Need help with Quant Prep Strategy

[a.ganguly758]

Hi,

I need a strategy to improve upon my quant skills, as I have been trying to improve on my quant scores for a while now but have met with little success. I have taken the following steps to prep myself:

1) Brushed up my basics from OG11 and Kaplan
2) Practiced the OG11 questions by topic for both sections PS and DS (timing them..). Have been fairing well on them, with high accuracy accept for a few questions where either I am unable to follow the language or my calculation time is killing me..:(
3) Practiced the Kaplan questions, however, at this stage I am familiar with their ques and answers. So, unable to take those tests again. (At times feel that I am falling short of practice resources!!)

After the above mentioned prep I am still hovering around the low 30s, which is seriously affecting my scores..

Some of the problem areas identified are:
a) High calculation time
b) Difficulty in setting up equations for 'Word Translation' ques,
c) High Decision making time on the DS ques
d) Most of the educated quesses dont yield accurate results

I seek advice to come up with a strategy to improve on my quant skills quickly, as I am left with a short time for my final test. Would highly appreciate the suggestions and thanks in advance!!

- Abhi

[StaceyKoprince]

OG offers practice questions but does not actually teach you how to answer the questions. What about the Kaplan materials you have? You only mentioned questions and explanations there - do you also have material that teaches you (a) the concepts, rules, and formulas tested on the exam, and (b) strategies for tackling the different kinds of questions on the test?

These are requirements in order to improve your score. If you don't currently have materials that help you with the above, then you're going to need to identify and buy those materials. The materials should cover these content areas: number properties, algebra, geometry, fractions, decimals, percents, statistics, rates, ratios, sets, and probability. The materials should cover not just the actual content but also how to answer GMAT-format questions using that content.

a) High calculation time. Cutting the time will require two things: studying how to solve problems more efficiently (best done on problems in your range that you got right - learn HOW to be more efficient on those, then apply those same lessons to similar but harder problems), and recognizing when something is just too hard (and letting it go)

b) word translation difficulties. See above - you're going to need a book or other resource that actually teaches you how to get better at this.

c) DS questions taking too long. Similar to (a). Why are these taking too long? Where is that "too much" time being spent? Are you doing more calculations than you need to do?

d) educated guessing. Most of your educated guesses should be wrong, actually. The threshold here is 20%: that's the "random guess" chance that you'll get something right. If you're higher than 20% on educated guesses, then you're doing better than you otherwise would have done. Your goal with educated guessing is simply to improve on the 20% random guess position. Your goal isn't to somehow to get educated guessing to be even better than regular solving (remember: the overall percentage correct is typically only in the 60% range).

You don't mention what your goal score is, how far away from that goal score you currently are, or when your test is. By the fact that you're seeking help, however, I'm assuming that you are not that close yet to where you'd like to be. As such, I just want to caution you that most people don't improve by large amounts in a short timeframe. Significant improvement typically takes a decent amount of time.

[a.ganguly758]

Thanks Stacey for the prompt response!!

You are absolutely right about the OG solutions, they are lengthy and do not teach you how to solve within the given 2 mins.. (Incase I am looking for an alternate solution to a OG ques, can I ask it on the Manhattan forum, or is that forbidden by GMAC?). Kaplan material according to me is not sufficient in terms of concepts and formulas.. yeah it does gives you some rules and strategies but again not sufficient.. Thats the reason I tried to supplement it with a Quant book for the Common Admission Test (CAT) prep, but the book contains some advanced-level concepts and not very helpful to an average joe..

What do you think about the 6 Mahattan tests?? Do you think taking those tests, reviewing the answers (have heard that the answers are well explained and provide you a good idea of the concepts) would give a good practice and solidify the basics? Any other quant book or material that should be helpful..?

To answer to your query, I am currently scoring in the range of 480-530 (Quant: Low 30s and Verbal: Mid 30s). My target score is 700 (Quant: Mid 40s and Verbal: in the 39-42 range) and my test is in a month's time. My concern is, I have already put in a 2-month prep and my quant scores are not up to the mark.

Well, reading the last few lines in your post about score improvement taking a decent amount of time makes me a bit worried about my plan of improving my score in a short span. Look forward to your suggestions..

[StaceyKoprince]

We can't, unfortunately, discuss OG questions on the forums - that's prohibited by GMAC. But we are going to publish, later this year, a book with our own solutions to the OG12 quant problems. I'm not sure exactly when that's coming out; if you're interested in finding out the publication date, you can contact studentservices@manhattangmat.com.

CAT exams are really good for (a) figuring out where you're scoring right now, (b) practicing stamina, and (c) analyzing your strengths and weaknesses. The actual act of just taking the exam is NOT so useful for improving. It's what you do with the test results / between tests that helps you to improve. Part of that involves reviewing and studying the explanations, yes, but more than that, you need something that teaches you, in a comprehensive way, the material you need to know for the exam.

Any other quant book or material that should be helpful..?

On the quant side, we have 5 separate books that collectively cover the material tested on the exam: (1) Number Properties, (2) Equations, Inequalities, and VICs, (3) Word Translations, (4) Fractions, Decimals, and Percents, and (5) Geometry. You can take a look at the table of contents for each in the Store section of our website - that should help you decide whether you think any of them would be useful for you.

Re: length of time, I would say most people spend 3-4 months preparing for the exam. Obviously, not everyone takes that long, and some people definitely do achieve their goal scores in shorter periods of time, but in my experience, people who take less than 6-8 weeks are less likely to achieve their goal scores than people who spend a bit longer. There's no way for me to tell what would happen in your particular case, of course. :)

[sgnk_dasgupta]

what is VIC in quants.looks like its a abbr. of something
Please explain.
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Sagnik

[StaceyKoprince]

VIC = Variables In Choices (problems in which the answers are in the form of variable expressions). For VIC problems, we can pick our own numbers (as long as we follow certain rules) to test the problem and find the answer. (Note: obviously, this only applies to PS problems, as DS problems can't have variables in the answer choices. :)