Suggestion needed to improve time management in Verbal

Question

I wrote GMAT exam on 13th Oct and got a devastating 620 (Q-47, V-28).
I got 700+ in my last 3 Mocks (GMATPREP). In the Exam,that i gave 2 days before GMAT i got 750 (Q-50, V-42).
I have imbibed the e-gmat process and it helped me a lot. I was feeling confident .
On D-day, I made a good start of verbal section and i know that i was doing good because i was getting hard questions.
I managed to complete 20 questions with 29 minutes remaining and when 2nd time i saw the clock i say 15 ques left in 15 min.
At this point, i came on backup strategy. I skip one SC, attempted two SC and then got a Passage again. i tried to complete RC passage carefully cause at least that could give me 3 correct answers but then in hurry, while trying to catch-up time i skipped few questions and attempted few and finally left one. In the end i got 28 in verbal.

I want to give GMAT again because i know that this score is not the true representative of my ability. I know the concept, i know that adherence to process is the key to solve any question but i need to work on time management and need to work on reducing time i take to solve RC and CR. I took few hours for recovery, but now i have decided that i will attempt GMAT next month.

I need your valuable guidance to proceed further. I don't know where to start and how to approach now. I have wasted all GMAT PREP test (i will get at least 5-6 repeated question on every attempt). I found 800 score and MGMAT verbal test easier than GMAT level (Though Quant is harder) . I have solved OG-13 and Verbal twice , i can explain problem in each and every choice for every question in official guide (For SC). Please help me in attacking GMAT, this time i want to nail it.

Thanks in advance.

apnmmm · Answer

Happened to me too, I was consistently scoring in the range of 650 -690 in my prep tests even gmat prep. But on the actual GMAT my verbal score tanked to 18 ! I never scored that low even when I gave it for the first time without any prepartion (It has ranged from 31 to 36 usually). My quant score is 48 (I have been consistent in prep test around that score) The verbal just stumped me.. and it was hard, there were 2 very lengthy passages with hardcore economics passages and rest were philosophical and culture related. I did feel time strain, but I didn't know what to do because the passages were really lengthy (4 long paragraphs in the economics passages) and I must have wasted atleast 20 minutes on one of those passages. Then rushed through all the sc and cr.. maybe that messed it up for me. But I am also very curious to know why my Verbal scored tanked like that, i thought the worst I could get will be 30 - 31 but I was devastated when I saw 18 ! I am still not sure if I got a penalty but for sure I know that those questions and the passages were very dense material not a 20 percentiler level. If any expert could try to explain where I went wrong?

him1985 · Answer

I am also expecting for some expert replies. Need to make a new strategy for retake. Meanwhile i found this for time management. May be helpful https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gener ... strategies

sharmasneha · Answer

Hi,

I am also planning to take GMAT again. My score in the first attempt was 600 Q49 V24, although I scored 680-730 in all the MGMATs and GMATPrep tests.

Are you planning to join any GMAT course for verbal? When are you planning to take the exam?

Regards,
Sneha

LighthousePrep · Answer

Hi him1985,

I feel your pain on this. It is tough to know that you can score better than what you actually did on test day. Here are a few tips that might help you, based on the information you provided. If you'd like to discuss further, feel free to PM me. I'd be happy to help.

1) You may have heard the saying "practice does not make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect." When you are studying for the GMAT, if you weren't in the habit of keeping a timer on your desk and paying attention to pacing, I highly recommend you do that before the next exam. Early on, you may be slower, and that's okay (don't skip questions just because you didn't finish them in 1.75 minutes). But you should be tracking to make sure you are improving in your efficiency.
2) Reading speed is critical. From what I've seen, the biggest deficit that most people have on verbal is that they need more time because they spend too much of their time on reading the passages (even the short CR passage reading adds up). Rather than focusing on test tactics and strategies, sometimes you just need to read a newspaper for a dedicated time so that your reading speed goes up.
3) Stress management is very important. If your performance on test date is significantly different than your performance during practice, you are either not practicing under similar conditions (see point 1) or you are stressing yourself out.

As for recommended next steps, my suggestion would be to not focus on doing full length tests. (unless you also want to make equal improvements in your quant). Instead, split your time 80-20 on verbal-quant practice questions. There are plenty of question lists on GMATclub to choose from, or invest in a good 700 level question book from the book store (that should be plenty to keep you going for 30 days). Just focus on reinforcing the concepts you have learned, becoming more efficient, and most importantly, getting a sense for how much time elapsed to answer the question. If it helps, keep track of it on a spreadsheet so you can track what types of questions are tripping you up.

Hope this helps! Good luck, I'm sure you'll do great on the next go around!

Also - I wouldn't worry too much about the second try, persistence and an improved score can also be painted as a positive on a b-school application.

him1985 · Answer

Thanks a lot Light house Prep for your suggestion.
I will try to improve my timing on verbal only. I finished quant with 5 min left. 
You are right about timing sometimes i take more time to read passage or big CR .
I have decided to try two strategies
 8 ques per 15 min approach 
I will practice in small slots of 15 min - 3 SC, 2CR and 1 Passage (standard 3 ques)
In this way i can break exam in 15 min slot.

2nd strategy is 5 question breakup 
I will check the timer after every 5 questions - 10 min per 5 question
I i find myself more than 2 min behind then i will skip one question in next slot - probably CR
By this way i can keep myself on track

To increase my reading speed i will try to spend a good amount of time with newspaper and magazine

Any inputs to this is appreciated.

Do you suggest practice from OG one more time or practice from any other source?

him1985 · Answer

Hi Sneha, I think if we get 680-730 score in GMAT Prep then we are good with content and concepts. We need to workout on our stamina and timing. I am already current student of e-gmat and have my subscription pending. It helped me lot in SC. I will brush my skills from there one more time. For CR- Power score Bible is itself sufficient. I have to work on RC to improve my strategy. For this i found a free course on GMATPREP NOW. Here is the link. It may be helpful for you. https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gmat- ... prehension When are you planning to give GMAT and how did u prepared for your 1st attempt. Himanshu

JTuquero · Answer

Hi him1985

When studying, try grouping five verbal questions together and spend no more more than nine minutes on them. You can use this strategy on both practice questions and simulation exams. If you fall behind schedule, make a strategic guess or two to catch up. Make strategic guesses on questions that you aren’t confident on or that would take you much longer than two minutes to answer. That way, you buy yourself some time and you can spend more time on questions that you can confidently answer.

When it comes to RC, don't forget to take notes. It may seem like it'll take up some time in the beginning, but it'll actually save you time as you practice this approach more and more.

Hope this helps!

Jessica

havoc7860 · Answer

Hi Guys,

I too gave my gmat today and was shocked to see the result. On the last three GMAT prep exams(i purchased the extra exam packs) i scored 640, 680 and yesterday before the actual gmat i scored 730!! Please note that these scores were not inflated because i have not retaken these exams. But today i scored a mere 600(q47 and v26)

i am really disappointed and do not know what to do. Please suggest how to get over this hump....

Any kind of input will be highly appreciated.

Thanks,
Aamir.

i am really disappointed and do not know what to do. Please suggest how to get over this hump.... Any kind of input will be highly appreciated. Thanks, Aamir.

Suggestion needed to improve time management in Verbal

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