I definitely come from the procrastinate-and-then-cram-the-night-before-or-even-the-morning-of-the-test school of studying. It’s how I survived high school. And college. And law school. And grad school. And work. Okay, it’s how I do almost everything. But when it comes to preparing for a test like the GRE, studying in smaller sessions over a longer period of time IS better. You give your brain a chance to dredge up and sort and apply the information without any cues from the material before, which is what the real exam is like.

It’s pretty easy to think of ways to study vocab for five minutes. As long as you have the words with you, working on one or two for a couple minutes is no problem. (By the way, you should definitely start doing that if you aren’t already.) But how do you improve your math skills in five minutes?

Do One Problem

Students fight me on this, saying that it’s not worth getting started if you don’t have time to study a whole bunch. I’m sorry to say, they’re wrong. Keep a set of problems with you, whether you print them out or just tear them out of your books. (Sacrilege! I know! But the point of those books is to up your score, not to look beautiful on the shelf.) In five minutes, you can do a problem and look over the answer. But the benefits don’t stop there, because when you’ve done only one problem, your brain has time to process it and think about it. You’ll be working on it still, even when you aren’t trying to. It sticks with you in a different way. Because you’ve done only one problem, you don’t get to rely on anything that came before it to prop you up – you have to really know what you’re doing.

Review One Problem

Sometimes during a study session there will be a few problems that really bug you. Maybe that’s because you thought you should have gotten them right. Maybe it’s because you still don’t understand the explanation. Maybe they seem to contradict something you thought you learned in another problem.

These are the problems that are perfect for their own five-minute review session. Look them up on a forum and read some explanations and conversation. Discuss them with a friend. Give them a try on your own again. Try to explain the problem to yourself (or someone else). Whatever you do, coming back to the problem on its own with a fresh pair of eyes may help really cement something into place that was loose before.

Practice Your Arithmetic

Maybe your days are more exciting than mine, but I bet you still find yourself sitting around sometimes. Whether you’re waiting for a meeting to start, waiting for a meeting to end, waiting for your dinner to cook, or just watching TV, there is probably a five-minute period in the day where your mind wanders. (Think of how many times you check your phone in a day. What if you spent all that time doing math?)

Just practicing your arithmetic really pays off. I’m not a phone person, but I’m sure there are apps for your phone that let you do just that. Or, get out the old paper and pen. Filling in your multiplication tables, listing out prime numbers, practicing division and multiplication shortcuts, and manipulating fractions can all help you get more comfortable and faster with numbers. I know the exam has a calculator, but a comfort and facility with numbers will help you recognize patterns and shortcuts.

Drill Your Rules

No calculator can overcome a lack of knowing the mathematical rules. Knowing the rules doesn’t take genius abilities or even great reasoning powers; it just takes practice. So if you aren’t rock solid comfortable on the rules of fractions, exponents, triangles, and the like, five minutes is a great time to practice them in drill form. Memorizing the exponent rules is nice, but using them enough that you know how to use them when they show up is even better.

Estimate

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Each week, we post a new GRE Challenge Problem for you to attempt. If you submit the correct answer, you will be entered into that week’s drawing for two free Manhattan Prep GRE Strategy Guides.

See the answer choices and submit your pick over on our Challenge Problem page.

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Each week, we post a new GRE Challenge Problem for you to attempt. If you submit the correct answer, you will be entered into that week’s drawing for two free Manhattan Prep GRE Strategy Guides.

See the answer choices and submit your pick over on our Challenge Problem page.

Here are the free GRE events we’re holding this week (All times local unless otherwise specified):

8/26/13– Online- Mondays With Jen– 9:00PM – 10:30PM (EDT)

8/28/13– New York, NY- Free Trial Class– 6:30PM – 9:30PM

8/29/13– Santa Monica, CA- Free Trial Class– 6:30PM – 9:30PM

Looking for more free events? Check out our Free Events Listing Page.

Each week, we post a new GRE Challenge Problem for you to attempt. If you submit the correct answer, you will be entered into that week’s drawing for two free Manhattan Prep GRE Strategy Guides.

See the answer choices and submit your pick over on our Challenge Problem page.

“Many a true word is said in jest.”—I don’t know, but I heard it from my mother.

Once upon a time in America, when I was a boy, my father, an engineer, said to me, “You can make numbers do anything you want them to do.”  This was the beginning of my cynicism.  But never mind that.  My father was fluent in four languages: English, German, French, and Algebra.  And his comment relied on the fact that most people can’t read Algebra.  Teaching GRE classes, I combat the fact that many people can’t read Algebra.  Because, like my father, the GRE exploits that weakness.  Thus, for many, preparing for the quantitative portion of the GRE is akin to studying a foreign language.  (Yes, I know that even many native speakers feel that preparing for the verbal portion of the GRE is also akin to studying a foreign language.  But that’s a different topic.)  In any case, you want to make your Algebra as fluent as your French. . .yes, for most of you, that was one of those jokes.

I know that some of you disagreed with the above and feel that the problem is an inability to understand math.  But that’s not true, at least on the level necessary to succeed on the GRE.  If you really didn’t have enough synapses, they wouldn’t let you out without a keeper—because you couldn’t tip, or comparison shop, or count your change.  It’s a literacy problem.  Think of our GRE math units.  Truthfully, the algebra unit is often a death march.  By the end, as country folk say, I often feel like I’m whipping dead horses.  On the other hand, the word problem unit concerning probability and combinations, putatively* a more advanced topic, usually goes really well.  Why?  Because folks can read the words and understand their meaning.  Conversely, folks just stare at the algebraic symbols as if they were hieroglyphics.  The problem is that putting a Rosetta Stone in the book bag would make it weigh too much. . .kidding.  But if you can’t read the hieroglyphics, the mummy will get you—just like in the movies.

It really is a literacy issue and should be approached in that fashion.  You still don’t believe me?  You want specific examples?  I got examples, a pro and a con.  On the affirmative side, I once worked one on one with a man who came to me because his math was in shreds.  Because he couldn’t read what the symbols were saying.  Partly because his mother had once said, “Your sister is the one that’s good at math.”  As far as the GRE is concerned, she was wrong, and so was your mother, if she said that.  Anyway, one day I gave him a high level word problem concerning average daily balances on a credit card.  He looked at it for about 30 seconds, and he didn’t write anything on his scrap paper.  Then he turned to me and said the answer was blah blah.  And he was right.  I looked at him and said, “How did you do that?  You’re not that good.”  (Yes, this is also an example of how mean I am to private students.)  But—and here’s the real punch line—he said, “It was about debt; I understood what the words meant.”  And there you go.

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Each week, we post a new Challenge Problem for you to attempt. If you submit the correct answer, you will be entered into that week’s drawing for two free Manhattan Prep GRE Strategy Guides.

Here are the free GRE events we’re holding this week (All times local unless otherwise specified):

8/12/13– Online- Mondays With Jen– 9:00PM-10:30PM (EST)

8/13/13– Boston, MA – Free Trial Class– 6:30PM – 9:30PM (EDT)

Looking for more free events? Check out our Free Events Listing Page.

Each week, we post a new Challenge Problem for you to attempt. If you submit the correct answer, you will be entered into that week’s drawing for two free Manhattan Prep GRE Strategy Guides.

Read more