IS Q46 a descent score for gmat ?

GC test is difficult compared to the real thing.
Now have you taken the official prep test? If not kindly do that to know where you stand

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Hi dasoisheretorule, it might not be a good idea to look at Quant score in isolation. How much have you been scoring in Verbal and what has been your total score?

Since a score of 700+ on GMAT is (almost) universally considered a good score, most schools would not worry too much about the Quant/Verbal split.

I have been scoring V34..though i need to work towards V40. I am appearing on November 7. Is writing whole mocks a good strategy at this point?

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Hi dasoisheretorule,

Q46 is a very nice quant score! That said, I agree that it would be helpful for you to take a full-length practice exam (completing all sections), so you can get an accurate baseline score. Once you take a practice exam, feel free to report back with your score breakdown, and I can provide some further advice. Good luck!

Hi dasoisheretorule,

November 7th is just 3 weeks from now - and depending on how you've been scoring on your CATs/mocks, that might be too soon for you to reasonably expect to hit your Score Goal. If you can answer the questions in my prior post, then I'll be happy to help you plan out this next phase of your studies.

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

Please use this and other tests to help with your quantitative training. It is not a good idea to use these tests to estimate your actual score on test day. Official GMAT materials are of different variety. Also, your test day experience will be different and the scores will use official databases.

However, you can still use third party materials to assist you. It is important though that you must be strong in the basic fundamentals of all the topics tested on the test. Doing "difficult" questions is okay, but your score will depend on not missing "many" easy to medium to some harder questions. GL!

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Hi,

I took the practice test from the official GMAT prep ( the free starter kit they provide which includes 2 CATs), I scored a measly 620 with Q48 and V28. I have 2 weeks to go before I write my exam, is there anything I can do improve my verbal.

Absolutely you should start writing whole mocks.

If you are targeting 700+, V34 Q46 would not enable you to reach your target.

Hi,

I took the practice test from the official GMAT prep ( the free starter kit they provide which includes 2 CATs), I scored a measly 620 with Q48 and V28. I have 2 weeks to go before I write my exam, is there anything I can do improve my verbal.

Hi dasoisheretorule,

If this is your first FULL practice CAT, then it's unclear whether this Score properly defines your current 'ability level' or not (re: you may have gotten a bit 'lucky' or 'unlucky' on this CAT, so your actual level might actually be in the high-500s or mid-600s). November 7th is a little less than 3 weeks away, so there will likely be a limit to how much you can improve in that time.

Regardless of how you choose to proceed with your studies, it's worth noting that each CAT is really a 'measuring device' - when used correctly, it will give you a realistic score and help define your strengths and weaknesses, but it will NOT help you to fix any of those weaknesses. To raise your scores, you have to learn the necessary Tactics and put in the proper practice and repetitions. The CAT will show you whether your studies are helping you to improve or not. As such, you really shouldn't take more than 1 FULL CAT per week.

You have not defined your Score Goal - or most of the other details behind your studies and plans - and all of that information is essential to properly planning out this next phase of your studies (and whether you should push back your Test Date or not).

Studies:
1) How long have you studied? How many hours do you typically study each week?
2) What study materials have you used so far?

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

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

Hi dasoisheretorule,

Although 2 weeks is not a lot of time, here is some advice you can follow to improve your verbal skills. I’ll start with CR.

when studying Critical Reasoning, you need to ensure that you fully understand the essence of the various question types. Do you know the importance of an assumption within an argument? Can you easily spot a conclusion? Do you know how to resolve a paradox? Do you know how to properly evaluate cause and effect? Do you know how to properly weaken or strengthen an argument? These are just a few examples; you really need to take a deep dive into the individual Critical Reasoning topics to develop the necessary skills to properly attack any Critical Reasoning questions that you encounter.

As you learn each Critical Reasoning problem type, do focused practice so that you can track your skill in answering each type. If, for example, you incorrectly answered a Weaken the Argument question, ask yourself why. Did you make a careless mistake? Did you not recognize the specific question type? Were you doing too much analysis in your head? Did you skip over a keyword in an answer choice? You must thoroughly analyze your mistakes and seek to turn weaknesses into strengths by focusing on the question types you dread seeing and the questions you take a long time to answer correctly.

When practicing Reading Comprehension, you need to develop a reading strategy that is both efficient and thorough. Reading too fast and not understanding what you have read are equally as harmful as reading too slow and using up too much time. When attacking Reading Comprehension passages, you must have one clear goal in mind: to understand the context of what you are reading. However, you must do so efficiently, so you need to avoid getting bogged down in the details of each paragraph and focus on understanding the main point of each paragraph. That being said, do not fall into the trap of thinking that you can just read the intro and the conclusion and comprehend the main idea of a paragraph. As you read a paragraph, consider how the context of the paragraph relates to previous paragraphs, so you can continue developing your overall understanding of the passage. Furthermore, as you practice Reading Comprehension, focus on the exact types of questions with which you struggle: Find the Main Idea, Inference, Author’s Tone, etc. As with Critical Reasoning, analyze your incorrect answers to better determine why you tend to get a particular question type wrong, and then improve upon your weaknesses. You can perfect your reading strategy with a lot of practice, but keep in mind that GMAT Reading Comprehension passages are not meant to be stimulating. So, to better prepare yourself to tackle such bland passages, read magazines with similar content and style, such as the New York Times, Scientific American, and Smithsonian.

Sentence Correction is a bit of a different animal compared to Reading Comprehension and Critical Reasoning. There are three aspects to getting correct answers to GMAT Sentence Correction questions: what you know, such as grammar rules, what you see, such as violations of grammar rules and the logic of sentence structure, and what you do, such as carefully considering each answer choice in the context of the non-underlined portion of the sentence. To drive up your Sentence Correction score, you likely will have to work on all three of those aspects. Furthermore, the likely reason that your Sentence Correction performance has not improved is that you have not been working on all three of those aspects.

Regarding what you know, to be successful in Sentence Correction, first and foremost, you MUST know your grammar rules. Let's be clear, though: GMAT Sentence Correction is not just a test of knowledge of grammar rules. The reason for learning grammar rules is so that you can determine what sentences convey and whether sentences are well-constructed. In fact, in many cases, incorrect answers to Sentence Correction questions are grammatically flawless. Thus, often your task is to use your knowledge of grammar rules to determine which answer choice creates the most logical sentence meaning and structure.

This determination of whether sentences are well-constructed and logical is the second aspect of finding correct answers to Sentence Correction questions, what you see. To develop this skill, you probably have to slow way down. You won't develop this skill by spending less than two minutes per question. For a while, anyway, you have to spend time with each question, maybe even ten or fifteen minutes on one question sometimes, analyzing every answer choice until you see the details that you have to see in order to choose the correct answer. As you go through the answer choices, consider the meaning conveyed by each version of the sentence. Does the meaning make sense? Even if you can tell what the version is SUPPOSED to convey, does the version really convey that meaning? Is there a verb to go with the subject? Do all pronouns clearly refer to nouns? By slowing way down and looking for these details, you learn to see what you have to see in order to clearly understand which answer to a Sentence Correction question is correct.

There is only one correct answer to any Sentence Correction question, there are clear reasons why that choice is correct and the others are not, and none of those reasons are that the correct version simply "sounds right." In fact, the correct version often sounds a little off at first. That correct answers may sound a little off is not surprising. If the correct answers were always the ones that sounded right, then most people most of the time would get Sentence Correction questions correct, without really knowing why the wrong answers were wrong and the correct answers were correct. So, you have to go beyond choosing what "sounds right" and learn to clearly see the logical reasons why one choice is better than all of the others.

As for the third aspect of getting Sentence Correction questions correct, what you do, the main thing you have to do is be very careful. You have to make sure that you are truly considering the structures of sentences and the meanings conveyed rather than allowing yourself to be tricked into choosing trap answers that sound right but don't convey meanings that make sense. You also have to make sure that you put some real energy into finding the correct answers. Finding the correct answer to a Sentence Correction question may take bouncing from choice to choice repeatedly until you start to see the differences between the choices that make all choices wrong except for one. Often, when you first look at the choices, only one or two seem obviously incorrect. Getting the right answers takes a certain work ethic. You have to put in the necessary time to see the differences between answers and to figure out the precise reasons that one choice is correct.

To improve what you do when you answer Sentence Correction questions, seek to become aware of how you are going about answering them. Are you being careful and looking for logic and details, or are you quickly eliminating choices that sound a little off and then choosing the best of the rest? If you choose an incorrect answer, consider what you did to arrive at that answer and what you could do differently to arrive at correct answers more consistently. Furthermore, see how many questions you can get correct in a row as you practice. If you break your streak by missing one, consider what you could do differently to extend your streak.

As with your Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension regimens, after learning a particular Sentence Correction topic, engage in focused practice with 30 questions or more that involve that topic. As your skills improve, you’ll then want to practice with questions that test you on skills from multiple SC topics.

You also may find my article with more information regarding
how to score a 700+ on the GMAT helpful.

Feel free to reach out with any questions.