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07 Mar 2017, 10:42
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Hi guys, I just came back from my GMAT exam with a massive smile on my face and a - for myself - great result: 740 (Q48, V44, IR4)
I know I have been pretty anonymous on the forum, but I have exploited it massively, and therefore, I want to thank you all for making this place such a great place to learn from (and to prepare the GMAT of course
).
I won't share my journey, as I think it has been everything but ideal, and therefore, I probably would not suggest anyone to replicate it.
But, I would like to share with the forum a couple of things about my experience. Maybe they will be useful for someone else, and in this way I will "pay back" my debt with the forum.
On the preparation:
The materials I used for the preparation are MGMAT (CATs + study collection), GMAT club Test Center, GMATclub forum, and official GMAT CATs (default EP, and EP1 and EP2).
My takeaways from my preparation:
- DO an CAT assessment before start preparing. I didn't do it, I guess because I was scared of the result. As a consequence I do not know which one was my my starting point. This is a huge mistake because keeping track of the progresses is fundamental (to know where you are compared to where you want to be, and from a moral point of view to know you ARE improving).
Anyway I think my starting point was around 500 and something (mainly because my math was really really really rusty, and my English - as you can notice for this post - is everything but an "Oxfordian" one.
- DO train both quantitative and verbal parts. I did not train verbal if not during the CATs. Again huge mistake. Verbal is the part that will help you make the difference. I read this in several posts but I always ignored it. From my experience going above Q49 in quantitative is really hard, and already Q49 means a pretty well-done session.
Obviously this is not the cases for everyone, but with Q49 you have to do a pretty sound verbal part if you want to achieve a great score!
Briefly the reasons why I did not train verbal are: 1) I love quantitative skills over verbal ones, 2) My CR and RC were already pretty strong compared to my quantitative skills. 3) I hate SC xD.
How did I get V44? I need to be honest, most likely I had a really good session and a bit of luck. In my GMAT CATs my verbal has always ranged from V44 to V38, with strong CR and RC, but with really poor SC
Again learning from my mistakes I will suggest you to train really well your verbal part. (My modest opinion, for CR and RC you don't need to study anything but just train, for SC there is plenty of material to choose from and for sure you will need to study)
- Official GMAT CATs are reliable when it comes to assess you actual score on the GMAT day. In my official CATs I went from a min of 690 to a max of 750. But a part from the 690 (btw my last CAT before the actual GMAT) I was always above 700, which was my target.
For all my preparation I was super paranoid about the possibility that GMAT official CATs were easier then the actual exam: WRONG. I assure you, from my experience, GMT official CATs represent the actual level.
Why I was so paranoid? Principally because of MGMAT CATs. MGMAT CATs are amazing, but I have never got more than 650. I believe the quantitative part has problems that require too much elaboration to be done in 2 mins. I still believe MGMAT CATs are a great resource because they will help you master some great concepts that you can apply to the actual GMAT, but they are not an accurate representation of your score.
So my suggestion is train hard on MGMAT CATs and on Gmat Club Tests, but when it comes to evaluate your final score rely on the official CATs.
-Finally FORUM, FORMU, FORUM. . Really guys this place is awesome. I don't know how people can prepare the GMAT only using the official GMAT book. In that book there is one explanation per problem. In this forum for each problem you can find several explanations. My suggestion: for each problem you fail to solve because you don't know how to do it, find the explanation you understand better and you like better and put it down on you notebook. Then review the notebook frequently. As I read in this forum many times MATH IS UNIVERSAL, the same principle/reasoning beyond a problem can be beyond many other problems. Once you master the principle you will apply it and the quantitative will look far more doable.
On the test day
Not many things to say but a couple of observations.
- There is NO break between the AWA and the IR. I know this is stupid and I know probably I am the only one who did not know about that, but I swear I did not know!!!!
I think this is the main reason beyond my low IR. Finished the AWA I was expecting a break, but the IR started immediately. I got used to do a break between these two sections, and not having it threw me in pure panic. I started thinking that maybe I had to press some button to "require" the break, and I started worrying about pressing it before the quantitative part. All of this distracted me incredibly. I went blank for the first 4 questions of the IR. I was not able to figure out what the question was asking me, I was completely frozen. Then finally the 5th question was pretty straightforward and I "restarted" my brain, but I wasted half of the IR.
- Train on dividing the scratch paper. There is a great way (at least for me) to set the scratch paper for the quantitative part (https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog/2014/09/23/how-to-set-up-your-gmat-scratch-paper/), but you need to be able to set the paper in one minute. I did not train in advance as I thought one minute was more than enough. It is not if you are not trained to do that. It is a silly detail, but starting knowing your paper is well set up makes the difference.
- Keep your breaks short enough, or you will waste exam time. Between the quantitative and the verbal part I decided to take as much time as I could. I went back to the room and the time was saying 7:30/8:00. At this point the marshal (XD) has to input his credential to start the exam again. The poor old guy put the wrong credentials and he had to put them back again. Result? I lost 40 secs. I know it is nothing, but again, mentally knowing that you are already half a question behind is not nice. So calculate this variable when taking your breaks.
Having said that, I apologise for the bad grammar and the typos of my post (yes I am really tired, but yes I need to work on my verbal skills), once again I thank everyone in the forum for all their hard work and their great insight, and I hope my long post will be useful to someone in the near future!
Ciao
I know I have been pretty anonymous on the forum, but I have exploited it massively, and therefore, I want to thank you all for making this place such a great place to learn from (and to prepare the GMAT of course
).I won't share my journey, as I think it has been everything but ideal, and therefore, I probably would not suggest anyone to replicate it.
But, I would like to share with the forum a couple of things about my experience. Maybe they will be useful for someone else, and in this way I will "pay back" my debt with the forum.
On the preparation:
The materials I used for the preparation are MGMAT (CATs + study collection), GMAT club Test Center, GMATclub forum, and official GMAT CATs (default EP, and EP1 and EP2).
My takeaways from my preparation:
- DO an CAT assessment before start preparing. I didn't do it, I guess because I was scared of the result. As a consequence I do not know which one was my my starting point. This is a huge mistake because keeping track of the progresses is fundamental (to know where you are compared to where you want to be, and from a moral point of view to know you ARE improving).
Anyway I think my starting point was around 500 and something (mainly because my math was really really really rusty, and my English - as you can notice for this post - is everything but an "Oxfordian" one.
- DO train both quantitative and verbal parts. I did not train verbal if not during the CATs. Again huge mistake. Verbal is the part that will help you make the difference. I read this in several posts but I always ignored it. From my experience going above Q49 in quantitative is really hard, and already Q49 means a pretty well-done session.
Obviously this is not the cases for everyone, but with Q49 you have to do a pretty sound verbal part if you want to achieve a great score!
Briefly the reasons why I did not train verbal are: 1) I love quantitative skills over verbal ones, 2) My CR and RC were already pretty strong compared to my quantitative skills. 3) I hate SC xD.
How did I get V44? I need to be honest, most likely I had a really good session and a bit of luck. In my GMAT CATs my verbal has always ranged from V44 to V38, with strong CR and RC, but with really poor SC
Again learning from my mistakes I will suggest you to train really well your verbal part. (My modest opinion, for CR and RC you don't need to study anything but just train, for SC there is plenty of material to choose from and for sure you will need to study)
- Official GMAT CATs are reliable when it comes to assess you actual score on the GMAT day. In my official CATs I went from a min of 690 to a max of 750. But a part from the 690 (btw my last CAT before the actual GMAT) I was always above 700, which was my target.
For all my preparation I was super paranoid about the possibility that GMAT official CATs were easier then the actual exam: WRONG. I assure you, from my experience, GMT official CATs represent the actual level.
Why I was so paranoid? Principally because of MGMAT CATs. MGMAT CATs are amazing, but I have never got more than 650. I believe the quantitative part has problems that require too much elaboration to be done in 2 mins. I still believe MGMAT CATs are a great resource because they will help you master some great concepts that you can apply to the actual GMAT, but they are not an accurate representation of your score.
So my suggestion is train hard on MGMAT CATs and on Gmat Club Tests, but when it comes to evaluate your final score rely on the official CATs.
-Finally FORUM, FORMU, FORUM. . Really guys this place is awesome. I don't know how people can prepare the GMAT only using the official GMAT book. In that book there is one explanation per problem. In this forum for each problem you can find several explanations. My suggestion: for each problem you fail to solve because you don't know how to do it, find the explanation you understand better and you like better and put it down on you notebook. Then review the notebook frequently. As I read in this forum many times MATH IS UNIVERSAL, the same principle/reasoning beyond a problem can be beyond many other problems. Once you master the principle you will apply it and the quantitative will look far more doable.
On the test day
Not many things to say but a couple of observations.
- There is NO break between the AWA and the IR. I know this is stupid and I know probably I am the only one who did not know about that, but I swear I did not know!!!!
I think this is the main reason beyond my low IR. Finished the AWA I was expecting a break, but the IR started immediately. I got used to do a break between these two sections, and not having it threw me in pure panic. I started thinking that maybe I had to press some button to "require" the break, and I started worrying about pressing it before the quantitative part. All of this distracted me incredibly. I went blank for the first 4 questions of the IR. I was not able to figure out what the question was asking me, I was completely frozen. Then finally the 5th question was pretty straightforward and I "restarted" my brain, but I wasted half of the IR.
- Train on dividing the scratch paper. There is a great way (at least for me) to set the scratch paper for the quantitative part (https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog/2014/09/23/how-to-set-up-your-gmat-scratch-paper/), but you need to be able to set the paper in one minute. I did not train in advance as I thought one minute was more than enough. It is not if you are not trained to do that. It is a silly detail, but starting knowing your paper is well set up makes the difference.
- Keep your breaks short enough, or you will waste exam time. Between the quantitative and the verbal part I decided to take as much time as I could. I went back to the room and the time was saying 7:30/8:00. At this point the marshal (XD) has to input his credential to start the exam again. The poor old guy put the wrong credentials and he had to put them back again. Result? I lost 40 secs. I know it is nothing, but again, mentally knowing that you are already half a question behind is not nice. So calculate this variable when taking your breaks.
Having said that, I apologise for the bad grammar and the typos of my post (yes I am really tired, but yes I need to work on my verbal skills), once again I thank everyone in the forum for all their hard work and their great insight, and I hope my long post will be useful to someone in the near future!
Ciao
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