finishing way too fast....How to slow effectively?

[jeremy.hansen]

I have always been a fast test taker. In college I literally finished every test I took first and usually by a wide margin (30 min +). I've had instructors burst out laughing because I finished so quickly. So being ahead of pace is something I'm accustomed to and usually I like this. The GMAT is different as I have lots of room for improvement. On my CATs I am finishing both sections right around the 60min mark. Now since I am not rocking a 780 (not even close!) clearly slowing down on some questions would be helpful.

But how to do so? How do you determine when you should slow down? Should I recheck math for careless errors focusing on the areas I'm strongest? Should I spend more time on the questions I end up guessing? Usually when I get to a question 1 of 2 things happens. I think ok I know what I'm supposed to do and I attempt to do it or I think crap what the heck is this? At which time I guess either intelligently or randomly.

Is there an actual process that can be used to smartly allocate more time? Does anyone else struggle with this?

[StaceyKoprince]

Sure, there are definitely processes you can use! I'll tell you what I do, and you can try things and adjust for yourself accordingly.

First, if I ever finish a problem in less than half the time I'm supposed to spend on a problem of that type, I do it again. From the beginning. Literally. I'm not just checking my work; I'm actually doing the problem again, in a different way if I can think of one.

Second, I write EVERYthing down. I really try not to think in my head, because it's easier for me to make careless mistakes that way.

Third, I check my work. On quant, this means what it always means: check the steps of the calculation, check that what you're solving for is actually what they asked for, and so on. On verbal, this means that I'm articulating to myself one good reason why each wrong answer is wrong. A "good" reason is something that I KNOW was a good reason to eliminate something on a practice problem that I did in the past. I also check to make sure that my chosen right answer doesn't contain any of those "good" reasons to eliminate.

In terms of guessing, I decide that I'm going to guess at about the one-minute mark; before that, I'm really trying to do everything I can (even if I first read it and think - "argh, what is this?" When that happens, just ask yourself, "ok, what CAN I do here?" and start there).

--> If this is a 2-min problem (eg, quant, CR), then I spend another 30 to 60 seconds trying to make an educated guess. I can take a decent amount of time to do this because I've actually studied HOW to make educated guesses on different kinds of problems, so I have lots of ideas already for things I could try in order to eliminate some answers.

--> If this is a 1-min (or so) problem (eg, SC, main idea RC, any verbal question I've already narrowed to 2 answers), then I look through any remaining answer choices ONCE more and I guess. (Again, using the knowledge I've built about HOW to make educated guesses on these kinds of problems.)

You do actually have to study how to make educated guesses, just as much as you have to study any other skill.