I have never met anyone who is better at algebra than he or she is at arithmetic. As good as a person may be with algebra, that person’s going to be even better with real numbers (arithmetic). How can we use that to our advantage on the test?

Algebra and arithmetic are very similar, but algebra uses variables where arithmetic would use real numbers. On certain GMAT problems, we can taken a problem in which we were given variables and use real numbers instead “ we’re turning algebra into arithmetic!

Note: a lot of my students will complain that this method takes too much time. Of course it does when you first start studying it. You’ve been doing algebra for years, but most of you are just learning how to turn algebra into arithmetic. Think how slow you were when you first started learning algebra. Put in the practice and you’ll pick up the speed!

Read more

This week, we’re going to discuss one of the most common critical reasoning problem types: Strengthen the Conclusion. Strengthen questions belong to the Assumption Family of questions; we’ll talk more about that later.

If you haven’t yet, read this article before we try our GMATPrep problem. Then set your timer for 2 minutes and go!

In many corporations, employees are being replaced by automated equipment in order to save money. However, many workers who lose their jobs to automation will need government assistance to survive, and the same corporations that are laying people off will eventually pay for that assistance through increased taxes and unemployment insurance payments.

Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the author’s argument?

(A) Many workers who have already lost their jobs to automation have been unable to find new jobs.

(B) Many corporations that have failed to automate have seen their profits decline.

(C) Taxes and unemployment insurance are paid also by corporations that are not automating.

(D) Most of the new jobs created by automation pay less than the jobs eliminated by automation did.

(E) The initial investment in machinery for automation is often greater than the short-term savings in labor costs.

Okay, now that you’ve got an answer, let’s use our 4-step CR process.

Step 1: Identify the Question

First, we read the question stem: Read more

Recently, I gave you a GMATPrep question and started out by asking What is this thing, anyway? I’ve got another one (along similar lines) for you this week (also a GMATPrep problem).

By the way, I love this problem. Yes, I know I’m a complete dork. But it does such an amazing job of disguising what’s going on, and it looks deceptively simple, but then it’s hard to figure out an efficient way to tackle it. There’s so much to learn on this one “ that’s why I love it.

Try it out (2 minutes!):

Are x and y both positive?

(1) 2x “ 2y = 1

(2) x/y > 1

It can’t be that hard, right? It’s just asking whether they’re positive, and the equation and inequality look pretty simple, and well, let’s see how we do.

This is a theory question, first of all. How do we know that? Because they’re asking whether something is true, that thing is a characteristic (in this case, positive), and the information they give us is clearly not enough to determine a single value for x and y. Therefore, those statements are actually disguising other characteristics that can help us to tell whether these variables are always positive. Read more

I’ve got a really interesting GMATPrep problem for you today. Try it out (1 minute 15 seconds) and then we’ll talk about it!

* The striking differences between the semantic organization of Native American languages and that of European languages, in both grammar and vocabulary, have led scholars to think about the degree to which differences in language may be correlated with nonlinguistic differences.

(A) that of European languages, in both grammar and vocabulary, have

(B) that of European languages, including grammar and vocabulary, has

(C) those of European languages, which include grammar and vocabulary, have

(D) those of European languages, in grammar as well as vocabulary, has

(E) those of European languages, both in grammar and vocabulary, has

I chose this problem because I wanted to remind myself (and you!) of something that I’ve been forgetting lately. We’ve been focusing a lot on meaning and very long underlines “ sentences in which it’s not so easy to find splits or differences among the answer choices. I wanted to remind myself that sometimes they do give us some easier clues to figure out what’s going on as long as we’re paying attention to the right things.

The process that we’re going to discuss below is my first, ideal process “ if I can use this method, I will. On the more convoluted sentences “ in particular, those with serious meaning issues, which often tend to have large chunks of the sentence changing “ well, okay, I’ll use the techniques that we’ve discussed in other articles. But those techniques are harder to execute and tend to take longer, so I want to use the most streamlined process whenever I can. Read more

We haven’t tried one of these yet: multi-source reasoning. These questions will consist of 2 or 3 tabs of information with accompanying questions. MSRs tend to have 2 or 3 associated questions, though it’s possible to have just 1 or more than 3. The one we’re going to try has been released as a sample question on the mba.com website and contains just one accompanying question.

Try the problem

Let’s try out the question: here it is. Just in case that link changes, you can also click on this link to go to the next-gen GMAT website, and then, toward the bottom of the page, click on the Multi-Source Reasoning link. We’re going to try the very first problem (with the text beginning Yesterday was the deadline).

Note: when you are done, do NOT click the next button. Just leave it up on the screen and come back here.

Set your timer for 2.5 minutes and go! (Note: we have an average of 2 minutes and 30 seconds for each IR question in the section, but some question types are more complicated than others. I recommend trying this one for 2.5 minutes, but you can spend 3 to 3.5 if needed. Normally, we would have at least 2 questions and a total of at least 5 minutes to spend on an MSR prompt, but we’re answering only 1 question here.)

Read more

Last week, we talked about what to do if you’re rushing to finish the test before it changes. As promised, this week, we’re going to talk about how to add integrated reasoning to your list of tasks if you’re planning to take the Next Generation GMAT.

First of all, the quant and verbal sections are not changing at all, nor is the one essay (analysis of an argument). You can still prepare for these sections in the same way that everyone has been preparing for years.

What does Integrated Reasoning test?

GMAC (the organization that makes the GMAT) says that the Integrated Reasoning (IR) section tests our ability to apply, evaluate, infer, recognize, and strategize. But how are they actually going to do this? They have developed four new question types that test us on a combination of quant and verbal skills together. If you’re worried about IR because quant is your weakness and you like verbal much more, it won’t be as bad as you think: a decent percentage of your IR questions will be based on verbal skills such as inferring information, articulating strengths or weaknesses, and so on. If, on the other hand, that sounds scary to you because quant is your big strength, the same applies: a decent percentage of the IR questions will be based on calculating averages, probabilities and percentages, reading graphs and interpreting the data, and so on.

In other words, whether quant or verbal is your strength, you’ll be able to carry over some of your skills into IR. And that’s good because, at first, you’re going to look at these new question types and feel a little bit of panic: they’re so long! They’re so weird-looking! They’re so different from what we’re used to! That’s true, but you can still learn how they work and how to handle them. I promise. : )

Read more

Has anyone not heard yet that the GMAT is changing on June 5th? If you’re sure you won’t need to take the new test, you don’t need to read this article. If you are planning to take the new test, though, or if you think you might have to, then read on.

Scoring

Over the past week, GMAC has released some additional information about the new Integrated Reasoning (IR) section “ in particular, some very key details on how the scoring is going to work.

When GMATPrep 2.0 launched a few weeks ago, it became apparent that the scoring scale would be from a low of 1 to a high of 8, and GMAC has since confirmed that the scores will be given in integer increments “ no 6.5 or 7.5 scores.

More importantly, we now know that the IR section scoring will be based on percentage correct, unlike the quant and verbal portions of the test, and there will be no penalty for incorrect answers. Integrated Reasoning is not an adaptive test, so the primary determinant of our score really is just how many we get right. (Note: although the test is not adaptive, we still can’t go back to questions we’ve already finished. Once you confirm an answer, that question is gone for good.) Further, the different question types will all be weighted the same “ so it’s not the case that, say, Graphics Interpretation questions will be any more or less important than Table Analysis questions. Read more

Then this article’s for you. Everyone I’ve talked to recently falls into one of two camps:

• I need to take the test before it changes and I’m running out of time! Help!
• I need to take the new GMAT with IR and I don’t know what to do! Help!

If you’re in the latter category, read last week’s article and check back again next week, when I’ll have an article for you regarding how to study for IR. This week, we’re going to talk about what to do for those who are still trying to get the test done before it changes on June 5th.

How far are you from your goal?

Have you taken a practice test recently “ under official testing conditions? Official conditions means you did the essays, you stuck to roughly 8 minute breaks, you didn’t pause the test and come back to it later basically, you did what you’re going to have to do on the real test. Also, you hadn’t already seen the questions before, right? One or two might still be okay, but if you recognized more than that, or if you deviated significantly from official test conditions, take another test.

You’re doing this to get a good idea of your current scoring level. Compare that to your desired score on the real test. How far apart are the two scores? Read more

We’ve talked a lot about meaning in sentence correction recently and I’ve got another problem along that same theme for you. The problem I chose comes from the new GMATPrep 2.0 (warning: you may not want to read the explanation until after you’ve used the new software yourself, just in case you see the same problem!). This one actually did also show up in the old version of GMATPrep, but I saw it years ago and forgot about it. When I saw it during my 2.0 test last week, I had the same reaction that I did when I first saw the problem about 5 years ago: I can’t believe they actually did that!

Here’s the problem. Set your timer for 1 minute 15 seconds and go for it!

* As the former chair of the planning board for 18 consecutive years and a board member for 28 years, Joan Philkill attended more than 400 meetings and reviewed more than 700 rezoning applications.

(A) As the former
(B) The former
(C) Former
(D) She was
(E) As the

Short underline “ should be easy right? I received this question as #14 on my test and I got the first 13 questions right. That should give you an idea of the difficulty level. : )
Read more

You may have already heard that GMATPrep 2.0 has been released. I’m pretty excited that we finally have a mac-compatible program “ after all, what better way to spend a random Friday night when I’m bored? : ) Seriously, though, I just tried my first CAT yesterday and I’ve got an IR question that I want to share with you.

Note: IR is not adaptive; in other words, we’re all going to see the same questions when we take the two practice CATs. So, if you haven’t taken your first GMATPrep 2.0 CAT yet, you might just want to bookmark this article right now and wait. Once you’ve taken the test, you can come back and read the rest of the article. Read more