My journey from 570 to 700

Question

Hi guys,

I gave my GMAT for the first time in June 2010 and scored a measly 570 (Q49, V20). Was thoroughly devastated that day and could not get proper sleep for weeks. But thanks to Knewton and GMAT club , my score improved by a whopping 130 points. I retook the test on the 20th of Nov and finally made it to the 700 club. My latest score is 700 (Q48, V38).

Recommendations   
 Quant 
1. GMAT club tests - IMO, the questions are of a greater difficulty level and hence they would suffice
2. Knewton GMAT - Try the extra practice section for harder problems.
For those who are weak in quant, Knewton is by far the best.

Verbal - General 
1. Knewton GMAT CATs, Knewton Extra practice homework (I found the questions in Extra practice section much more challenging than the ones in the core homework)
2. GMAT club forum - An inexhaustible set with thousands of questions. 
3. For expert answers to most Verbal questions, please check out the posts by RonPurewal (Manhattan GMAT forum)

For those who have ample time to prepare for the test, I would strongly advise them to go through the 1000s of questions in this very forum.

SC  (Dos and Don'ts)
1. MGMAT SC - This book is a collection of rules but questions are not based on the GMAT template. This book is really useful and probably covers all the SC variants ever seen on the GMAT
2. SC Bible - Hardly more than 130 questions but good coverage.

RC 
1. Aristotle - The best material available on the net. Too bad I couldn't lay my hands on this earlier
MGMAT RC is one book that was not helpful and I would never recommend this to anyone since the tome lacks coverage.
For me, RC was the toughest section

CR 
1. CR Bible - I found this quite useful since no two questions are similar. 
2. MGMAT CR - essentially similar to the bible, but good as a supplement

Test Scores   
Knewton diagnostic GMAT - 690 (Q44,V41)
Knewton Practice Test #1 - 730 (Q47,V43) 
Knewton Practice Test #2 - 720 (Q45,V45) 
Knewton Practice Test #3 - 760 (Q49,V44) 
Knewton Practice Test #4 - 730 (Q50,V39) 
Did not take the last test due to lack of time. Knewton added the 6th test recently.

Conclusion    
I hope my testimony will be useful to those who got low scores in their first attempt. I profusely thank the members of this forum for posting the official questions. I also would like to express my gratitude to Adam and Allison of Knewton for their quality tutoring.

For Knewton students - The Knewton scores (esp on the verbal) are inflated (by 4-5 points). But almost all of Knewton's questions are based on the real GMAT questions and hence the line of reasoning is similar. Also, Please dont miss out the extra practice section esp on the verbal.

Cheers,
Wormtongue

Rux10 · Answer

Thanks for the debrief! Nice breakdown. +1

I'm considering a Knewton online prep course. How did you find their teaching with regards to DS? It's a trouble area for me and i'd like to go with a prep company that can teach decent strategies.

Good luck with the apps!

Dreamy · Answer

How did you prepare for RC? That is my weak area too.

wormtongue · Answer

The good thing about knewton is that they have a zillion problems :-)

. Since I was quite strong in that area, I did not go through the extra practice section. But that section probably covers all types of problems you'd ever face on the GMAT Quant. My simple question to you - When are you planning to take the test? Please let me know your weak areas (if you have any , apart from DS) Knewton prep is good value for money.

wormtongue · Answer

As I said earlier, I did not enough time on my hands to go through Aristotle RC 99. When are you planning to take the test? If you have more than a month to go, I would strongly recommend you to use Aristotle prep's RC99. Thats probably the most comprehensive RC set available on the net.

Rux10 · Answer

Cool thanks for that info, Q is something I want to improve on a lot. Knewton sounds like a strong option and I like their prices a hell of a lot more than the others. My weak areas are definitely DS (only skimmed through proper rephrasing techniques during my study) and SC. I'm not sure how weak I am in any particular area Q or V to be honest - my error log was non existent!

Planning to take the test in the first week of April for applications in fall 2011. I had intented on applying for R1 this year but my lacklustre score (610) in October meant it wasn't to be. I have no time to cram for a couple of months and apply for R2 because I just started a new job.

Just to be clear, did you attend live person to person classes with Knewton or did you use the online service which was mainly pre-recorded tutorials on demand and some live/interactive online classes?

Thanks for the feedback! I appreciate it.

mads · Answer

Congratulations. That is very impressive and inspirational. Good Luck

wormtongue · Answer

My friend, I am from India, not Manhattan :-)

, so I was compelled to take the latter

Rux10 · Answer

Oh right! So you did't fly over for the weekly lessons then. Haha

Even more reason for me to do it online too, i'm not American either. Did the time difference prohibit your usage of the online 'live' classes? Are you applying this year for R2?

rg1 · Answer

Congrats for your score and kudos to your persistence.

wormtongue · Answer

check my pm

wormtongue · Answer

Rux10, did you get my pm?

it still shows the message in outbox folder and not sent messages folder

sv76 · Answer

Congratz for coming under list of 700 scorers..and a great jump in verbal score..How did you find GMAT Verbal questions in comparison to OG tough verbal questions .. Were GMAT CR questions lengthy and convoluted with respect to OG CRs..

prashantbacchewar · Answer

Congrats Buddy..

I have one question. There seems to be a very huge jump in the verbal score. What is that you did to improve your verbal?
I am struggling with verbal as most indians will. My verbal scores are aroung V22 can you pls give some inputs on how to improve verbal to atleast V35-36 level.

gururaya · Answer

does knewton have only online classes or do they also give us some material

sumitra · Answer

I am going to take in the next twenty days. I would like to have your suggestions. I took two GMAT tests, my scores are 520 and 530 (Q 42, V 20) for both tests. So, I plan to buy gmatclubtest for improving the quan part and I plan to buy the manhattan gmat for doing the 6 CATs. Do you think this is good approach? I also want to know where can I find exercises for verbal, I am weak on this part? (I used to work on sc1000 and OG 10, 12, Kaplan but it seems that it is not helpful). I appreciate your reply. Thank you.

wormtongue · Answer

You've already booked an appointment? If yes, then I strongly recommend you to go through Manhattan SC and Aristotle RC 99 (try the 33 easy passages first and then try the others). For CR, Powerscore CR bible is the best. And particularly for SC, go through as many questions as possible in the GMATCLUB SC subforum . That should do the trick. Take 1 CAT every 3 days and go through the explanations for each question. You just need to buy 1 MGMAT book to get access to the 6 CATs

sumitra · Answer

Dear wormtongue,

Thank you very much for your advice. I have manhattan book (that my friend gave me) so I plan to buy the 6 Manhattan CATs to practice and also the gmatclubtest. I do read SC Manhattan and CR Powerscore. But my scores are low. Do you think I did somthing wrong? So, for this time, I will follow your step by working through the exercise in Aristotle RC99 and join the GMAT Sc Forum as you mentioned.

wormtongue · Answer

Also, dont forget to check out Manhattan GMAT forum for detailed explanations( for verbal questions ) by Ron Purewal

ChrisBKnewton · Answer

Hi all,

First off, congrats on your awesome score increase,  wormtongue ! You put in some great work, so we're glad to hear you got the score you wanted.

For those of you with questions about how the Knewton course works, here are a couple of key details:

Live and on-demand classes

All our classes are online (so you never have to visit a classroom in person) but you have the option of attending live or reviewing lessons on your own schedule. There's a recorded version of every class, so if you miss a live one you can always catch up later.

Extra practice quizzes

The extra practice quizzes wormtongue mentioned come after every lesson, so you always have the option of challenging yourself beyond the required homework. Knewton recently added a set of extra-difficult quizzes, designed to be even harder than the questions you'll see on the actual GMAT.

A sixth practice CAT

We just added an additional full-length CAT two weeks ago, so students can now take 6 throughout their course.

Hope that helps, and let me know if you have any more questions.

Chris

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