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Kurai
Joined: 18 Apr 2016
Last visit: 31 May 2021
Posts: 78
Own Kudos:
Given Kudos: 310
Schools: Stanford '24 Anderson (UCLA)
GMAT 1: 610 Q47 V27
GMAT 2: 710 Q50 V37
WE:Supply Chain Management (Aerospace and Defense)
Products:
21 Oct 2016, 15:56
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Hello All! After 3months of studying, I wrote my GMAT this week scoring a 620 (Q49, V26).
My previous score from last year was 610 (Q47, V27). After studying around 20 hours a week, I was very discouraged and disheartened by the 620 score.
As for my study plan, it was to work on my fundamentals first, then work on practice questions and mock exams.
Resources used:
1.) E-GMAT Verbal Online
2.) Math Revolution
3.) OG 2016
4.) GMAT Club Grammar Book
5.) Veritas Prep Practice Exams
6.) GMAT Prep Question Pack 1
7.) GMAT Prep Free, Exam Pack 1/2
With SC being my most glaring weakness, I started off with the E-GMAT Verbal online eventually going through all of the SC and CR section in the first month or so. After this, I did practice a little bit on OG and saw improvements in my SC accuracy. I then eventually signed up for MathRevolution as a goal to consistently hit the Q49/50 mark. I went through this program within a month and was hitting Q48-50 consistently in all my practice exams. I realized that the questions were not difficult and for Quant, it was about re-learning the fundamentals and avoiding silly mistakes. With this, I turned back to reviewing my verbal while taking mock exams every weekend.
Mock Exams:
GMAT Prep 1: 590 (Q47, V25) - Original CAT before any studying
GMAT Prep 2: 600 (Q47, V26)
GMAT Prep 3: 640 (Q49, V29) - 3 weeks before exam. Right after finishing Math review
GMAT Prep 4: 680 (Q49, V34) - After a week of verbal review
GMAT Prep 5: 640 (Q48, V29) - 1 week before exam
GMAT Prep 6: 650 (Q48, V31) - Day before exam
I also took just the Quantitative portion for Veritas Prep Test while I was going through Math Revolution
Veritas Prep 1: Q46
Veritas Prep 2: Q47
Veritas Prep 3: Q49
Veritas Prep 4: Q48
Veritas Prep 5: Q50
From my personal observation and experience I feel very confident on consistently hitting Q49 and on doing so on test day. I understand Q50/51 is on another level/tier so I don't believe it is worth my time to try and improve Quant at this point. That being said, my Verbal is still terrible and although I feel more comfortable after going through so many problems and covering all basic fundamentals, it is obvious I still have some serious flaws when it comes to SC especially. I do feel as though my CR and RC are on a decent level. My CR has ranged from 32-38 usually while RC has been between 32-36. Unfortunately, my CR went horribly on my exam and felt that it was much harder than the GMAT Prep or anything else I have encountered. Finally, for SC, I also felt as though the real exam was harder than what I have been practicing.
I am now looking for advice on how I should refine my SC skills to get it to a respectable level. I need to improve my accuracy and speed for SC to have a chance to improve my Verbal. MY goal is to consistently hit V34-36 so I have a shot of hitting 680+ on test day. I ran out of time before the exam last time to go through all of OG 2016 SC so that will definitely be part of my study plan for the next exam which I am planning to take either the end of November or early December.
If anyone has any advice on how I can improve (SC especially) or anything else, I would appreciate it! Also if anyone has tried the MGMAT SC or MGMAT Foundation for GMAT Verbal and would like to share their experience I would love to hear it.
Thank you for reading my long post and thank you in advance for any help!
My previous score from last year was 610 (Q47, V27). After studying around 20 hours a week, I was very discouraged and disheartened by the 620 score.
As for my study plan, it was to work on my fundamentals first, then work on practice questions and mock exams.
Resources used:
1.) E-GMAT Verbal Online
2.) Math Revolution
3.) OG 2016
4.) GMAT Club Grammar Book
5.) Veritas Prep Practice Exams
6.) GMAT Prep Question Pack 1
7.) GMAT Prep Free, Exam Pack 1/2
With SC being my most glaring weakness, I started off with the E-GMAT Verbal online eventually going through all of the SC and CR section in the first month or so. After this, I did practice a little bit on OG and saw improvements in my SC accuracy. I then eventually signed up for MathRevolution as a goal to consistently hit the Q49/50 mark. I went through this program within a month and was hitting Q48-50 consistently in all my practice exams. I realized that the questions were not difficult and for Quant, it was about re-learning the fundamentals and avoiding silly mistakes. With this, I turned back to reviewing my verbal while taking mock exams every weekend.
Mock Exams:
GMAT Prep 1: 590 (Q47, V25) - Original CAT before any studying
GMAT Prep 2: 600 (Q47, V26)
GMAT Prep 3: 640 (Q49, V29) - 3 weeks before exam. Right after finishing Math review
GMAT Prep 4: 680 (Q49, V34) - After a week of verbal review
GMAT Prep 5: 640 (Q48, V29) - 1 week before exam
GMAT Prep 6: 650 (Q48, V31) - Day before exam
I also took just the Quantitative portion for Veritas Prep Test while I was going through Math Revolution
Veritas Prep 1: Q46
Veritas Prep 2: Q47
Veritas Prep 3: Q49
Veritas Prep 4: Q48
Veritas Prep 5: Q50
From my personal observation and experience I feel very confident on consistently hitting Q49 and on doing so on test day. I understand Q50/51 is on another level/tier so I don't believe it is worth my time to try and improve Quant at this point. That being said, my Verbal is still terrible and although I feel more comfortable after going through so many problems and covering all basic fundamentals, it is obvious I still have some serious flaws when it comes to SC especially. I do feel as though my CR and RC are on a decent level. My CR has ranged from 32-38 usually while RC has been between 32-36. Unfortunately, my CR went horribly on my exam and felt that it was much harder than the GMAT Prep or anything else I have encountered. Finally, for SC, I also felt as though the real exam was harder than what I have been practicing.
I am now looking for advice on how I should refine my SC skills to get it to a respectable level. I need to improve my accuracy and speed for SC to have a chance to improve my Verbal. MY goal is to consistently hit V34-36 so I have a shot of hitting 680+ on test day. I ran out of time before the exam last time to go through all of OG 2016 SC so that will definitely be part of my study plan for the next exam which I am planning to take either the end of November or early December.
If anyone has any advice on how I can improve (SC especially) or anything else, I would appreciate it! Also if anyone has tried the MGMAT SC or MGMAT Foundation for GMAT Verbal and would like to share their experience I would love to hear it.
Thank you for reading my long post and thank you in advance for any help!
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22 Oct 2016, 10:32
Kudos
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Sorry to hear that you had a bad test day, Kurai. Clearly, you've worked really hard at this, so you deserve some score improvement!
For the most part, I think that you've had a solid approach to your GMAT studies. I like that you built your fundamentals first, and then started concentrating more on practice tests toward the end. That's a good thing. It's also good that you've stayed away from "knockoff" verbal tests -- it's simply impossible for a company like, say, Veritas to accurately copy the style of real GMAT verbal questions, so doing just the quant tests was a good move.
I'm obviously not 100% sure, but here's my theory on your SC struggles: I wonder if you've been a little bit too hyper-focused on some of the mechanics, at the expense of the big picture of SC. Many of the SC resources you've used focus on "memorizable rules" for the test -- things like parallelism or pronoun usage or idioms. Those things are really important, obviously. But I'd argue that it's equally important to make sure that you're able to think about the difference in meaning between two answer choices, and that skill basically comes down to how well you can pick up on the nuances of language. Perhaps that's something that would be worth concentrating on as you move forward.
Sure, it's also possible that you're just struggling to really understand and use those grammar rules on the test: you might know the textbook version of, say, pronoun rules, but maybe you struggle to actually notice the pronouns when you're taking the test. That's probably part of the issue, but my hunch is that you're not drilling into the meaning as deeply as you should on SC -- the mechanical rules will only get you so far.
So maybe you're already doing this, but concentrate on the grammar/usage rules on your first pass through a question, and eliminate as much as you can. Then, take whichever answer choices remain, and see if you can pin down exactly what's different between those choices -- and exactly how those differences impact the meaning. I could be wrong, but that might move the needle somewhat as you keep studying.
In terms of GMAT study materials, it looks like you haven't finished all of the verbal OG questions -- and it looks like you haven't touched the official GMAT verbal guide. Those are going to be easily the most important resources for your retake, so use those strategically.
For CR (and RC), I'd recommend using official LSATs as a supplement to the GMAT. LSATs are harder -- and there are obviously some cosmetic differences between the LSAT and the GMAT -- but the LSAT tests the same fundamental skills as GMAT CR & RC, so LSATs are a good way to build some consistency. And on CR, my hunch is that consistency is a fundamental issue for you, since there was quite a bit of variation among your GMATPrep tests and actual exam. So more practice with official materials can only help.
Last thing: I wouldn't be shocked if fatigue played a role on test day. In theory, the CR questions you saw shouldn't be any harder than the ones you saw on your GMATPrep exams, so maybe you were just a little bit more worn out on test day than when you took your practice tests? It wouldn't take much additional stress or fatigue to drop your score a few points. That, or some of the CR struggles were just bad luck -- which should even out next time, right?
Let me know how it goes!
For the most part, I think that you've had a solid approach to your GMAT studies. I like that you built your fundamentals first, and then started concentrating more on practice tests toward the end. That's a good thing. It's also good that you've stayed away from "knockoff" verbal tests -- it's simply impossible for a company like, say, Veritas to accurately copy the style of real GMAT verbal questions, so doing just the quant tests was a good move.
I'm obviously not 100% sure, but here's my theory on your SC struggles: I wonder if you've been a little bit too hyper-focused on some of the mechanics, at the expense of the big picture of SC. Many of the SC resources you've used focus on "memorizable rules" for the test -- things like parallelism or pronoun usage or idioms. Those things are really important, obviously. But I'd argue that it's equally important to make sure that you're able to think about the difference in meaning between two answer choices, and that skill basically comes down to how well you can pick up on the nuances of language. Perhaps that's something that would be worth concentrating on as you move forward.
Sure, it's also possible that you're just struggling to really understand and use those grammar rules on the test: you might know the textbook version of, say, pronoun rules, but maybe you struggle to actually notice the pronouns when you're taking the test. That's probably part of the issue, but my hunch is that you're not drilling into the meaning as deeply as you should on SC -- the mechanical rules will only get you so far.
So maybe you're already doing this, but concentrate on the grammar/usage rules on your first pass through a question, and eliminate as much as you can. Then, take whichever answer choices remain, and see if you can pin down exactly what's different between those choices -- and exactly how those differences impact the meaning. I could be wrong, but that might move the needle somewhat as you keep studying.
In terms of GMAT study materials, it looks like you haven't finished all of the verbal OG questions -- and it looks like you haven't touched the official GMAT verbal guide. Those are going to be easily the most important resources for your retake, so use those strategically.
For CR (and RC), I'd recommend using official LSATs as a supplement to the GMAT. LSATs are harder -- and there are obviously some cosmetic differences between the LSAT and the GMAT -- but the LSAT tests the same fundamental skills as GMAT CR & RC, so LSATs are a good way to build some consistency. And on CR, my hunch is that consistency is a fundamental issue for you, since there was quite a bit of variation among your GMATPrep tests and actual exam. So more practice with official materials can only help.
Last thing: I wouldn't be shocked if fatigue played a role on test day. In theory, the CR questions you saw shouldn't be any harder than the ones you saw on your GMATPrep exams, so maybe you were just a little bit more worn out on test day than when you took your practice tests? It wouldn't take much additional stress or fatigue to drop your score a few points. That, or some of the CR struggles were just bad luck -- which should even out next time, right?
Let me know how it goes!
23 Oct 2016, 16:35
Kudos
Bookmarks
Hi Kurai,
Thank you for providing such detailed information. I agree that your quant is definitely in a stable place and you should focus on increasing in your verbal knowledge in order to raise your GMAT score. Although sentence correction is your weakest topic, according to your ESR, you may consider trying to improve all aspects of verbal, so you can raise your verbal score as much as possible.
You mentioned that in your previous round of studying you went through many sentence correction problems covering all the basic fundamentals. Thus, it’s possible that you started practicing random questions prior to fully understanding the principles underlying sentence correction.
To truly master sentence correction, you must master grammar rules (parallelism, subject/verb agreement, etc.) and accepted English usage. Concentrate on one topic at a time, such as modification, and practice with as many modification questions as you can find. Only after you feel confident with modification should you move to the next topic. In addition to your dedicated study, notice grammar and usage in your everyday life. Be aware of the things you habitually read, in terms of sentence structure, how phrases are worded, and whether pronouns are easy to understand. Make sure you use proper grammar in your everyday writing as well. Have you put parallel ideas into parallel constructions? Do all of your pronouns refer appropriately to their antecedents? The more you reinforce your study with related activity outside of your study, the greater the likelihood you will master the topics and these rules of grammar will become second nature to you.
Once you feel you have sufficiently mastered sentence correction, move on to critical reasoning and reading comprehension. As with sentence correction, rather than diving straight into random practice questions, you may find it more productive to tackle each topic one at a time and follow up your learning with focused practice. For example, when learning about critical reasoning, you want to be able to learn about all aspects of critical reasoning: strengthen and weaken the conclusion, resolve the paradox, find the conclusion, must be true, etc. Follow up your learning with targeted critical reasoning practice, so you can determine your specific weaknesses within that topic. After practicing a large number of CR questions, you may find, for example, that you struggle mostly with “must be true” and “find the conclusion” questions. If that is the case, be sure to spend some time improving your knowledge of those concepts before moving on to the next verbal topic.
Finally, you may find it helpful to read my latest Poets and Quants article that provides some further advice on how to improve your GMAT verbal skills.
If you have any further questions, feel free to contact me directly.
Thank you for providing such detailed information. I agree that your quant is definitely in a stable place and you should focus on increasing in your verbal knowledge in order to raise your GMAT score. Although sentence correction is your weakest topic, according to your ESR, you may consider trying to improve all aspects of verbal, so you can raise your verbal score as much as possible.
You mentioned that in your previous round of studying you went through many sentence correction problems covering all the basic fundamentals. Thus, it’s possible that you started practicing random questions prior to fully understanding the principles underlying sentence correction.
To truly master sentence correction, you must master grammar rules (parallelism, subject/verb agreement, etc.) and accepted English usage. Concentrate on one topic at a time, such as modification, and practice with as many modification questions as you can find. Only after you feel confident with modification should you move to the next topic. In addition to your dedicated study, notice grammar and usage in your everyday life. Be aware of the things you habitually read, in terms of sentence structure, how phrases are worded, and whether pronouns are easy to understand. Make sure you use proper grammar in your everyday writing as well. Have you put parallel ideas into parallel constructions? Do all of your pronouns refer appropriately to their antecedents? The more you reinforce your study with related activity outside of your study, the greater the likelihood you will master the topics and these rules of grammar will become second nature to you.
Once you feel you have sufficiently mastered sentence correction, move on to critical reasoning and reading comprehension. As with sentence correction, rather than diving straight into random practice questions, you may find it more productive to tackle each topic one at a time and follow up your learning with focused practice. For example, when learning about critical reasoning, you want to be able to learn about all aspects of critical reasoning: strengthen and weaken the conclusion, resolve the paradox, find the conclusion, must be true, etc. Follow up your learning with targeted critical reasoning practice, so you can determine your specific weaknesses within that topic. After practicing a large number of CR questions, you may find, for example, that you struggle mostly with “must be true” and “find the conclusion” questions. If that is the case, be sure to spend some time improving your knowledge of those concepts before moving on to the next verbal topic.
Finally, you may find it helpful to read my latest Poets and Quants article that provides some further advice on how to improve your GMAT verbal skills.
If you have any further questions, feel free to contact me directly.
It's not a vocabulary test, fortunately. 
