SC Improvement.

by **smar83** Sun Feb 17, 2008 10:39 pm

Hi,

I am preparing for SC using MGMAT SC book. I have all the concepts jolted down. But whenever I start practicing, I am having a hard time finding out which concept is tested. I generally go by what " sounds correct" and that leads to my downfall. Can someone please help me ? any suggestion on how different can I approach them ?

Thank you.

by **StaceyKoprince** Mon Feb 18, 2008 9:19 pm

Don't go by what "sounds" correct. That will frequently get you into trouble.

When you're studying the grammar concepts in the red book, you also have to study how to identify the different concepts in a sentence. How do you recognize nouns vs. verbs vs. pronouns, etc? Also, look for the splits (differences) present among the answer choices. If you see three choices that say "are" and two that say "is" - you know you have a subject-verb agreement issue. If you see some options with a pronoun and some with the pronoun missing, there's another possible issue. Etc.

Each chapter in the SC book has a problem set - questions from OG that test the concepts discussed in that particular chapter. Since you know that issue exists in the sentences listed for that chapter, actually study how to find it, what the characteristics are, what a sentence looks like when it tests that issue. (Note that there are other issues tested in that sentence as well, so you should look for those too, but at the least, you have a major clue based upon what chapter that problem was listed under.)

by **smar83** Wed Feb 20, 2008 1:40 am

Thanks Stacey...

yesterday, I practiced with the SC questions from the MGMAT question bank and scored 15/25. This time though, I used all the rules I can think of and avoided " sounds correct" pitfall.

Thanks for your help.

by **StaceyKoprince** Thu Feb 21, 2008 10:44 pm

Good, some of those questions are really hard! Keep practicing like that!

by **Prajwal** Sat Mar 01, 2008 11:33 am

skoprince Wrote:Each chapter in the SC book has a problem set - questions from OG that test the concepts discussed in that particular chapter. Since you know that issue exists in the sentences listed for that chapter, actually study how to find it, what the characteristics are, what a sentence looks like when it tests that issue. (Note that there are other issues tested in that sentence as well, so you should look for those too, but at the least, you have a major clue based upon what chapter that problem was listed under.)

Stacy, is it generally advisable to appracoh the OG problems the way you described above? The reason I am asking is because as you said, by working on problems after each chapter, I know what to look for in the questions. However on the exam since I don't have the clue I sometimes feel lost. I do look for splits, but I get confused.

Are there any good grammar books that talk about how to identify verbs (the non standard ones like auxillary verbs etc), nouns (especially of the type "the splitting")?

by **StaceyKoprince** Mon Mar 03, 2008 9:24 pm

Do some OG problems after each chapter so you can test yourself knowingly, but save some to do in random sets later on, so that you can also test yourself on your ability to pick out what's going on in a test-like situation.

I don't know the names of any grammar books that specifically help on identifying parts of speech, but I'm sure you can find some good options if you do a search on Amazon and read the reviews. Also, re things like "the splitting" if you put an article (the) in front of a word, that word is not a verb even though it may look like one. "The" means it's a noun. An -ing form is only a verb if it is immediately preceded by some form of the verb "to be."