Should I purchase the OG?

Question

Hi,

I gave the GMAT yesterday and scored 630, Q49-V28, which is really less as compared to what I have been scoring in the mocks (670-680). I have been using the material on the GMAT club extensively for the past month and a half but have not bought the OG yet. For both quants and verbal, I have solved the questions in the official guide posted by carcass but I guess that didn't suffice.

Hence, I am extremely confused on what to do right now

. Should I purchase the OG? Will it help me bridge that gap? If not, then what should be my path forward?

I plan to retake the GMAT in October. Please help!

Posted from my mobile device

. Should I purchase the OG? Will it help me bridge that gap? If not, then what should be my path forward? I plan to retake the GMAT in October. Please help! Posted from my mobile device

Shri15kumar · Answer

Hello rana2103,

I would highly recommend purchasing the OG. I have come across many posts which suggests that no other company are close to the questions as provided by the OG, after all, they are the creators. I also realised that practising quant on GMAT club tests has helped people for a smooth test on exam day. I would recommend going through the egmat free course as that will help to clear up your many doubts.

hope this helps. Do give a kudos! Thank You.

AjiteshArun · Answer

The OG is probably the most commonly recommended resource for GMAT prep, and I don't think you can go wrong using it. That said, working through the OG may or may not be the only thing you need to do. Do you have an idea about your weaknesses and how to tackle them?

GmatDaddy · Answer

Hi  rana2103

for bridging the gap, you need to figure out where the gap lies !
I would suggest you to sit one Official GmatPrep mock and rather than solving for answers, solve to figure out your weaknesses.

That way, you will atleast have a direction to start working on.
and probably make a study plan accordingly to accomplish your goal.

AkshdeepS · Answer

IMO OGs are the best books to study for GMAT along with GMAT prep tests and practice questions. You can buy OG 18 and 19 to work with as official materials are best for Verbal mainly. Quant can be done from few other resources, but Verbal must be done from standard test prep material.

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi rana2103,

GMAC has publicly stated that the Official Score that you earn on Test Day is within +/- 30 points of actual ability. Assuming a similar 'swing' in how your CATs function, it's possible that your current 'ability level' is right around 650 (+/- a few points) and that your Official Score (630) is at the 'lower end' of your range. Thankfully, the GMAT is a consistent, predictable Exam, so you CAN train to score higher. To that end, the Official Guide is a great source for practice questions, but you have to be mindful about simply jumping into that book and working through practice questions in the same ways as before. If you've developed any 'bad habits' during your studies that are keeping you from scoring higher on Test Day, then working through random prompts (even if they are the most realistic prompts) won't necessarily 'fix' any of those issues.

Before I can offer you any additional advice, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

Studies:
1) How long have you studied?
2) What study materials have you used so far?
3) How have you scored on EACH of your CATs (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores for EACH)?

Goals:
4) What is your goal score?
5) What is your exact retest date?
6) When are you planning to apply to Business School?
7) What Schools are you planning to apply to?

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

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi rana2103,

First off, awesome quant score! A Q49 is fantastic. That being said, in order to drive up your overall score, you will need to work on your verbal. Since you scored a V29, it’s clear that you lack certain GMAT verbal skills that are necessary for a high score. To develop those skills, you will need a study plan that allows you to learn linearly, such that you can slowly build GMAT mastery of one topic prior to moving on to the next. Within each topic, begin with the foundations and progress toward more advanced concepts. 
 
For example, let’s say you begin studying Critical Reasoning. Your first goal is to master the individual Critical Reasoning topics: Strengthen the Argument, Weaken the Argument, Resolve the Paradox, etc. As you learn each Critical Reasoning problem type, do focused practice so you can assess how well you understand the topic. If, for example, you incorrectly answer a Weaken the Argument question, ask yourself why. Did you make a careless mistake? Did you not recognize the specific question type? Were you doing too much analysis in your head? Did you skip over a keyword in an answer choice? You must thoroughly analyze your mistakes and seek to turn weaknesses into strengths by focusing on the question types you dread seeing and the questions you take a long time to answer correctly.

When practicing Reading Comprehension, you need to develop a reading strategy that is both efficient and thorough. Reading too fast and not understanding what you have read are equally as harmful as reading too slow and using up too much time. When attacking Reading Comprehension passages, you must have one clear goal in mind: to understand the context of what you are reading. However, you must do so efficiently, so you need to avoid getting bogged down in the details of each paragraph and focus on understanding the main point of each paragraph. That being said, do not fall into the trap of thinking that you can just read the intro and the conclusion and comprehend the main idea of a paragraph. As you are reading a paragraph, also consider how the context of the paragraph relates to previous paragraphs, so you can continue developing your overall understanding of the passage. Furthermore, as you practice Reading Comprehension, focus on the exact types of questions with which you struggle: Find the Main Idea, Inference, Author’s Tone, etc. As with Critical Reasoning, analyze your incorrect answers to better determine why you tend to get a particular question type wrong, and then improve upon your weaknesses. You can perfect your reading strategy with a lot of practice, but keep in mind that GMAT Reading Comprehension passages are not meant to be stimulating, so to better prepare yourself to tackle such passages, read magazines with similar content and style, such as the Economist, Scientific American, and Smithsonian.
 
Sentence Correction is a bit of a different animal compared to Reading Comprehension and Critical Reasoning. There are three aspects to getting correct answers to GMAT Sentence Correction questions: what you know, such as grammar rules, what you see, such as violations of grammar rules and the logic of sentence structure, and what you do, such as carefully considering each answer choice in the context of the non-underlined portion of the sentence. To drive up your Sentence Correction score, you likely will have to work on all three of those aspects. Furthermore, your Sentence Correction performance has not improved likely because you have not been working on all three of those aspects. 
 
Regarding what you know, to be successful in Sentence Correction, first and foremost, you MUST know your grammar rules. Let's be clear, though: GMAT Sentence Correction is not just a test of knowledge of grammar rules. The reason for learning grammar rules is so that you can determine what sentences convey and whether sentences are well-constructed. In fact, in many cases, incorrect answers to Sentence Correction questions are grammatically flawless. Thus, often your task is to use your knowledge of grammar rules to determine which answer choice creates the most logical sentence meaning and structure.
 
This determination of whether sentences are well-constructed and logical is the second aspect of finding correct answers to Sentence Correction questions, what you see. To develop this skill, you probably have to slow way down. You won't develop this skill by spending under two minutes per question. For a while, anyway, you have to spend time with each question, maybe even ten or fifteen minutes on one question sometimes, analyzing every answer choice until you see the details that you have to see in order to choose the correct answer. As you go through the answer choices, consider the meaning conveyed by each version of the sentence. Does the meaning make sense? Even if you can tell what the version is SUPPOSED to convey, does the version really convey that meaning? Is there a verb to go with the subject? Do all pronouns in the sentence clearly refer to nouns in the sentence? By slowing way down and looking for these details, you learn to see what you have to see in order to clearly understand which answer to a Sentence Correction question is correct.
 
There is only one correct answer to any Sentence Correction question, there are clear reasons why that choice is correct and the others are not, and those reasons are not that the correct version simply "sounds right." In fact, the correct version often sounds a little off at first. That correct answers may sound a little off is not surprising. If the correct answer were always the one that sounded right, then most people most of the time would get Sentence Correction questions correct, without really knowing why the wrong answers were wrong and the correct answers were correct. So, you have to go beyond choosing what "sounds right" and learn to clearly see the logical reasons why one choice is better than all of the others.
 
As for the third aspect of getting Sentence Correction questions correct, what you do, the main thing that you have to do is be very careful. You have to make sure that you are truly considering the structures of sentences and the meanings conveyed rather than allowing yourself to be tricked into choosing trap answers that sound right but don't convey meanings that make sense. You also have to make sure that you put some real energy into finding the correct answers. Finding the correct answer to a Sentence Correction question may take bouncing from choice to choice repeatedly until you start to see the differences between the choices that make all choices wrong except for one. Often, when you first look at the choices in a Sentence Correction question, only one or two seem obviously incorrect. It may take time for you to see what you have to see. Getting the right answers takes a certain work ethic. You have to be determined to see the differences and to figure out the precise reasons that one choice is correct.
 
To improve what you do when you answer Sentence Correction questions, seek to become aware of how you are going about answering them. For instance, are you being careful and looking for logic and details, or are you quickly eliminating choices that sound a little off and then choosing the best of the rest? If you choose an incorrect answer, consider what you did that resulted in your arriving at that answer and what you could do differently in order to arrive at correct answers more consistently. Furthermore, see how many questions you can get correct in a row as you practice. If you break your streak by missing one, consider what you could have done differently to extend your streak.

As with your Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension regimens, after learning a particular Sentence Correction topic, engage in focused practice with 30 questions or more that involve that topic. As your Sentence Correction skills improve, you’ll then want to practice with SC questions that test you on skills from multiple SC topics.
 
Ultimately, if you are unable to learn and practice in the manner described above, you may consider looking for additional verbal prep resources. If you are unsure of which resources to choose, check out some reviews here on GMAT Club.

You also may find my article with more information regarding
 how to score a 700+ on the GMAT  helpful.

Feel free to reach out with any questions.

Good luck!

rana2103 · Answer

Thanks for the advice EMPOWERgmatRichC !
To answer your questions,
Studies:
1) How long have you studied?
For approximately a month and a half

2) What study materials have you used so far?
Honestly, I haven't used any "study material" as such. I had seen lecture videos on SC, RC and CR by Veritas on YouTube and then just started solving questions from https://gmatclub.com/forum/the-official ... 68445.html and that's it I guess.

3) How have you scored on EACH of your CATs (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores for EACH)?
I scored 530(Q47, V17) in my first GMATPrep mock (this was before I started preparing). In my second GMATPrep mock I scored 620 (Q49, V27). I had 2 free Veritas mocks wherein I scored a 650 (Q48, V31) and 680 (Q47, V37) respectively.

Goals:
4) What is your goal score?
710+

5) What is your exact retest date?
I have not booked the test date yet, but mostly will be book the test on 28th October.

6) When are you planning to apply to Business School?
Right away, for 2019 batch.

7) What Schools are you planning to apply to?
ISB, IMD, Nanyang, NUS and INSEAD.

rana2103 · Answer

Thanks for the advice  AkshdeepS . Will keep that in mind! :D

rana2103 · Answer

I do not know how to thank you for that wonderful article  ScottTargetTestPrep !
I will keep that in mind, try out the method given by you and let you know the results!

Thanks! :D

EducationAisle · Answer

Hi  rana2103 , OG is a compilation of old retired GMAT questions. Unfortunately, OG's explanation to a lot of questions,  conceals  more than it reveals.

So, a better approach would be to do a self-analysis, to figure out the exact areas and topics that are your nemesis, and then subsequently build academic foundations in those areas/topics. While there is some theory given in OG, it is  not  really a text book.

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi rana2103,

To start, many Test Takers spend 3 months (or more) of consistent study time before they hit their 'peak' scores, so since you've been studying for just 1.5 months - and you don't appear to have followed a formal Study Plan - this 630 is actually a fairly strong performance. While you might naturally improve as you continue to study, raising a 630 to the point that you are consistently scoring 710+ will require some specific, focused study (and not just randomly working through lots of Verbal practice questions). Thankfully, the GMAT is consistent, predictable Exam, so you CAN train to score at a higher level.

1) What 'steps' do you go through when working on a typical SC, RC or CR prompt?
2) Going forward, how many hours do you think you can consistently study each week?

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

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

My pleasure!

Let’s do this!!

rana2103 · Answer

1) For SC:
I go by the 7 rules, see if I can eliminate a few options and bring it down to 2 or 3. Then, I read the sentences individually to figure out which one is the best on the basis of logical meaning of the sentence. Though, I always fall in the "trap" of choosing wordy sentences over smaller sentences ;

For CR:
I try to understand what the argument is all about. And then on the basis of the question asked, try to figure out which options suits the best.

For RC:
I read the passage entirely first, and then start answering the questions. In-case there is some detailed type of question, then I come back to the passage, try to locate that specific line, read it, read a few lines above and below that line and then answer the question.

2) I think, I will be able to dedicate a minimum of 15 hours a week specifically for the GMAT prep.

Please let me know what you think!

(

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi rana2103,

From what you describe about your approach to the various Verbal question types, your overall strategy for the Verbal section is somewhat generic. The Verbal section of the GMAT is remarkably consistent and predictable, so you can learn all of the patterns - and the proper Tactics - to properly deal with all of the Verbal questions. While you could potentially learn all of that content by working through random practice questions and materials, to be efficient with your time, you would likely benefit from investing in a Verbal GMAT Course of some type so that you can learn everything in an organized, logical way.

Most GMAT Companies offer some type of free materials (practice problems, Trial Accounts, videos, etc.) that you can use to 'test out' a product before you buy it. From what you describe, I think that you would find the EMPOWERgmat Verbal Score Booster to be quite helpful. Most of our clients finish that Study Plan in under a month, so it would fit your schedule perfectly. During that time, you'll also be able to access any of the Quant resources that interest you. We have a variety of free resources on our site (www.empowergmat.com), so you can 'test out' the Course before setting up an account. I suggest that you take advantage of all of the various options, then choose the one that best matches your personality, timeline and budget.

If you have any additional questions, then you can feel free to contact me directly.

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

rana2103 · Answer

Thanks for the suggestion EMPOWERgmatRichC ! I will definitely test out https://www.empowergmat.com and let you know the outcome asap! :D

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