I was telling you at the beginning.

To answer to your questions:

i) I had my first GMAT attempt on 11 December, 2020 and my second attempt on 4 January.
ii) So far, my studying has been pretty consistent (2-3 hours a day from Monday to Friday and 6-8 hours over the weekend).
iii) For Quant, I have used Target Test Prep, which I have found incredibly helpful. For Verbal, I have used mainly OG, just doing tons of questions without really understanding what I got wrong. The last month I have tried to use eGmat, but to be fair I do not feel that I have dedicated enough time in understanding well enough concepts and application.
iv) Unfortunately, I gave all my 6 mocks within 3 weeks (last two weeks of November and the first of December). I probably rushed too much.

v) My goal is to score 720+.
vi) My target schools are LBS and INSEAD.

I have decided to take my exam in a little bit less than one month. I have taken a few days off and I am determined to do well.

Thank you again!

Hi PiWorld17,

Before you can include attachments with your posts/PMs, you need to have at least 5 posts in the forums (right now, you have 4 posts). If you post just once more, then you should be able to post an attachment (and if you would rather not post your ESR publicly, then you can feel free to PM it directly to me. As an alternative, you can also feel free to email me directly (at Rich.C@empowergmat.com).

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

Hi,

I just mailed you my ESR.

Thank you so much.

Hi PiWorld17,

I've sent you a PM with an analysis of your ESR and some additional questions.

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

I think an ESR can give us a few more insights about your performance and your weak areas. We can connect over a zoom conference call and analyze it together. I'll PM you my mail id to which you can send your ESR.