How to Improve GMAT Reading Comprehension Skills
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I’ve had multiple conversations recently with different students about how to improve GMAT Reading Comprehension skills, and each person had a somewhat different angle or issue going on. I realized, though, that these students all had something in common—and, therefore, there was one particular thing that they all needed to do to get better at RC.
What is That One Thing?
I’ve got to give you some background first.
Some of the students I spoke with were non-native speakers who didn’t do their undergraduate studies in English. Others did attend English-based schools (and some were even native speakers) but their specific programs of study did not involve very much reading. And still others did read a lot of academic material in school…but that was a long time ago now.
Separately (but actually related, it turns out!), we always make fun of how pedantic and boring the Reading Comprehension passages can be. (Though, secretly, I find a lot of them interesting! ? Shh, don’t give me away.)
You can take the exact same topic and write about it at any “level” of writing: grade-school level, high-school level, university-level, magazine-story level, casual-email-to-a-friend level, and so on. These different levels or styles are designed to be appropriate for a particular audience, and that determines such features as vocabulary, sentence complexity, and even what I would call “general human interest” level. For example, a general-market magazine demands pieces that are written with a very engaging style of writing—the reader never has time to get bored or be distracted by something else.
Academic writing, by contrast, is a much more formal style, especially as you get up to university-level writing (or even higher). You’ll have more advanced vocabulary, of course, but the differences go well beyond that. It is much more common to employ sentence structures that are used only in writing; nobody would ever speak aloud that way, even in formal speech. And it’s more common to write dense sentences—sentences that pack a whole lot of complexity into a relatively small number of words.
And here’s one more key to the puzzle: Did you know that the test writers don’t write these RC passages specifically for the GMAT? Rather, they cut down and adapt actual academic articles for their test. So this academic material that you may have missed out on in college (or have just not read for a really long time) is literally the exact type of writing that you’re going to see on the GMAT.
As a result, GMAT testers require lots of exposure to and practice with reading at a university level. Some people have a natural advantage in that they regularly read and analyze this type of writing (whether in school or for work). Others, though, don’t or didn’t—or they did but conducted those studies in a language other than English. If this describes you, then you have some work to do to remedy the problem.
So…I Need to Recreate My College/University Studies?
No, definitely not. It’s true that this is not going to be a quick fix, but it’s not going to take you 4 years, either.
Depending on your level of (dis)comfort with this kind of academic writing, you may need a solid 3 to 6 months of regular reading in order to build these GMAT Reading Comprehension skills. (This is yet another reason why it’s a good idea to get a head start on your GMAT studies. Don’t leave it till the last minute!)
The good news, though, is that any steps you take to get better at reading on the GMAT will directly (and immeasurably) help you with graduate school as well. That’s not always the case for some things we have to study for the GMAT.
How Do I Practice This?
Let’s start by identifying sources (ideally free!) that give you access to this kind of material.
I started with MIT’s OCW (OpenCourseWare) website, where the school lists hundreds of courses available for free. Under Find Courses, I browsed by Topic. I went for Health and Medicine first—that sounded interesting to me. ☺
I then picked Health and Exercise Science as my Sub-Topic and looked down below at the Results. (Note: it can take a while for Sub-Topics, Specialties, and Results to populate. Just wait a little.)
I’m looking for something at the Undergraduate level and I decided that Food in American History was the kind of topic that might show up on the GMAT.
On the page for that course, click on the Readings tab.
Twinkies! This is definitely the course for me. ?
Then, I started scanning for free readings linked on that Readings page. The first one is an article by Marcy Norton entitled “Tasting Empire: Chocolate and the European Internalization of Mesoamerican Aesthetics.” Perfect! (I’m really not sure what that title means. But it sounds GMAT-like!)
Follow that link and it will take you to Dr. Norton’s article. (I’m not giving you the direct link here. Follow my steps above to find it yourself—so that you know how MIT’s website works!)
Finally, go ahead and read the first 3 to 4 paragraphs of her article. Look up any words you don’t know. (Note: The GMAT will be nice to you. It won’t expect you to know any really technical or obscure words. But when you’re reading for a university-level class, you’re just expected to look up and learn any words you don’t know—and that’s exactly what you’re trying to recreate here.)
Finally, you may notice that this article is seriously long—far longer than anything that will show up on the GMAT. Expect that to be the case for all of the academic articles you find. You don’t need to read the article in its entirety (unless you want to). Typically, the introductory material in an article will be most likely to match GMAT-level passages.
I Read It. Now What?
As you read, jot down a few notes to help you articulate the main ideas and main contrasts. Then try to say (aloud!) or write a summary, in your own words, about what the author is trying to say. Don’t focus in on all of the details—your goal is not just to repeat the content. Pretend you’re talking to a friend and trying to summarize the main points of this really interesting article that you read (but your friend didn’t).
Ideally, in fact, find a friend with whom to have these conversations! If you know someone else studying for the GMAT, you two can help each other. If you have a friend or family member who is naturally good at this kind of stuff, that person can also help you to stretch your GMAT Reading Comprehension skills further.
Here are some other exercises to try:
— You and your study friend both read the same article, then both summarize in writing. Send your summaries to each other (at the same time!). Where do you agree or say the same things? Where do you disagree—or where do you write about something that your friend doesn’t and vice versa? Then get together to discuss those similarities and differences.
— You and your already-a-good-reader friend both read the same article, then you summarize the article either in writing or aloud for your friend. S/he tells you where you did a good job of summarizing and where you might have misinterpreted or missed important points.
—Variation on the above: your friend does NOT read the article ahead of time. You summarize for your friend (and your friend is allowed to ask questions if confused about anything). Then, your friend reads the article to see whether there are any major discrepancies and tells you what you may have missed or misinterpreted.
If you want to get really serious, you might even try taking a course yourself! Many universities and community colleges run continuing education programs with night and weekend classes. Pick a topic that sounds interesting to you and check the syllabus to ensure that there will be both reading and assignments that will require you to analyze that reading to demonstrate your comprehension.
Any Other Tips?
Here are some of the other paths that I followed through MIT’s database. This is just a small subset, but these are the kinds of topics that the GMAT tends to use and all have a decent number of appropriate undergraduate-level courses.
TOPIC: Business. Sub-Topics: Business Ethics; Globalization; Leadership; Management.
TOPIC: Health and Medicine. Sub-Topics: Cancer; Health and Exercise Science; Immunology.
TOPIC: Humanities. Sub-Topic: History. Specialty: Any.
TOPIC: Humanities. Sub-Topic: Literature. Specialty: Nonfiction Prose*.
TOPIC: Social Science. Sub-Topics: Anthropology; Economics; Sociology.
TOPIC: Science. Sub-Topic: Biology. Specialty: Developmental Biology; Genetics.
TOPIC: Science. Sub-Topic: Earth Science. Specialty: Atmospheric; Climate; Geology; Planetary.
*This one focuses mostly on writing vs. reading…but you’re going to need that for your applications!
For the science-y/more technical ones, I would stick to courses whose titles sound pretty introductory. And, in general, go for reading assignments assigned earlier in the course vs. later—unless you actually want to try that whole course.
Get Ready…Get Set…
Get on out there and start reading! Let us know how it goes—and share any classes you’ve loved or ideas on other sources in the comments! ?
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Stacey Koprince is a Manhattan Prep instructor based in Montreal, Canada and Los Angeles, California. Stacey has been teaching the GMAT, GRE, and LSAT for more than 15 years and is one of the most well-known instructors in the industry. Stacey loves to teach and is absolutely fascinated by standardized tests. Check out Stacey’s upcoming GMAT courses here.