Crush the GMAT! Am I on the right track.

[Gmat Delight]

I took a GMAT test last April and scored 620 ( Q:49 ;V:27; AWA: 5.5)

I am not a native English speaker and I decided to work on my verbal skills and score 700+.

I just enrolled to the on line class and I am on my second week of the course.

I would like to get some comments about my study plan:

1) I am using the MGMAT study organizer and following every step religiously. It takes me 2-3 hours per day.
2) I am reading every answer and if I find a new theory or any good stuff I put it on a Flash Card
3) I am reading articles online to improve my reading skills and to get better at reading from the computer screen
4) I am using the OG Tracker and also the OG Stop Watch and keeping a record of my timing. So far I only have data for my DS numbers. ( 33/35 = 94 % and 0:52 seconds )
5) I took the first CAT exam and set 120 seconds for the Quantitative questions ( which was a mistake, I should have set it to 75 minutes, because I left some questions unanswered, and 75 minutes for verbal )

Right Wrong %
PS 13 6 68%
DS 7 7 50%


Right Wrong %
SC 9 6 60%
RC 6 6 50%
CR 5 9 36%

As a result of this performance I only got

Quantitative 43 70%
Verbal 29 56%
Total 590 67%

I realized that my best % on Verbal part came from SC - Suprise!!

6) I also started to look at the challenge questions - Some of them take too long but they all teach you a different technique.

7) I have not started to work on the Question Banks and frankly I do not know when and how I should approach them. ( During the course vs After the Course )

8) I also realized that MGMAT Study organizer leaves 330 Q and 288 V questions from the OG 11 + OG Purple and OG Green to the EXTRA section. I wanted to do all of the OG questions before the test. And I am aware of that "Reviewing the questions with 10 steps" takes time. Other wise the remaining 600 Questions can be done in 15 days. ( 15 x 40 ) 40 Questions x 6 minutes = 4 hours / day after the course. SO What should I do ? Should I plan to finish all the OG questions during the course ? and study 3 hours instead of 2 everyday ? - I do not have any problem with that and I am very motivated right now -

9) I also follow the BEAT THE GMAT forums and I find it very useful and inspiring.

10) I will also set up 30 minutes of 1 on 1 session every week. ( I just had my first session today and I loved it )

I am confident that I will score between 49-51 on Quantitative section and I am studying to master my knowledge. I am hoping to improve my verbal score and AWA results.


I am looking forward to your feedbacks!

Cheers,

Gmat Delight

[StaceyKoprince]

You're very organized - that's excellent! Some thoughts:

Downgrade the challenge problems in terms of importance - many of them are harder / more complicated than anything on the real test; as such, they're not usually very representative of the real test.

Don't worry about the Question Banks for now - use them at the end if you need more work.

As you learned, do the tests in 75 minute sections, not per question. One of the things you have to get used to is learning how to balance your time and cut yourself off when it's taking too long.

Save some OG questions for after the course - you're going to want to go back and review everything. Some people like to just save the green and purple books for after - whatever you want, but don't do them all during the course.

You'll probably want to spend something like 6-10 minutes per question - 6 min is really the minimum. 2 minutes first to do the problem, and then 4-8 minutes to answer the 10 questions from class 2.

If you know anyone else who's studying for the test, set up a study group (you can try to study with classmates if you want). That helps to keep you motivated and it can also help with the 10 questions - you guys can discuss things like educated guessing, spotting (and avoiding) traps, alternate ways to do the problem, why the wrong answers are wrong, etc.

All in all, keep doing what you're doing - it looks like you've got a great plan! Good luck!