Advice for improving V from 25 to 35 & Q from 42 to 50

[JSP]

Hi,
I recently gave my GMAT and scored a disappointing 550. I 'm retaking the exam on Oct 22. Any advice on how to improve my score by 10 points in each section. I dont think 550 is a true representation of my preparation, even though my highest score was only 620, i was confident that I would score around 650 at the GMAT. Any advice on how to proceed and study??
Following are my previous scores from CATs

MGMT CAT 1 :Q-39 V30 590
CAT 2 : Q 46 V 29 610
CAT 3: Q 44 V 31 610
CAT 4 : Q43 V 28 580
CAT 5 :Q 45 V 31 610
GMAT PREP CAT 1: 580
CAT 2 : 620

GMAT : Q 42 V 25: 550
On The day of my GMAT I tried to follow my usual routine. During the Quant section i felt the questions were tougher than the one I have come across during my 7-8 CAT's. First question was a geometry question and around 15 question was a overlapping set. I got couple statistics questions later in the section also. I think I got questions wrong which I would normally get right and was short on time towards the end of the section.
In the Verbal section, first question was SC followed by a CR. Around 10th question I got an RC which I thought was very difficult to comprehend. In the verbal section the pacing was ok for most part. I had sufficient time to answer all questions. I 'm not sure what I could have done better in verbal to improve my score on the GMAT.

Going forward, for verbal I 'm thinking of concentrating more on CR & RC with some regular practice of SC. And for Quant not sure how to proceed.

Any suggestions for improving my scores and strategies would be great.
Thanks

[StaceyKoprince]

I'm sorry you had a disappointing test day.

even though my highest score was only 620, i was confident that I would score around 650 at the GMAT.

Don't assume that next time. Assume that your practice scores are in line with what you should expect on the real test. And that's only true if you took your practice tests under 100% official conditions (as much as you can). If you skipped essays, took longer breaks than allowed, etc, then your practice test scores may have been inflated.

And that's one question I have for you actually - why did your scores drop a bit on real test day? They dropped in both the quant and verbal sections. Did you skip the essays on your practice tests? Did you take longer than an 8-minute break between sections? That might have led to stamina issues on test day.

was short on time towards the end of the section.

Okay, that also explains part of it - if you mismanaged your time, that would likely lead to a score drop. Did you have any timing issues on practice tests? Use the below article to analyze your most recent MGMAT CAT, then come back and tell us what you found out.
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... ice-tests/

(Note: don't just give us the raw data - do the analysis. Tell us what you think the data means!)

That additional data will help us to determine what you need to improve, and that will help us give you specific advice about what to do.

Next, read this article immediately and start doing what it says:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... anagement/

Finally, do you have a specific deadline? You're looking to improve your scores by 30+ percentile points in each section. That's a VERY significant improvement - most people wouldn't be able to do that in one month. You may need more time than that.

[JSP]

Stacey,
Thanks, for replying. I took 8(6 MGMAT & 2 GMAT Prep) practice tests before the actual GMAT. For the first 2-3 test i didnt write essays but attempted essays on rest of them. During my practice test i actually didnt take a 8 min break like i did on my actual GMAT.

In my MGMAT practice test, in quant I got questions wrong in a bunch and most of them were in the range of 600-800. I had problems with speed sometimes, it depended mostly on what type of questions were in the first half of the section.
Verbal has been all over the map, because i dont know the SC rules properly. I would attribute that partly to being a non-native.In verbal i have scored better in RC as compared to CR & SC. On the actual GMAT the RC was very tough and that might have pulled my scores down in verbal.

I will be travelling for the next 2 months for work and this is my only time for writing my GMAT again. I would like to apply for round 2 depending on my scores.

I realize that improving 30% is a big task. In my opinion i can surely improve Quant scores to atleast 46-48, same as my practice test scores. As for Verbal. I guess I would need a bit of luck to hit 30+. If I 'm successful in doing that, it should pull up my score by 50 + points I guess.

For the next 2 weeks my strategy is to redo all the quant from the MGMAT books that i have and work on topics where i scored less on my practice test. For verbal i 'm doing 10 CR & SC (verbal review & OG) questions daily. This would allow me to analyze and improve my scores in verbal.

Can you suggest any strategy, so that i can improve my score by atleast 70+ points.
Thanks

[StaceyKoprince]

I'd really like for you to use that article I linked last time - for analyzing your practice tests. Please do that analysis and come back here and tell me very specifically what you discovered, in terms of content areas, timing, everything. I can't give you detailed advice if we don't actually have detailed data on your strengths and weaknesses.

You're traveling for the next 2 months - does that make it easier or harder to study outside of work? (For some people, it's easier because they have nothing else to do at night and on the week-ends. For others, it's harder, because they're working 80 hours a week or something like that.)