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05 Feb 2016, 14:17
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Here is some context before i start rambling on about my experience. I was looking to get a 700 as i was looking into the EMBA programs. I barely get any time off work but figured i would give myself 2 hours a day and use the weekends for mock tests. I've always been good at Math and i assumed id be good with verbal but soon realized that wasn't the case. It took me two attempts to get to my desired story and here is my summary of it
First attempt:
Materials:
Reading materials: Princeton, Kaplan, OG, E-gmat, Manhattan SC guide
Tests
rinceton, Kaplan and 800 gmat mock tests.
Test performance :
I was consistently scoring between 680-750 and felt pretty confident going in. Point to note, my quant scores were always on the higher side, 48 and over, but struggled on the verbal. I wasn't sure why and still dnt know why as english has always been my language of communication.
The night before the test i just couldn't sleep well and had the test at 8 am. Woke up feeling funny but i was confident i'd be able to crack the test. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case. Ended up with a 620 48 q and an abysmal 27 in my verbal. I was pretty upset as i thought i had all my fundamentals down and wasn't sure where i went wrong.
After doing some research i realized the flaws in my strategy:
1) Test stamina. You have to practice the test in it's entirety. No skipping AWA and IR.
2) Not sleeping well the day before the test
3) Picking quantity over quality. It's not about how many problems you solve, but it's whether you understand where you went wrong. I fell into the trap of tackling problems using the wrong strategy.
I gave myself a month before my next attempt as i figured it's more about getting my strategy right than knowledge. I got a friend of mine( she happened to score a perfect in the verbal section of her GREs) to notice the areas i was going wrong in. She gave me a couple of pointers after observing the strategies i was employing. Here are some of them
Reading Comprehension:
DO NOT USE COMMON SENSE to answer the questions. If it's not in the passage, it's not the right answer.
Sentence Correction: Do not change the meaning of the Question Stem.
Critical Reasoning: Concentrate on the conclusion for strengthen, weaken and assumption questions, and watch out for subtleties in the answer choices. I know, I Know everyone preaches these things, yet i was falling into the gmat trap. The biggest take away for me was to go through all the answer choices, justify why each answer choice is incorrect before deciding on the final answer.
I also wasn't too thrilled about my quant score and i knew i could do better. I decided to sign up for the GMAT Club tests as i heard about how challenging the quant tests were.
Attempt 2:
Materials:
Practice: OG ---> NOTHING ELSE BUT OG. Understand the concepts tested on each question and why every answer is incorrect.
Tests: Veritas, Manhattan, GMAT Prep and GMAT Club tests
I used veritas 7 practice tests + Gmat Prep tests for my full length tests over the weekends. I used the GMAT club tests to practice quant tests every alternate day and used the days in between to go over my mistakes. I used manhattan for only the verbal section. I made sure i took a verbal test every alternate day. Once i exhausted the manhattan tests, took all the GMATClub verbal tests.
For the first three works, employing these minor changes in approach I was consistently scoring in the 680-700 range and a week before the test I started hitting the 720-740 range.
Exam Day:
Did not repeat my mistake from the first attempt and decided to take the test at 2 pm to give myself sufficient time to get a good night of rest. Only problem this time around: i was down with the flu and i was debating whether i should reschedule my test. At this point I was mentally and physically exhausted from work and GMAT study, and i just wanted to be done and did not want to wait any longer. Just a FYI I do work 14-15 hour days and was running on 4-5 hours of sleep every day for over two months.
Exam time:
AWA and IR were pretty straight forward, breezed thru it and i got to the quant section. I was very careful with the first ten questions and kept going back to re check my answers as i was knocking out those questions in under a minute. I wanted to make sure i wasn't being over confident. The questions never got hard and if anything kept getting easier. I was so confident i messed up in quant and with every new question, I was telling myself i messed up pretty bad and i would need to make up with the rest of the questions if i intend on getting a decent score. My spirit was down, the flu wasn't helping and mentally I was preparing myself to retake the test. During the 8 minute break between the Quant and the Verbal section, I gave myself a pep talk in the washroom, telling myself how i need to concentrate on the verbal section to make up for my quant debacle .
Verbal started well and i was being very careful but for whatever reason i was considerably slower than usual. I blame the flu. I kept moving forward not deviating from my game plan. Once i was done with question # 30 i did a quick time check. I had 15 minutes left and 11 questions to answer. I hit the panic button and started to rush thru the remaining questions. Pretty confident i could have scored higher had I been a little more careful with my timing. At this point I basically gave up on a decent score and was mentally prepared to retake the test. Once I finished the verbal section i was so dejected with the way the exam turned out. I skipped past the survey section as i just wanted to get to the section with my score, see how bad i did, and leave. Once the score popped up i had the biggest smile on my face. 700 ( Q 51, V 33). I know i could have done better on verbal had i managed my time better and not have the flu, but i wanted a 700 and over and I got it. No complaints.
Key takeaway:
1) Veritas and GMATCLUB test quant sections are much harder than the real test but I HIGHLY recommend using them to work on your fundamentals and work on the some of the Gotchas. After doing those tests the GMAT quant section is an absolute breeze. Manhattan and Veritas Verbal do a very good job with respect to the real test. The RC's maybe a lil too dense at times but they make for a good practice session.
2) Sleep. Cannot stress how important a good night of rest before exam day is. I managed to get around 12 hours of sleep. Only positive of having the flu i guess? Those antibiotics knocked me out cold
3) Do not look beyond the OG for Verbal practice questions. You are just going to waste your time. I did that mistake the first time around and i hope none of you commit the same mistake
4) Sentence Correction came pretty naturally to me but Manhattan SC guide helped me understand some of the GMAT nuances.
I hope this helps and I'm happy to answer any questions any of you may have.
P.S thank you GMAT CLUB for the tests and having the solutions for every problem set out there. All the members of this forum, you guys are awesome. Stay awesome.
.
First attempt:
Materials:
Reading materials: Princeton, Kaplan, OG, E-gmat, Manhattan SC guide
Tests
rinceton, Kaplan and 800 gmat mock tests. Test performance :
I was consistently scoring between 680-750 and felt pretty confident going in. Point to note, my quant scores were always on the higher side, 48 and over, but struggled on the verbal. I wasn't sure why and still dnt know why as english has always been my language of communication.
The night before the test i just couldn't sleep well and had the test at 8 am. Woke up feeling funny but i was confident i'd be able to crack the test. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case. Ended up with a 620 48 q and an abysmal 27 in my verbal. I was pretty upset as i thought i had all my fundamentals down and wasn't sure where i went wrong.
After doing some research i realized the flaws in my strategy:
1) Test stamina. You have to practice the test in it's entirety. No skipping AWA and IR.
2) Not sleeping well the day before the test
3) Picking quantity over quality. It's not about how many problems you solve, but it's whether you understand where you went wrong. I fell into the trap of tackling problems using the wrong strategy.
I gave myself a month before my next attempt as i figured it's more about getting my strategy right than knowledge. I got a friend of mine( she happened to score a perfect in the verbal section of her GREs) to notice the areas i was going wrong in. She gave me a couple of pointers after observing the strategies i was employing. Here are some of them
Reading Comprehension:
DO NOT USE COMMON SENSE to answer the questions. If it's not in the passage, it's not the right answer.
Sentence Correction: Do not change the meaning of the Question Stem.
Critical Reasoning: Concentrate on the conclusion for strengthen, weaken and assumption questions, and watch out for subtleties in the answer choices. I know, I Know everyone preaches these things, yet i was falling into the gmat trap. The biggest take away for me was to go through all the answer choices, justify why each answer choice is incorrect before deciding on the final answer.
I also wasn't too thrilled about my quant score and i knew i could do better. I decided to sign up for the GMAT Club tests as i heard about how challenging the quant tests were.
Attempt 2:
Materials:
Practice: OG ---> NOTHING ELSE BUT OG. Understand the concepts tested on each question and why every answer is incorrect.
Tests: Veritas, Manhattan, GMAT Prep and GMAT Club tests
I used veritas 7 practice tests + Gmat Prep tests for my full length tests over the weekends. I used the GMAT club tests to practice quant tests every alternate day and used the days in between to go over my mistakes. I used manhattan for only the verbal section. I made sure i took a verbal test every alternate day. Once i exhausted the manhattan tests, took all the GMATClub verbal tests.
For the first three works, employing these minor changes in approach I was consistently scoring in the 680-700 range and a week before the test I started hitting the 720-740 range.
Exam Day:
Did not repeat my mistake from the first attempt and decided to take the test at 2 pm to give myself sufficient time to get a good night of rest. Only problem this time around: i was down with the flu and i was debating whether i should reschedule my test. At this point I was mentally and physically exhausted from work and GMAT study, and i just wanted to be done and did not want to wait any longer. Just a FYI I do work 14-15 hour days and was running on 4-5 hours of sleep every day for over two months.
Exam time:
AWA and IR were pretty straight forward, breezed thru it and i got to the quant section. I was very careful with the first ten questions and kept going back to re check my answers as i was knocking out those questions in under a minute. I wanted to make sure i wasn't being over confident. The questions never got hard and if anything kept getting easier. I was so confident i messed up in quant and with every new question, I was telling myself i messed up pretty bad and i would need to make up with the rest of the questions if i intend on getting a decent score. My spirit was down, the flu wasn't helping and mentally I was preparing myself to retake the test. During the 8 minute break between the Quant and the Verbal section, I gave myself a pep talk in the washroom, telling myself how i need to concentrate on the verbal section to make up for my quant debacle .
Verbal started well and i was being very careful but for whatever reason i was considerably slower than usual. I blame the flu. I kept moving forward not deviating from my game plan. Once i was done with question # 30 i did a quick time check. I had 15 minutes left and 11 questions to answer. I hit the panic button and started to rush thru the remaining questions. Pretty confident i could have scored higher had I been a little more careful with my timing. At this point I basically gave up on a decent score and was mentally prepared to retake the test. Once I finished the verbal section i was so dejected with the way the exam turned out. I skipped past the survey section as i just wanted to get to the section with my score, see how bad i did, and leave. Once the score popped up i had the biggest smile on my face. 700 ( Q 51, V 33). I know i could have done better on verbal had i managed my time better and not have the flu, but i wanted a 700 and over and I got it. No complaints.
Key takeaway:
1) Veritas and GMATCLUB test quant sections are much harder than the real test but I HIGHLY recommend using them to work on your fundamentals and work on the some of the Gotchas. After doing those tests the GMAT quant section is an absolute breeze. Manhattan and Veritas Verbal do a very good job with respect to the real test. The RC's maybe a lil too dense at times but they make for a good practice session.
2) Sleep. Cannot stress how important a good night of rest before exam day is. I managed to get around 12 hours of sleep. Only positive of having the flu i guess? Those antibiotics knocked me out cold
3) Do not look beyond the OG for Verbal practice questions. You are just going to waste your time. I did that mistake the first time around and i hope none of you commit the same mistake
4) Sentence Correction came pretty naturally to me but Manhattan SC guide helped me understand some of the GMAT nuances.
I hope this helps and I'm happy to answer any questions any of you may have.
P.S thank you GMAT CLUB for the tests and having the solutions for every problem set out there. All the members of this forum, you guys are awesome. Stay awesome.
.
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