dilemma in verbal part

[lindaliu9273]

Dear Stacy,

I'm an international student who took gmat for 4 times. Before I came to US, I took 3 times and got basically the same score every time(q50, v20-23). I'm not surprise with the score because it was difficult for me to understand the sentences fast and correctly. And I got only about 50% of the answer correct in OG and prep.

I recently took the 4th gmat after I have been in US for more than 1 year(prepare for 1 month). This time, I feel much better than before. I understand the sentences much better and I got about 70% answer correct in OG and v34 in prep.

During the exam, I feel good. For sc, I can elimate many wrong choices, but in the 3rd exam, I "guessed"in many sc questions. For cr, I can understand most arguments and elimate 3-4 wrong choices fast. During the first 3 exams, it's even hard for me to understand some of the arguments. Not to mention the logic of them.

I feel my progress during my preparation and feel nothing wrong happened in the exam. I estimated that at the very least I should get about 30 for verbal. But I it turned out to be(q50,v25,ir7).

The most terrible thing is that I don't know the reason for this low ,unimproved score ,so I don't know what I should improve and what mistakes I should avoid next time. But if I can't find the right way, I'm afraid that the nightmare will happen again. I'm quite lost at this moment and really need gmat experts' guidances.

Thank you so much!

[StaceyKoprince]

I'm sorry you're having such a struggle with the verbal section. I do have one suspicion about what might be happening.

Often, as people learn to get better at something, they then slow down on some questions - they know more, so the feel like they "should" know how to get harder things right. Then, they speed up on others in order to make up the time.

People often end up spending extra time on the ones that are harder, and they speed up when they think "Oh, this one's easy, I can do it faster!" This kind of time (mis)management then leads to careless mistakes, and specifically mistakes on easier / lower level questions. That brings your score down.

Could something like that be happening in your case? We don't get data from the real test, unfortunately, but you may be able to spot this trend in your practice tests. How often are you going over time on problems? A little over is fine, but if you go more than about 30 seconds over, that can be problematic. And how often are you having to go significantly faster than average to make up time?

How often are you making careless mistakes? When you look after, how many times do you think "Oh, I can't believe I picked C. The answer is obviously D!"

The other possible culprit is mental stamina. Verbal's the last section of the test, so if you're really mentally tired out by then, your performance can drop quite a bit. When you were taking practice tests, did you do the IR and essay sections? Did you limit yourself to the two 8-minute breaks? Or did you skip sections, take longer breaks than allowed, or do anything else that deviated from the full official test conditions?

If so, then you may have had artificially inflated practice scores AND you may not have built up the mental stamina necessary to last for the whole 3.5+ hour test.

Think about what happened and look through the data in your last two practice tests. Tell me if you think either of those things was happening (or both!).

If you're having timing issues, read this:
https://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/inde ... lly-tests/

And then these two:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... -to-do-it/
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... nt-part-1/

If you're having stamina issues, first know that you need to do all tests under 100% official conditions (including essay and IR). Also, look at this:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... you-crazy/

If you're noticing careless errors:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... -the-gmat/

If you also want help on specific content areas, then use the below to analyze your most recent MGMAT CAT (this should take you a minimum of 1 hour):
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... ice-tests/

Figure out your strengths and weaknesses as well as what you think you should do based on that analysis. Then come back here and tell us; we'll tell you whether we agree and advise you further. (Note: do share an analysis with us, not just the raw data. Part of getting better is developing your ability to analyze your results - figure out what they mean and what you think you should do about them!)

[lindaliu9273]

Thank you so much for your patient reply. For time issue, my average speed is SC 1.5min, CR&RC 2 min. In the exam, I finished all quesitons. The pace is fine, although I accelerated for one or two times on half of the exam to catch up with the pace.

For the careless mistake, I didn't make many careless mistakes in my daily practice. But for the mental stamina, I did skip writing in prep and brake more time than 8min. So this could possibly be one of the reason.

My confusion is how can I solve this problem? I mean, 4hs test will make people tired. Should we practice for 3.5h without stop to get used to it?

[StaceyKoprince]

The pace is fine

Check the individual questions, not the overall averages. I talk to people every day who tell me their timing is fine, but when we look at the individual questions, we discover that they're spending too much time on too-hard questions, then going fast on some others to catch up, increasing the error rate. Maybe your individual questions are okay, too - but I want you to check because so many people think they're fine when they're actually not.

Everyone will become tired as a 4-hour test goes on, of course. No way to avoid that. You can do a couple of things to build stamina:
1) always take practice tests under full official conditions, including all 4 sections
2) when studying, study in 1-hr "go without stopping" increments (for up to 2 hours in a row). So you figure out everything that you're going to do, then you study without stopping for an hour. Then take a good break (at least 15m), then go again for another hour. Then take a substantial break (at least 1h) before doing any more.

You don't want to go longer than about 2 hours while studying because studying is actually more mentally draining than taking the test. When studying, you're actually trying to create new memories, while during the test, you're only trying to retrieve memories. So you don't want to tire yourself out so much during study that you're not longer making good memories.