Need Help. Disappointing Low score in GMATPrep Mock

Question

After about 2 months of preparation, I only managed to score a Q48, V25 in my first official GMAT Mock. Did not expect this at all as I am targeting 720+ and I have given some mocks before. The timing seems to be a massive issue for me.

Really need someone to help me evaluate this performance and truly improve to be able to give the test in the next 2-3 weeks.

Looking forward to valuable inputs. 
Thank you.

MathRevolution · Answer

Hello tangokilo23,

GMAT club is one of the great platforms to get information about the GMAT official test, Study plan, Section wise instructions, and many more.

You can schedule a Free counseling(https://calendly.com/mathrevolution/1-on-1-session) session for 20 mins with one of our experts to have detailed advice on your current study plans.

A couple of things that can be a noticeable barrier to your scores would be some or all of the below.

• Inefficiency by using time-consuming Conventional method to tackle DS and PS questions still
• No expert support (maybe) who can tutor, analyze, and guide you during your learning
• Lack of many updated questions and practice in the recent exam trend
• Not well aligned with time to solve questions.

Precisely, there has to be one end-to-end solution encompassing all the points mentioned above. We also want to understand your approach to solving PS and DS questions. You can try our free diagnostic test https://www.mathrevolution.com/diagnostic/dtExamMember and receive a comprehensive study guide by topic. This test will clearly help you understand your weak areas.

Also, make a note of various possible combinations to achieve a score of 700+. The possible scores will help you track your performance after taking the mock or practice test. It will also help you maintain balance in both the sections, and you will always be in a great position to allot the study hours to a specific area accordingly.

The possible score combinations for 700+: Q should be Q 46, 47, 48, and V should be V38, 39, 40.

Take as many mock tests as you can. Regular tests will reflect the positive change in the score, and hence, your confidence will boost up. Gradually, with the help of mock tests, you will be able to compete with time and hence will be able to learn time management.

We appreciate your time and patience in reading this reply.

Should you need any further information, please do not hesitate to contact us at [email protected]

Success is within your reach.
Good luck!

Math Revolution Team

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi tangokilo23.

You have the quant section under control. Nice work. Now, to get to 720+, you can continue to increase your quant score by strengthening weaker areas of quant one by one.

The verbal section is where your biggest opportunities lie, and increasing your verbal score comes down to the following three things:

- learning more concepts

- improving your strategy/execution/overall approach

- improving your skill in seeing what's going on in the questions

By doing those three things, you'll learn to answer verbal questions more quickly and get them correct more consistently.

For a comprehensive discussion of how to increase your GMAT verbal score, see these two posts.

How to Score High on GMAT Verbal

Three Key Practice Tips for Mastering GMAT Verbal

GMATWhizTeam · Answer

Hi tangokilo23, Let me share my insights here. For scoring 700 and above, you need to get the easy medium questions right as GMAT test is adaptive in nature. You can afford making mistakes only in the later half of the Section, not in the beginning. You have to make the GMAT algorithm serve you difficult questions and get them right. For that, being conceptually clear on all topics is really vital. Not only this, you have to be good with application of concepts because GMAT is a test of application of concepts. A score of V28 indicates that you are struggling with concepts and would need to start from the basics again. Before suggesting anything specific though, I would like to understand your approach till now, what resources have you followed, how much time have you devoted per day etc. Generally speaking, the best order of prep for Verbal is SC->CR->RC. The logic behind this is the level of skills tested. SC acts as the most basic skill tester and tests your comprehension skills. CR builds on this, and also tests your analytical skills on top of the comprehension skills. Once you've mastered these two, you move on to RC, where you are tested on both the previously mentioned skills along with a third one - your ability to focus on the main point in a given passage. This way, its a natural progression of skills that you learn. As you may know, GMAT tests your inferential skills and your application skills, and as such, you need to learn not only the concepts but the application of those concepts, the methodologies to solve questions correctly and consistently. Thus I recommend going about the verbal prep in 3 phases - learn the concepts, learn the correct application methods (for e.g. a meaning based approach in SC etc), and practicing of questions. Coming to time management, time management is one of the most important skills for competitive exams that most students struggle with. There is a significant penalty for failing to complete any section of the GMAT exam, so it is also important to develop pacing skills. Once you hone your time management skills strategically, you will be confident about not missing out on any questions on the test day. The possible reason for struggling with time management in case of Verbal: Talking about the reason behind struggling with time management, you are likely taking more time to solve RC questions. The reason for this might be you are taking too long to read a passage or you might be going back and forth to the passage for every question. This happens when you don’t use the right reading strategies. Students often read the passage from a detail perspective and stuff themselves with the details. And once they come across an inferential question or a main point question, they cannot answer it and they read the passage again to find the answer. This would often lead to the wastage of time. For GMAT Verbal, it is very important that you follow the right methodology and the logical approach. Your focus has to be on eliminating four incorrect choices rather than choosing the right one. The key is to develop a solid understanding of the concepts that are typically tested on the GMAT and master the process skills that are required to solve GMAT questions. Only then, you will be able to smartly avoid the traps set by the test makers and avoid taking too much time in solving questions. • For SC – Follow the meaning based approach. • For CR – Focus on Scope Analysis and Framework driven Pre-thinking. • For RC – Involve yourself in the passage and understand why the passage is written and not just on what’s written. This should help. Important Tip – Don’t practice tons of questions directly. First focus on learning the right methods for each question. That plays a significant role in getting hard questions correct within 2 mins. The importance of using a standard resource: The only method to make sure that you invest your time, money and effort in an effective way is to use a standard resource which teaches you the concepts, strategies and also helps you work on your weaker areas. Studying using OG or a few random resources might help you to solve GMAT like questions but I’m afraid that they won’t be able to help you much from a strategy perspective. I would suggest you to go for some standard course for your Verbal preparation at least which can help you prepare in a structured and efficient manner thereby increasing your productivity. It’s always better to spare some more time on your preparation until you are ready instead of missing out on your dream colleges/ b-schools in hurry. GMATWhiz helps you with all these things as we follow a structured and methodical way of teaching things, which makes the learning process simpler and efficient. It also helps you to develop an understanding of the test maker’s intention behind asking the question. It uses an AI powered learning platform to provide you with real time improvement modules after every practice quiz. It provides you with additional concept videos and practise quizzes which helps you overcome your weaker areas in a specific topic right away without having to put in additional effort to identify your weaker areas. You can go through the below link to see how Rishabh, with a full time, hectic job schedule, improved from V33 to V41 in 20 days with GMATWhiz private tutoring, exhaustive videos, and the strategies, bringing it to a GMAT 740: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xw5TvxA_1zE You can check out GMATWhiz and go for it. Here’s a link to our free trial – https://learn.gmatwhiz.com/?page=signup Hope this helped and feel free to contact if you have any further queries. You can always write back to me here or the better way would be to connect over a call and have a discussion. You can schedule a free consultation call using the below link. Click here to schedule a call

GmatKnightTutor · Answer

After about 2 months of preparation, I only managed to score a Q48, V25 in my first official GMAT Mock. Did not expect this at all as I am targeting 720+ and I have given some mocks before. The timing seems to be a massive issue for me.

At a V25 level, it's probably fair to say there may also be fundamentals that are still a bit slippery. Improving solving approach for Verbal (methods to make your way of tackling questions more efficient) can help boost your score, though.

If you don't have a time management method, consider making some time markers to check yourself with during the exam.

Some Verbal tips:

https://www.gmatknight.com/post/5-verba ... gmat-tutor

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi tangokilo23,

Many GMATers spend 3 months (or more) of consistent study time before they hit their 'peak' scores, so if you have been studying for just 2 months, then it's likely that you just have not put in enough time and effort to score higher yet. Approximately 6 weeks ago, you posted a similar message describing your pacing issues - and we still need to define your studies in more detail before we can plan out how to ultimately 'fix' these issues. Thankfully, the GMAT is a consistent, predictable Exam, so you CAN train to score at a higher level. If your current 'ability level' is right around a 600 though, then you will almost certainly need more than just another 2-3 weeks of study time to get to the point that you can consistently score 720+.

Before I can offer you the specific advice that you’re looking for, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

1) 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)?
4) When are you planning to apply to Business School and what Schools are you planning to apply to?

760+: What GMAT Assassins Do To Score at the Highest Levels

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

Contact Rich at: [email protected]

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

Hi tangokilo23
Your Quant score reflects your ability to logic and reason out well.
However, your Verbal score needs a huge upgrade.
The Verbal score reflects that you are yet to reach to a level where the grip on concepts and fundamentals is at place. From there, you can move ahead to advance questions and build up on the time and accuracy on advance level questions.
Build up on skills to incorporate smarter strategies of elimination on questions that will help you save the precious minutes.
Nail the easy and medium questions in under 1-1:30 sec. Use the time saved to build up on the accuracy on 700 level questions.
Plan ahead to take simulated timed tests to build up on pace.
You may also check out the following links to gain more insights:
https://www.crackverbal.com/resources/t ... -the-gmat/
https://www.crackverbal.com/resources/h ... an/#part-d

Having said this, it also drops down to individual level of right planning and a structured approach.
We strongly suggest you to plan your pre with a practical and flexible approach.
Pls feel free to connect with us on any assistance.

tangokilo23 · Answer

Thank you so much for the replies. EMPOWERgmatRichC CrackverbalGMAT GMATWhizTeam MartyTargetTestPrep MathRevolution
I really appreciate it.

I am attaching this picture of my previous attempts since I began my prep.
Kindly note that I have taken significant breaks throughout this period. Most of the wrong answers lie in the later part where I have to guess at least the last 10 questions on verbal.

As per my analysis, I still feel that I do know about fundamentals (in verbal too) because when I review my prep. I catch these mistakes easily. Rather it is the application part where I really lack under time pressure or anxiety etc. (Purely what I feel, not undermining your valuable suggestions).

I know the pre-thinking, meaning-based, summary based all these approaches. But I spend enormous time applying them. And still, fall for the easiest trap GMAT throws at me.

Kindly help.
Thanks.

TANMAY
EMAIL: [email protected]

Attachments

GMAT MOCKS.PNG [ 38.49 KiB | Viewed 1496 times ]

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

One thing that might be taking up time unnecessarily and causing you to have to guess on some verbal questions is pre-thinking in CR.

Pre-thinking is an extra step that takes up time in a few ways and can even lead to choosing incorrect choices.

So, one move you could make is to try ditching pre-thinking and going directly to the answer choices instead. Virtually everyone I work with who has been pre-thinking answers CR questions faster and more accurately once she or he stops pre-thinking.

For some more CR tips, see this post.  GMAT Critical Reasoning: 8 Essential Tips

GMATWhizTeam · Answer

Hi Tanmay,

I would like to have a one-on-one conversation with you. This way you can take me through the approach being followed by you to solve a question and answers some other questions to help me understand your exact pain points to suggest a plan of action. You use use the link below to schedule a call with me.

Click here to schedule a call

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi tangokilo23,

I've sent you a PM with some notes and questions.

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

	Target Test Prep - Save up to $599 $400 Discount + $99 Bonus GMAT Club Tests
	e-GMAT: 60% Off on GMAT Focus Get to 735+ from any starting point
	Magoosh increases your score, guaranteed - 15% off ALL Magoosh GMAT plans with code GMATCLUB15 + Free GMAT Club Tests.
	Manhattan Prep: $99 Bonus Score Higher on Your GMAT Exam. Guaranteed.
	Experts' Global - ~~$1720~~ $960 End-to-End GMAT Prep + App Support: 150+ Videos, 2000+ Questions, 15 FLTs +
	GMATWhiz - $299 ~~$499~~ Experience the course through a free trial.
	GMAT Club Tests - Free Included with every course purchase of $149+ View all deals

Need Help. Disappointing Low score in GMATPrep Mock

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards