How to get a super high verbal score

[NGL]

I'm looking to get a very strong GMAT score to help mitigate a low undergrad GPA and to possibly qualify for a scholarship. I've been primarily focusing on quant, since verbal has always been my strongest area. However, now that my official exam is rapidly approaching, I'd like to maximize my verbal performance. On my last few tests I've scored the following for verbal: 44 (GMATPrep 1), 41 (GMATPrep 2), 45 (MGMAT).

Any tips to get a super-high verbal score, 45+? At this point, I'm confident in the concepts, and I'm using my time effectively. So what separates the people who score in the low 40's from the people who score in the upper 40's?

As a native English speaker, verbal comes naturally for me, so I haven't had to figure out a verbal study plan until now. Should I just focus on practicing OG verbal problems?

[StaceyKoprince]

Good question. First, anything 45+ on verbal is 99th percentile, so there's not much that separates a 45 from a 47 or 49. :) A few questions and a lucky day.

A 40 is the 90th percentile, so what's the different in those last 9 percentile points? Different things.

First, you know ALL grammar rules, sentence structures, obscure rules, less commonly tested CR question types, etc backwards and forwards. You're comfortable with ALL of the types of passages / topics you might see on RC.

If I were to say "tell me what you know about CR Evaluate the Conclusion questions," you'd be able to tell me:
1) how to recognize this question type
2) what kinds of information you'd expect to see in the argument (premises, conclusion, possibly counterpremises, along with unstated assumptions)
3) what kind of reasoning they want us to do on Evaluate questions
4) what kinds of trap answers they tend to give / what kinds of faulty reasoning they try to use to trip us up

And you could do that for ALL CR types, as well as ALL RC types, major and minor.

If I showed you the answers to an SC questions but didn't let you read the full original sentence, you'd be able to:
1) tell me 90% to 100% of what's being tested on that sentence, even though you haven't read it
2) narrow down to 2 answers at most, and possibly down to the one right answer
(On some questions, there's a key clue in the nonunderlined portion, so then it'd be impossible to figure out everything. But on many if not most, you should be able to figure out many things with 100% confidence and even have some guesses about what's probably in the non-underlined portion that you haven't read.

Finally, you can look at any verbal question, even the hardest, and you can tell someone:
- why the most tempting wrong answer looks so tempting (and, of course, why it's wrong)
- why it's tempting to cross off the right answer (and, of course, why it's actually right)

That is, you can articulate the traps used by the test-writers to lead us astray.

In other words, for all of the above: you're so good at this that you could explain it all to others from any angle. :)

You may also want to read this:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/7 ... erence.cfm

The article talks about overall score (700 to 760), but that's also 90th percentile to 99th percentile, so just apply the "lessons" to verbal only. :)

Good luck!

[dheeraj787]

Hi Stacey,

Thank you so much for such a wonderful article.

Need on help. Have you written answers to these questions somewhere ? Can you please share the link of that post. Thanks.

If I were to say "tell me what you know about CR Evaluate the Conclusion questions," you'd be able to tell me:
1) how to recognize this question type
2) what kinds of information you'd expect to see in the argument (premises, conclusion, possibly counterpremises, along with unstated assumptions)
3) what kind of reasoning they want us to do on Evaluate questions
4) what kinds of trap answers they tend to give / what kinds of faulty reasoning they try to use to trip us up

And you could do that for ALL CR types, as well as ALL RC types, major and minor.

If I showed you the answers to an SC questions but didn't let you read the full original sentence, you'd be able to:
1) tell me 90% to 100% of what's being tested on that sentence, even though you haven't read it
2) narrow down to 2 answers at most, and possibly down to the one right answer
(On some questions, there's a key clue in the nonunderlined portion, so then it'd be impossible to figure out everything. But on many if not most, you should be able to figure out many things with 100% confidence and even have some guesses about what's probably in the non-underlined portion that you haven't read.

Finally, you can look at any verbal question, even the hardest, and you can tell someone:
- why the most tempting wrong answer looks so tempting (and, of course, why it's wrong)
- why it's tempting to cross off the right answer (and, of course, why it's actually right)

Regards,
Dheeraj

[StaceyKoprince]

I have in each of my CR articles that cover different types of questions. :)

You can find links to all of the different articles here:
https://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/inde ... reasoning/