Improve RC

Ahh that phase when its either you jump into the pit and ruin it all or get lucky to reach the other end.

Fortunately, there is a third option that many people miss out on.
Before giving you advice like any boring consultant, I would like to give you a short debrief on where you are at.

Imagine yourself walking without taking a step backwards, gaining more miles with every step forward. Obviously, the earth is not flat so there will be mountains, that I am sure you have climbed with a lot of hard work. Then you kept moving, and now..... You are in front of a DEEP pit. If you fall, well... you'll have a hard time coming up.


BUT!!!!
It is a time to stop. Now is a time to take a step back. Slow down.

Why?
When you were moving ahead, subconsciously, you started generalising stuff that you learnt. I have seen the courses on e-GMAT and have been through the Manhattan guides. My suggestion currently to you is to stop worrying about time. Don't get into a thought process of "OMG! Are you kidding? it will waste my time, you're the worst!"
No it is not that, your mind is incapable of catching minor details and structure of the passage as a whole.
(Manhattan + IELTS + Veritas + my technique) combined dictate that when you read an RC, read it actively. By that I mean, read each line and find it's association with the previous line and with the paragraph as a whole. Now you need to stop after each paragraph in a long passage and see what the hell just happened and what did you read, should take about 10 seconds to get an idea. Label the paragraph. Yup, give it a title. For example, if the first paragraph talks about the history of some thing, label it " History of xyz". I fit describes personality, then sth in that direction.

Then repeat for the second paragraph

Then see the entire structure, how the passage starts and how it evolves till the last paragraph. Your labelling can make that job easier. Initially you may want to use paper and pen but slowly this thing will become second nature to you.
When you have idea to this extent, the general questions can be answered very easily.

And you now have idea of what's where, so that way if you see a "detail" question such as "according to " "Inference" and other questions such as "except... "
You can now go back and re-read and see their connection the the paragraph and passage as a whole.
If you need more help, PM me. I have started a service, currently free as we're beta testing.

Also, take about 15-20 mins if you need to solve any RC. Just focus on getting the answer than rushing to the judgement. Solve LSAT RCs to not burn the Official RCs.
Skip any vocabulary questions.

Businessconquerer

Thanks a lot for your guidance. I will follow this approach and will update you after two weeks.

Have a nice day!

Hey experts,

KarishmaB GMATNinja AjiteshArun DmitryFarber ExpertsGlobal5 mikemcgarry sayantanc2k

Could you please guide me in terms of next steps to improve my RC ability. I am facing issue of timing primarily the time to answer first question as I take a lot of time to read the passage. My time to answer the first question is roughly 1 minute 30 seconds more than the average time for others students; however, my time to answer subsequent questions is inline with average time of others. Moreover, my accuracy is also 80% in medium and hard questions.

Thanks in advance!

Hi GMATyodasimran,

There's almost always a trade-off between time taken and accuracy, so we don't know whether other students are really in a better position just because they seem to be slightly faster than you. For what it's worth, I like to read the passage carefully before moving on to the questions, and that's what I ask my students to do as well. My advice to you is to continue working through more RC passages. Don't try to rush the process, and don't try to "read fast", as that doesn't work.

Also, an accuracy rate of 80% in medium and hard questions is good, so taking an extra minute or so may not be a problem. I think you should first check whether you're facing any timing issues in the verbal section (as a whole). Have you taken an official practice test yet? If you have, were you able to finish the verbal section? By the way, if you haven't, there's no need to take a practice test immediately. Stick to your testing plan, and check for timing issues whenever you do start taking practice tests.

Another view here:
At certain times, when you are "in the zone", speed and accuracy go hand in hand... this happens because the brain does not waste effort in unneccesary and useless thoughts, which we mostly occupy our brains with, consciously and unconsciously - especially in RC, these uselss thoughts are the main hindrance, as I have observed in myself - slower the reading, more of these useless thoughts, lower is the accuracy - so I would suggest you to try reading very fast, "God speed", (and completely relaxed at the same time) - do not give your brain time or scope for such useless thoughts.... initially you may be comprehending very little from what you read, but when you keep up the practice of forcing yourself to read fast and relaxed (paradoxically: forcing yourself to relax ), it is likely that the brain will get trained to get rid off the useless thoughts.

...what they call "effortless effort" in zen terms - if you manage to get yourself "in the zone" during the GMAT, that's it!

Thanks for your thoughts AjiteshArun. I am facing a lot of timing issues in verbal section. I gave official mock 1 got(Q51, V36). I got V36 inspite of leaving 2 RC passages. Maybe the algo misjudged my ability because i did first 17 questions correct. However, after attempting 17 questions i only had 27 minutes left to answer remaining 19 questions, and then I started skimming questions. This strategy will definitely not work in the official exam. I diagnosed 2 improvement areas from mock i.e. improvement in speed in SC and RC sections. I have managed to cut my time on SC and I am progressing well on that, but in RC i am unable to see any improvement. I practiced 35 official RC's yesterday but my speed did not improve. Moreover, my accuracy also remained same as my previous levels i.e. ~95%, ~85%,~80% in easy, medium, and hard questions respectively.

Please do suggest how to got ahead as I am only left with 50% of official RC passages. Thank you!

Hi GMATyodasimran,

The algorithm did not make a mistake. You earned that V36.

If the questions you saw were "fresh", V36 with the first 17 questions correct on your first practice test is a very good sign. 27 minutes for the last 19 questions isn't ideal, but it may not be a major problem, as in my experience, most test takers don't manage time very well on their first practice test. This is not a problem unless it keeps happening. As for the improvement areas you identified, (i) I think you're doing the right thing by going after SC (I recommend 60-80 seconds as the target average for SC) and (ii) I strongly recommend that you not rush the (RC) process. You'll most likely find yourself getting a little faster with practice, but this process takes time. It's just not possible to speed-read anything other than extremely simple (or unimportant) material without sacrificing comprehension. Your accuracy is also already very good, which means that there's no "easy win" here.

I recommend that you continue working through RC passages for now, focusing on topics and/or question types that you need to work on. Also, choose a timing strategy, and use it in your practice tests.

This is the RC strategy I usually suggest:

Read the RC passage twice. One tends to miss a lot of things on the first read. The second time around, familiarity sets in and one understands the passage well. Yes, it takes time but using this strategy, when one comes to the inference questions, usually one doesn't need to refer back to the passage. Only for stated facts does one need to re-examine the relevant part of the passage.
Gmat is giving shorter but denser passages with time. This strategy works better in that case. The more questions there are per passage, the better is the result but with fewer questions, one may end up spending some extra time.
Try the strategy a few times to see if it suits your needs.

Hope you know that it's really rare for anyone to get the first 17 questions right in a practice test. So the algorithm has not misjudged your ability. (Important point: this is true ONLY if you have not seen these or similar questions earlier)

The strategy will definitely not work to get you a V45 in the official exam. It could work to get you V36.

Focus on improving your accuracy and improving your reading. "Improve your reading" means pay attention to identifying main points and understanding the structure/flow of the passage. If you have understood the passage properly, subsequent questions (after the first question) will take less time and effort.

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GMATyodasimran

First, do not allow yourself to fall behind time at all during the test. Aim for a rough benchmark of 5 questions every 9 minutes, allowing for slight wiggle room depending on the mix of question types you've seen. (For instance, if you're 10 questions in and haven't seen any SC yet, you might expect to have taken more like 20 minutes vs. 18 otherwise). If you fall behind, drop something to catch back up--usually that's CR, since those are standalone q's that take up some time. However, work on answering and moving on within time constraints so that you don't have to drop anything. As for running so far behind that you have to skip/skim an entire passage, that is only for amateurs. Don't allow it!

How long are you currently spending on your initial read of the passage (not including first question)? How greatly does this time vary, from the shortest/easiest to the longest/hardest passages?