Timing and accuracy on SC! Experts please help

Hey Sharath - I am in a similar position. Took my first mock yesterday - GMATPrep 1 - Q46V34 (650). I have been prepping for a month odd with Veritas classroom course. Havent been able to focus till last 2 weeks. I am at 1min45sec @ SC. As previously stated, timing issues don't occur in a vacuum. I rushed the second half of both V and Q. I reviewed some time tracker tips on youtube. Basically have a 'burn' list and dump out of those questions next time - eg CR with boldface (for me) matching arguments. Never seem to get them right. My target score is close to yours. My current focus area is DS and SC. As a non-native speaker I approach the SC like you do. The read and fix strategy works in the 500-600 level max. After that its tough to apply .... 80percentile onwards it gets ugly!!


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Thanks Rich for the reply,
Below are responses to your questions, looking forward to some help:

1) What study materials have you used?- Took classroom coaching with Crackverbal, used OG and VR.
2) What 'steps' do you go through on a typical SC, RC and CR prompt?-
My SC methodology:
1. Quickly sift through the choices, identify things like(which, where, Has vs have, verb+ing, pronouns etc.)-15-20 secs
2. Read and understand the original choice wrt the meaning and then eliminate (with the differences I found in the initial scan) a few choices.
3. Off the options left I re-read the un-underlined portion with the options at hand. (Here i take a lot of time to zero in on the answer).
RC-
1. Read the passage in 3-4 mins.. I do try getting the tone of the author and the overall view without getting into details.
2. General questions(30-40 sec) I answer without going back to passage, rest (1-1.3 sec) I get back to specific areas
CR-
1. Read the question whether its assumption,inference etc.
2. Understand the premise-conclusion and quickly prethink some solution.
3. Eliminate wrong options and arrive at the correct one.

Goals:
3) What is your exact Test Date?-Yet to take the date- Tentatively first week of August
4) When are you planning to apply to Business School?-- This year
5) What Schools are you planning to apply to?-Indain B schools

vismadeb

I reviewed my GMATprep 1 SC yesterday in depth, tried redoing those questions again with timer one. I took around 1 min on an average, a good percent that I got wrong earlier I could get them right this time.
What I realized was that with the time presssure, I fixated myself to pure grammatical rules.
In one of the questions I outright rejected two options because a ver+ing modifier was immediately after a (preposition+noun) and it didnt make sense.
While reviewing I understood that I was really getting into the finer details without getting a hang of the bigger picture.
Today I will try doing the same on new SC questions and update the results here.
CR-I have taken a conscious call to skip BF, unless it comes at the start. With my average timing, I will have to skip 1-2 CR and run super quick on 1-2 SC.

Do update on what worked for you and what did not!

Sharath

Hi Sharath,

Based on what you've described, it is not clear how often (or how thoroughly) you are taking notes as you work through the Verbal section. Based on the pacing issue that you describe, I have to assume that you're doing too much work "in your head" - and that is costing you a LOT of time since you end up having to reread and reread and reread portions of each question (on SCs, RCs and CRs). Thus, it might be that changing your 'process' a bit might solve all of these issues. The question is whether you can commit the next few weeks to consciously changing your approach or not.

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

I think I saw the note-taking video on Youtube. Yes I believe thats the case with my SC. I do take single line summary notes for each RC para. I rewrite PREMISE --> Conclusion logic in CR. Strategic note taking on SC may be the key. Havent practiced much OG material and thats my focus now. Will report back for sure.

Hi Sharath, should it not be step 2 first (understand the original choice wrt the meaning) and then step 1?

vismadeb

I believe notes are required for RC, because it helps us stick to the passage. CR and SC I do not think so.

EducationAisle
Yes, it ideally should be meaning first, but quickly going through the options(in say 10 secs) direct me to possible errors in the first read.
I am still trying different methods to improve my SC.