Need help in verbal-1 week left-actual GMAT date-6th Sept15

[AbhishekGanguly]

Hi Instructors ,
I have been studying for the GMAT for the last 3 months(only weekends since I am a working professional). My target score is 700+ at least.I was really weak in verbal when I started my preparations .I was scoring in the twenties .Now I am scoring in mid thirties .In MGMAT CATs I am consistently scoring 35-36 in verbal .I need a 38 at least to boost my score(anything above that is obviously welcome) .I have only 1 week left .The problem is there is no specific area where I am constantly getting questions incorrect . Some combinations- 6 SC , 4CR and 5 RC incorrect, 8SC 6CR 1RC , 4SC 5CR 4RC incorrect .Need a solid study plan for last week to boost up the score(2 points in verbal) .
Previous scores -MGMAT CAT-660(Q46 V35), 660(Q46 V34) ,Princeton review 680(Q47 V37) GMATPREP 690(Q48 V36)
A few pointers about me-Earlier I struggled to finish the test .Now i finish them badly(ex-last gmatprep had 15 mins to do last 10 questions-got 7 wrong)
Should I leave one RC passage in the middle(I am a slow reader and this(leaving 1 passage) helped me finish the test better in the princeton review test)
Also typically i miss out on keywords in the CR and SC .Sometimes I miss the ambiguous pronoun ,sometimes I miss easy pointers in CR such as-Citizens of parktown are worried by the increased frequency of serious crimes committed by local teenagers. -here I missed the Serious keyword and got the question wrong .I have been practicing a lot but still these mistakes happen .

Please help me out here .

Thanks in advance
Abhishek

[StaceyKoprince]

I have to say first that what you are scoring right now is most likely approximately what you will be scoring in 1 week. Most people don't see a significant jump in score in the last week.

On the plus side, you are within one standard deviation of a 700 score. (Remember, though, that standard deviation works in both directions). Generally, we recommend that people try to hit their goal score on at least one practice test before taking the real thing.

If you are okay with this and are willing to take your chances (and re-take the test in future if need be), then go ahead and take the test and see what happens. Maybe you will hit 700!

FYI: if you reschedule an official test date at least 7 days in advance, then you only have to pay a $50 re-scheduling fee. If you are already within 7 days, you would have to pay the whole $250 again. I think you are already within the 7 days; if so, then you might as well take the test. You've already paid for it!

Next, let's talk about what to do to continue to lift your verbal score (nice work so far, by the way!).

First, you mention timing issues. You should be letting some questions go during the section, yes, but you may or may not want that to be an entire RC passage. Really, what you want to do is pick the hardest questions as you see them scattered throughout the test. You can guess quickly and randomly approximately 4 to 7 times throughout the section (the same is true of quant) without significantly impacting your score.

How do you know what's too ahrd? Here are some criteria I use:

SC: I read the sentence and can't even understand what it's trying to say. I read it again - still no. I substitute in answer (E) and try again. Nope, still lost. Guess my favorite letter and move on.

CR: I can't figure out what kind of CR question the problem is. I can't understand the argument or find the conclusion (if there's supposed to be a conclusion).

RC: The content is really technical. Usually, in this case, I can still pick up the overall / main idea, but if I realize that the detail in paragraph 2 is terrible, and then I get a question about that paragraph, my best path might be to guess immediately and move on.

Next, I never let myself agonize back and forth between two answers. If I've narrowed to two answers, I allow myself to compare those answers just once. Then I have to make a decision and move on.

Those steps should alleviate, if not eliminate, your timing issues and that alone might help you to lift another point or two. But here's something else you can do when studying verbal problems:

Ask yourself:
1) why was the wrong answer so tempting? why did it look like it might be right? (be as explicit as possible; also, now you know this is not a good reason to pick an answer)
2) why was it actually wrong? what specific words indicate that it is wrong and how did I overlook those clues the first time?
3) why did the right answer seem wrong? what made it so tempting to cross off the right answer? why were those things actually okay; what was my error in thinking that they were wrong? (also, now you know that this is not a good reason to eliminate an answer)
4) why was it actually right?

Read this:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2015/08/ ... r-the-gmat

That will also help you to make appropriate decisions to bail on certain questions.

Re: missing details of problems, that's basically because you feel pressured to rush because of the timing issues. If you do what I said above and reduce that timing pressure, you won't feel so compelled to rush, and you won't make as many careless mistakes. (You'll still make some, though. You're human!)

[AbhishekGanguly]

Thanks Stacey for such a detailed reply .Will keep in mind the points mentioned by you .I am planning to take one more mock test before the final one .Will tell you how I did on the actual GMAT .

Abhishek

[StaceyKoprince]

good luck!!

[AbhishekGanguly]

Hi Stacey,

I did manage to get the score I was aiming for .Got 710(Q49 V36) and I am really happy with it .
Firstly thank you again for the wonderful advice on timing .I would also like to mention this post of yours-https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog/2014/09/23/how-to-set-up-your-gmat-scratch-paper/
I found it very late(couple of days before gmat) so couldn't practice much with it -but still went ahead and used it on the GMAT(big gamble I know but it worked for me) .Really helpful in tracking the time(specially in the verbal section with the 56 37 18 approach as sometimes I got lost in the middle of the test in my practice tests).
I must also thank RonPurewal for his wonderful explanations(which were simple enough for me to understand) on this forum .Whenever i had any difficulty to understand a problem ,I found his explanations extremely useful .You guys rock....

Regards
Abhishek

[StaceyKoprince]

Yay! Congratulations - I'm really happy for you.

And thanks for letting me know that that article was useful. I'll pass your thanks along to Ron as well!

Good luck with applications - let us know how it goes!

[evelynho]

Hi Stacey,

I did manage to get the score I was aiming for .Got 710(Q49 V36) and I am really happy with it .
Firstly thank you again for the wonderful advice on timing .I would also like to mention this post of yours-https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog/2014/09/23/how-to-set-up-your-gmat-scratch-paper/
I found it very late(couple of days before gmat) so couldn't practice much with it -but still went ahead and used it on the GMAT(big gamble I know but it worked for me) .Really helpful in tracking the time(specially in the verbal section with the 56 37 18 approach as sometimes I got lost in the middle of the test in my practice tests).
I must also thank RonPurewal for his wonderful explanations(which were simple enough for me to understand) on this forum .Whenever i had any difficulty to understand a problem ,I found his explanations extremely useful .You guys rock....

Regards
Abhishek

Dear Instructors,
I have the same issues like Abhishek at the starting point, and I was scoring in the twenties in the verbal at first, but now I was scoring in the mid thirties in MGMAT CATs. In the last GMAT real exam on Mar 15, I got 28 for my verbal(51 percentile). Here it is the specifics in my Enhansed Score Report for Verbal Part:
Score/Percentile//Mean reponse time per question
CR - 35 / 70th//2.83
RC - 33 / 66th//2.11
SC - 30 / 57th//1.77
The worst part is that I have FOUR QUESTIONS in verbal part left uncompleted because of time lagging hebind, and even more worse is that virtually I can not complete all the 41 verbal questions for every test, no matter it is mock and actual tests, EVERY TIME I got 5-10 questions left within last few minutes. I know I have to work on this hard besides the problem indicated on ESR.
Previous scores of MGMAT CAT-640(Q41 V36), 630(Q40 V36)
I have practiced with the set-up way of my scratch paper Abhishek provided above on the link for about one week until the exam day, for Qualitative part it works in a perfect way (I'd like to thank Stacey for such awesome tips). For Verbal part, the assumed set up way for scratch paper is about three passages, but I always embraced four passages at most of my mock tests, and the same for my actual gmat exam(I don't know why?); Then I had difficulties in managing the three timers, 56, 37, 18, alloted for my four passages in exam, and I tried to adjust the checkpoint timer ealier but I alway got lost around the second checkpoint(I guess I often lost around 14 or 15 questions from the start) and then have to catch up with the pace all the time until the end of exam.

I also need to improve my IR score. Well, I have decided to retake the exam 57 days later, and started to prepare the SC by topic first. For now I can study from Sunday to Thursday for five full days.

Please shed lights on my issues. Thank you.

Best Regards,
EH

[StaceyKoprince]

I'm going to give you a short reply here, but please start your own separate thread and we'll move the discussion over there. I need to keep each person separate so that I don't mix up details of each case. Thanks!

I can not complete all the 41 verbal questions for every test, no matter it is mock and actual tests, EVERY TIME I got 5-10 questions left within last few minutes.

The problem here is that you are trying to complete all 41 questions. Most people cannot complete all of the questions in a section to the best of their ability - that's what a time-pressure test is designed to do! Your only choice is in regard to which questions you skip. (ie, on which questions you make a random guess and move on.)

Most people need to guess on 4 to 7 questions per section. Instead of being forced to make these guesses at the end of each section, you want to identify the hardest ones for you as you work your way through the section - and then you will choose to guess immediately on those. (We call these "freebies.")

What V question types are your biggest weaknesses? Look at your test data and also think about what you just dread. Hate CR boldface? Can't stand when the entire SC is underlined? Hate inference questions on science passages?

Great. Next time you see one of those, pick your favorite letter and move on. (Always pick the same letter. It doesn't matter which one. My favorite letter is B. There's no reason why B is a better letter to pick than another. It's just what I pick when I have to guess. What's your favorite letter?)

Next, timing. Do you have access to our Interact lessons? If so, watch the Timing Strategies lesson in Session 6; that has another technique for verbal timing and maybe you'll find that technique easier.

Note: all of our timing strategies assume 4 passages, not 3. The three checkpoints you mentioned (56, 37, 18) comprise 4 different time segments: (1) 75 minutes to 56 minutes; (2) 56 to 37; (3) 37 to 18; and (4) 18 to 0. The basic timing assumes that you will see one passage within each of those blocks, and then you need to adjust if, for some reason, the test deviates from that pattern.

Back to the freebies: at the level you are scoring in practice (mid-30s), I'd give yourself 6 freebies, with permission to go to a 7th if needed. If you eventually lift your V score to 40+, give yourself 4 freebies, with permission to go to a 5th if needed.

Try that out and tell us what happens!