Huge difference in Test day and practice tests

Question

Hi, 
I have been preparing for gmat for almost 3 months. Today I gave the GMAT offline test and scored a 580 (Q48, V23). I was shocked when I saw such a score. I knew the quant was tough when I started solving the questions but still I was expecting a Q49. For verbal, I am totally blank on what went wrong. Timing was not at all a problem. 
My scores in official mock tests:

Test 1- 730 
Test 2- 760
Test 3- 770
Test 4- 770

I am quite disheartened and feel like I shouldn’t try anymore because it’s a huge test difference. The mocks were given by me on similar timings as my test day’s and without any disturbance. Please let me know what can I do now?

Posted from my mobile device

HoneyLemon · Answer

I m sorry to hear your experience . It happens sometimes. We need to accept and start preparing again as this is not the end of the world. You can take 2 day off -completely switch off- from GMAT ,and read or listen  'The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance
Book by Joshua Waitzkin'  during that time. You may relate your story in patches with that of the author.

Coming to reason for unexpected verbal score, it seems that under test-day anxiety you mostly got trapped answers in verbal as brain didn't function properly while it saw new questions other than what you have practiced.
 This happens when we focus more on the answer of any question while practicing rather than the process and learnings associated of the same.

Also I am assuming
 1. You never saw the questions those appeared in the mocks prior to your mock tests .
 2. All the mocks were taken under exact exam circumstance. 
 
Could you elaborate a bit more on your preparation so that the experts in this forum can help you.

Moreover ,you may try going through the forum debrief and consider using a course from a prep company that focuses on building the skill in terms of mastering the concepts and application of the same. In case you haven't already got, you can consider getting Target Test Prep course which is kind of cheaper as of now than other courses. Even in the verbal Pre-launch ,it has really cool questions with deep conceptual analysis, an activity that will help in building the skill and regaining the confidence.

Wish you luck for your next attempt.

globaldesi · Answer

Extremely sad to hear this
Did you feel the questions were very different from what are in mocks?
Did you run out of time?

harshtandel838 · Answer

Hey  reyarana 
I have experienced same on test day. Even I’ve encountered few difficulties:
1. Stress because of different environment, and I was rushing through section. 
2. Difficulty eliminating answers! While it’s true that OG questions are easier than actual test. Maybe it’s because OG contains retired GMAT questions (which are much direct and we can eliminate most wrong choices), while those new added questions, most involve one trap choice. Idk why? I feel that GMAT isn’t purely reasoning test but it’s testing whether we can spot that new kinda errors in options..!
3. Idk if there’s any change in algorithm in actual test! It claims that those official mocks has much similar scoring algorithm to that of the actual. But tests seem never to change over years! Idk if they’ve even updated the questions of those official mocks. 
GMAC tries to create exam difficult each coming year.! I suggest you should try to read some of debriefs of folks who’d appeared exam within few years. What are the difficulties they’d faced!! It’ll help you to gain confidence for your next test and avoid those challenges.

Posted from my mobile device

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi reyarana,

I'm sorry to hear that Test Day didn't go as well as planned. 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. Before we discuss any of those potential issues though, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

Studies:
1) What type of study routine have you been following over the last 3 months? How many hours do you typically study each week?
2) What study materials have you used so far? What “brands” of CATs/mocks have you used? 
3) On what dates (or approximate dates) did you take EACH of your CATs/mocks and how did you score on EACH (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores for EACH)?

Goals:
4) What is your overall goal score?
5) When are you planning to apply to Business School and what Schools are you planning to apply to?

If you took your Official GMAT at a Test Center, then you might also choose to purchase the Enhanced Score Report. While the ESR doesn’t provide a lot of information, there are usually a few data points that we can use to define what went wrong on Test Day (and what you should work on to score higher). If you purchase the ESR, then I'll be happy to analyze it for you.

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

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

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 V23. 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

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