High Quality GMAT Verbal Materials to Practice

Question

All,

GMAT Classic Verbal Only:

I am 95% done with the OG, Verbal, and Quant review questions. I am going through the ones I did incorrectly, but it seems like I almost remember the answer. I have taken Manhattan Prep. Although, outside of official questions, I highly admire and recommend MGMAT verbal questions, their pool of questions is significantly smaller (which is disappointing).

I am subscribed to GMAT Club Forum Quiz (thankfully!) and GMAT Club has incredibly vast collection of questions (highly recommended for all that are still deciding).
For Verbal (especially CR and SC), I personally prefer solving from course materials. I know Veritas does not exist anymore and MGMAT pool is not enough.  bb   Bunuel  which question bank do you recommend that is closest to OG verbal? Moreover, I am considering MBA.com's additional question banks, GMAT Official Practice Questions 1 and 2, $29.99 each. Do you know if they could repetitions of OG, V, and Q Reviews?

Thank You!

bb · Answer

Hi. For verbal, the official questions are best.

If you have used up 95% of all of the official guides and other sources, the only remaining new questions for you will be from the GMAT focus GMAT prep but I’m not sure if you want to burn those questions.

Another options would be to use the 1000 series or LSAT.

About verbal questions for $29 from nba.com, I just bought them last week and I did not see any new questions. It seems like it was the same collection as existed in the past. But I’m not sure 100%

PS. I would also caution you, though it’s probably way too late, the key to a high score is usually not in solving thousands of questions. It actually difference for different people and so for some it may indeed require but do you want to sort of speed through it Since some extent during questions is like taking a bath of razor blades and I’m not sure how many months I want to spend in it … My recommendation would be to get in and get out and try to bleed as little as you can 😂

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Engineer1 · Answer

Didn't get this part - "but do you want to sort of speed through it Since some extent during questions is like taking a bath of razor blades". Can you explain? My exam, 2nd attempt, is on Nov 28th, but I am considering moving it out by a month (and kill myself during Christmas vacation

). So, I am focusing on the test strategy, rerun of incorrect questions from OG and GMAT Club and MGMAT, but my only problem is that I remember answers to many questions that I solved even 6 months before. :/ I will still do it and see if my thought process is correct. I am definitely solving GMAT Club as well. What do you recommend me doing in this 1.5 months? I will try the 1000 series and take tests. Thank you.

bb · Answer

Hi. Sorry for confusing you. 
My comment was more about the use of your time before the exam. Everyone has a limited time and especially very limited high-quality time when you learning it’s a my recommendation is to spend most of it learning and refreshing material and using questions only as a way to check how well you’ve learned it. Some people try to learn material by taking questions and that’s a very lengthy process.

My recommendation would be to study during your peak performance times which means not after work and not after a big dinner and not in the bus. Whether you have two weeks or six weeks, I would recommend identifying weaknesses in the easy and medium level questions and the eradicating them completely. Don’t worry about high-end things too much.

I would also be focusing on timing and eliminating careless mistakes. There’s no excuse for making careless mistakes. That should be a punishable offense. 😇

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Engineer1 · Answer

Gotcha, yes I totally agree with eradicating the careless mistakes part. In the beginning, I also tried only avoiding easy and medium questions and solving 700+ level questions and it was a huge mistake. I'll concentrate on this point. thank you!

GmatKnightTutor · Answer

If you have the Official-Guide, see whether it came with any online exclusive questions you can activate/use. You can get e-versions of different guides from the MBA website.

-contact: gmatknight site | gmatclub dm

carcass · Answer

I bought it too. I also confirm: 99 % periodic no new questions.

as for 1000 series sometimes are from official sources, sometimes are good, and sometimes are really bad.

GMAT has a lot of material, well enough for a top preparation without even use a third part questions. BUT people think different, of course

Score-Quest · Answer

Have you considered exploring the GMAT Official Advanced Questions for a more challenging practice? Additionally, Manhattan Advanced Quant can be a great resource for tough quant practice. It's crucial to not just solve more questions, but to focus on understanding where you went wrong and gradually increase the difficulty level of the questions you're practicing

MartyMurray · Answer

Some additional sources:

- Official Practice Question sets 1 and 2 available on MBA.com

- Target Test Prep - If you don't want to sign up for a month, you can use the 5-day trial and get lots of practice

- LSAT CR and RC - They are not exactly the same as GMAT CR and RC, but you can still learn a lot by using them.

- GRE RC and CR - Some of the RC answers don't work quite the same as GMAT ones, but you can certainly get some good practice using these questions.

- Varsity Tutors GMAT Verbal section tests - These are the former Veritas tests. The Verbal questions are not always ideal, but you can get some reasonably good practice using them.

Engineer1 · Answer

bb  I have a follow up question. Yes, learning by taking questions is not something that I recommend too. So, I go back to basics and check Manhattan strategy guide for the verbal when I feel lost at times. I make mistake mostly due to time constraints and silly mistakes (:/). I am working on the silly mistake part. But what do I do to improve on the timing? What do I do to refresh my concepts? For example, I was doing good 80 - 85% correct on Assumption, Strengthen, and Weaken questions for a while, a month and half before. Since the past 1.5 months, my CR performance has awfully deteriorated - 40-50% correct. I am worried. Same thing happened with my test score - GMAT Official Practice Test end of September - 660, MGMAT 2 weeks later - 600, 2 more weeks later 530. This is ridiculous. I am on the verge of getting lost now. This is the reason I definitely am going to move out my date. I am targeting around 680 -700 for an evening / weekend MBA. I don't really know why this is happening. I solve the questions well with no time constraint, back to almost 80% accuracy.

Now, for SC, if my performance deteriorates, I go back to my notes and revise and do OK after. But CR used to be my relatively stronger point, and it is blowing me out of the water now. I think MGMAT strategy guides are perfect and I don't blame them for my recent performance. Practicing more is one thing. How do I improve on the concepts?

bb · Answer

It’s not exactly very clear why your critical reasoning performance has gone down but there are usual types of suspects…

1. Using a new approach or a new system after doing it based on the gut field often requires additional practice to learn it and have muscle memory for it. When starting to use a new approach, many people see their scores go down and blame the new approach but in reality they just haven’t learned to use it properly

2. Maybe you are taking harder questions. I don’t know

3. About timing, it’s good that you know that you can solve questions without time pressure. I assume the 20% you cannot solve without time pressure are the really hard ones and hopefully it’s down to just to answer choices. However, you need to learn to have an internal clock so you have a routine for solving questions without going through the multiple times and rereading them and so on and so forth. It takes different types of strategies to solve a question if you have a limited time and if you have a very limited time… my suggestion would be to only timing yourself and optimizing your approach. Read the question first, then read the passage, then read the question again, try to answer it in your mind or at least envision what the answer should be and then match that answer with the answer choices. That was the approach that worked great for me. It worked really well on the easy and medium. It did not work at all on the hard ones but that’s totally fine. Card questions require a different type of approach because they are hard and they don’t really fit very easily into simple patterns. Instead they rely on scope and relationships and that requires almost a gut feel and reaction for what’s within the scope and in the proper relationship. For that purpose, I would separate hard questions away from medium and easy and make sure you can master easy and medium questions first and that you have those done solidly.

They should be enough for a week of a headache for you 😂😇 but hopefully improvement more than headache

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Engineer1 · Answer

bb  I did not respond for a while because I was trying to analyze and practice. Your points are spot on and I am still working on this. In a recent practice test (OG Test #4, fresh take) I got 4 out of 9 CRs wrong. As you can imagine my verbal score was very low, while by God's grace (and practice) Q was 48 (more or less consistent). I am reading through MGMAT and practiced questions. Now, I am contemplating buying the MGMAT CR only book (old one when MGMAT was a separate entity I guess) from Amazon. Do you or does anyone know if the content is any different / advanced from MGMAT All the Verbal? (Just as a reminder - I am subscribed to the MGMAT course)

Thank you!

bb · Answer

Hi. You can definitely get the standalone Manhattan critical reasoning book or the PowerScore critical reasoning book.

The Manhattan book 6th edition was my favorite

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