ivymba wrote:
Hi ,
I had a question about the same thing .
1. Does everyone do AWA when doing these practice tests ?
2. When you say you got a 760 or 730, approximately how many questions is getting right with these kind of scores ?
I gave GMAT prep the other day I got a 590 . Here is the break down of each section .
Quant 20/37 questions right (Very poor , need lots of improvement)
Verbal 31/41 questions right (Some more room for improvement)
I understand its adaptive but a ballpark figure will help me to be more focussed in areas where I need to improve. Thanks for all your answers ..
Absolutely practice AWA's. I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone come in here and say "OMG.... I got a XXX, I totally burned out on the verbal and scored a XX!!!" and then you ask "Did you do your practice tests with the AWA" and the answer is "No...." and there you have it. You don't have to do ALL your practice tests with them - but you need to realize that the GMAT is testing your endurance as much as it tests anything else. You need to get used to 4 hours of concentration. Do exams w/ AWA's, yes.
As for the # of questions - I dont know why people focus on this... by the very definition of adaptive, the # you get right is, effectively meaningless. Someone who gets 30 easy questions right and 10 medium difficulty questions wrong, is going to score very differently from the person who gets 30 hard questions right and 10 very hard questions wrong. Similarly, someone who gets 20 hard questions right and 17 very hard wrong may well score higher than someone who gets 30 easy right and 10 medium wrong. The number of "right or wrong" has absolutely nothing to do with your final score.
I've scored 730's with numbers (that is right/wrong #'s) not that dissimilar from yours. (My verbal had 5 wrong but my math was roughly the same).
Focus not on how many you got wrong but WHAT you got wrong. Cause you know what? As you improve, you will get harder questions - which means that, in all likelyhood, the number of right and wrong answers you give wont really change dramatically - but your score will. What will have changes is WHAT you are getting wrong - and THAT will change your score.
I dont have the numbers but I think that the # of right and wrong answers never really changed for me between a 640 and a 730 - I know my verbal went down to about 5 wrong from about 7-8, and my math decreased by 2 or 3 max.... in other words, focusing on this will just make you feel discouraged.