But I Studied This – I Should Know How To Do It!
When was the last time you thought that? For me, it was sometime within the past week. I knew that this problem was not beyond my reach! Meanwhile, the clock was ticking away and all I could focus on was the fact that I couldn’t remember something that I should have been able to remember.
That horrible, sinking feeling is universal: we’ve all felt it before and “ unfortunately “ we’re all going to feel it again. How can we deal with this?
Recognize the But! feeling
You almost certainly already know what this feels like, but here’s a longer list of the ways in which this manifests. When was the last time you thought any of these things?
– But I studied this
– But I should know how to do this
– If I just had a little more time, I’m sure I could figure it out
– I’ve already invested so much time, I don’t want to give up now
– I’ve been struggling with this for 2 minutes but I really did finally figure out now what I need to do; it’s just going to take me another 1.5 minutes
My Timing Is Killing Me
I’ve written a lot “ and you’ve read a lot “ about timing already, but I want to address something that I’ve been hearing lately from students particularly those who have been studying for a while and are really struggling to make progress on practice tests.
My best timing was on my very first practice test
I’ve spoken with a few students lately who’ve told me that they felt more comfortable with the timing before they started studying all of this stuff. How is that possible?
Actually, it’s fairly common. Here’s what happens: on your first practice test (before or shortly after you started studying), you know what you don’t know and so it’s much easier to let go of the too-hard questions. Once you start studying, you’ll see something and think, Oh, I studied that! I can get this one! But it turns out that one is still too hard only, this time, you won’t let go when you should. Do that a few times and the whole situation snowballs: you realize you’re behind on time, you start to panic and rush, that causes careless mistakes. Then you get stuck on another because you feel like you’re getting a bunch wrong so you don’t want to get this one wrong too now you’re wasting even more time, and then the section ends with a bunch of guesses or even blank questions.
I’m fine with OG / untimed / with shorter problem sets
I’m sure it’s no surprise to you that you’re better when the timer isn’t ticking. We all are. Unfortunately, the real test is timed, so our untimed performance doesn’t matter. Lots of people also discover that everything’s fine when doing sets out of the Official Guide, especially shorter problem sets. This, again, is to be expected “ it’s easier to keep track of your global time for 5 or 10 questions rather than 37 or 41.
So what do I do?
The Role of Confusion in Your Prep
Wait, is that a typo? Maybe I meant Confucius, the Chinese teacher and philosopher?
I actually do mean confusion. ; ) Journalist Annie Murphy Paul recently contributed a post to KQED’s Mind/Shift blog: Why Confusion Can Be a Good Thing.
Go ahead and read it “ I’ll wait. It won’t take you more than 5-10 minutes. Take particular note of item 2 on her 3-item list.
Why Is Confusion Good?
Ms. Murphy Paul supports her thesis with an important point: When we don’t know the right way to do something, we open up our minds to many potential paths “ and sometimes an alternate potential path is better than the official path.
We’ve all had the experience of reading an official solution and thinking, Seriously? That’s how you have to do this? only to find a better way on an online forum or via discussion with a teacher or fellow students.
Further, as far as a test like the GRE is concerned, the discomfort inherent in figuring out that best path allows us to determine why a certain approach is preferable. That knowledge, in turn, helps us to know when we can re-use a certain line of thinking or solution process on a different (but similar) question in future.
How Can I Use Confusion To Help My Prep?
Murphy-Paul offers three suggestions (quotes below are from the article; the rest is just me):
(1) Expose yourself to confusing material
On the GRE, you have no choice: you’re going to be exposing yourself to confusing material every day! So I’ll tweak Murphy-Paul’s suggestion slightly: embrace the confusion. Instead of feeling annoyed or frustrated when that feeling of confusion creeps in, tell yourself: okay, I’m on track here. I’m going to figure this out “ and, when I do, I’m going to remember it because my current confusion is actually going to help me remember better once I do know what I’m doing!
(2) Withhold the answers from yourself
What’s the first thing you do after finishing a problem or problem set? If you’re anything like my students, you look at the answer to see whether you got it right. Is that really the best move?
Read more
Studying Reading Comprehension with The 5 lb. Book
I’ve got an interesting* Reading Comp question for you from our new 5 lb. Book of GRE Practice Problems.
*Well, it’s interesting if you like standardized tests, Reading Comprehension, and astronomy. : )
Let’s try it out! Normally, you’d see several questions associated with an entire passage but I’m only giving you one of the paragraphs and one question. Give yourself up to about two minutes total to read the information and answer the question.
In 1604 in Padua, Italy, a supernova became visible, appearing as a star so bright that it was visible in daylight for more than a year. Galileo, who lectured at the university, gave several lectures widely attended by the public. The lectures not only sought to explain the origin of the star (some posited that perhaps it was merely vapour near the earth), but seriously undermined the views of many philosophers that the heavens were unchangeable. This idea was foundational to a worldview underpinned by a central and all-important Earth, with celestial bodies merely rotating around it.
The author mentions which of the following as a result of the supernova of 1604?
(A) The supernova created and dispersed the heavy elements out of which the earth and everything on it is made.
(B) Galileo explained the origin of the supernova.
(C) The public was interested in hearing lectures about the phenomenon.
(D) Galileo’s lectures were opposed by philosophers.
(E) Those who thought the supernova was vapour were proved wrong.
© ManhattanPrep, 2013
Just an FYI: the full passage consists of two paragraphs, so you might have taken about 2 minutes or so to read the whole passage. Three questions go along with the entire passage; expect to spend about a minute to a minute and a half on each, depending upon the specific question type.
Italics represent quotes from the passage or questions.
Let’s dive in! The paragraph tells us about an event that happened in 1604: a really bright star appeared; Galileo tried to explain it; some previous views of others were undermined by Galileo’s views; those previous views were foundational to the idea that everything revolved around Earth.
The question asks what the author mentions, so this is a lookup detail question; the answer will appear directly in the passage somewhere. Specifically, what happened as a result of the supernova in 1604?
The 5 lb. Book: Regular Quant Theory Problem
We’ve got another problem for you from our new book, the 5 lb Book of GRE Practice Problems. The book contains more than 1,100 pages of practice problems (and solutions), so you can drill on anything and everything that might be giving you trouble.
This regular problem solving question asks us to pick one correct answer (other variations might ask us to select more than one answer or to type in our own answer). Give yourself approximately 2 minutes to finish (or make a guess).
Read more
The 5 lb. Book: How to Study Sentence Equivalence
We’re using the launch of our latest book, the 5 lb.
Book of GRE Practice Problems, as motivation to take a look at each of the major question types. The book contains more than 1,100 pages of practice problems “ crazy! “ so you can spend all of your spare time doing nothing but studying. (Kidding. : ) )
Let’s try out one of the problems! Give yourself approximately 1 minute to get to your answer. Afterwards, we’ll solve the problem and also discuss how to approach SE questions in general.
Note: If you haven’t done SE before, you need to pick two answers, either of which could fill in the blank!
A field trip was arranged so that this troupe of ___________ dancers could observe the real masters of their art.
- seasoned
- fledgling
- expert
- torpid
- novice
- lithe
© ManhattanPrep, 2013
Do you have your two answers? Let’s go! There are several important steps that help us to answer SE questions both effectively and efficiently. (Note: if you’ve already read the TC article, the steps are the same!)
(1) Read only the sentence
Read all the way to the period, but do NOT then jump to the answer choices. Instead
Read more
The 5 lb. Book: Quantitative Comparisons
Our latest book, the 5 lb. Book of GRE Practice Problems, just hit the shelves! The book contains more than 1,100 pages of practice problems (and solutions), so you can drill on anything and everything that might be giving you trouble.
We’ve already tried out a regular math problem. This time, we’re going to try out one of the weird Quantitative Comparison problems. If the question type looks unfamiliar, or if you just haven’t had much practice with QC yet, you might want to check out this introductory article first.
Alright, are you ready to try one? Give yourself about 1 minute and 15 seconds to do this problem. (Remember that these times are averages, not limits “ you can choose to take a bit longer, but don’t go beyond about 30 seconds longer than the average. At that point, all the extra time is telling you that you don’t really know how to do this one.)
0 < a < < 9
Quantity A Quantity B
9 “ a b/2 – a
© ManhattanPrep, 2013
Yuck. That inequality thing at the top doesn’t look fun. It might have been fine if it said 0 < a < b < 9, but I'm not really sure how to think about that b/2 piece.
Let’s see. So a itself is between 0 and 9. What about b/2? Here’s a cool little trick: when we have a multi-part inequality (an inequality with 3 or more pieces), we can just chop out two parts as long as we keep the correct relationship. So let’s look just at the last two parts: b/2 < 9. Read more
The 5 lb. Book: How to Study Logic-Based Reading Comprehension
We’ve very excited because our latest book, the 5 lb. Book of GRE Practice Problems, has just hit the shelves! The book contains more than 1,100 pages of practice problems (and solutions), so you can drill on anything and everything that might be giving you trouble.
Let’s try out one of the problems! Give yourself about 2 minutes to answer this Logic-Based Reading Comprehension (Logic RC). Afterwards, we’ll solve the problem and also discuss how to approach Logic RC questions in general. Read more
The 5 lb. Book: Regular Quant Problems with Translation
We’re very excited because our latest book, the 5 lb.Book of GRE Practice Problems, is about to hit shelves! The book contains more than 1,100 pages of practice problems (and solutions), so you can drill on anything and everything that might be giving you trouble.
Let’s try out one of the problems! This regular problem solving question asks us to pick one correct answer (other variations might ask us to select more than one answer or to type in our own answer). Give yourself approximately 2 minutes to finish (or guess). Afterwards, we’ll solve the problem and also discuss how to approach these in general
A taxi driver makes $50 an hour, but pays $100 in rent per day of use for his taxi and has other costs that amount to $0.50 per mile. If he works three 7-hour days and one 9-hour day and drives a total of 600 miles in one week, what is his profit?
(A) $700
(B) $800
(C) $1,100
(D) $1,200
(E) $1,500
© ManhattanPrep, 2013
Translation questions are the bane of most test-takers’ existence. (Don’t know the word bane? That’s a great GRE word “ go look it up!) First, we have to figure out how to re-write a paragraph in mathematical terms, and then we still have to do the actual math!
A number of techniques can help us with these tasks. We’re going to start with one discussed in our main Translations article: make it real. (Follow the link to the main, 2-part article, if you haven’t already read it.)
Make the story real
The problem no longer says taxi driver. Instead, your name is sitting there “ you’re the taxi driver. Now, what do you need to know in order to figure out how much money you get to keep at the end of the week?
Well, let’s see. First, I’d figure out how much I made, but then I’d have to subtract all of my costs. That’s how much I get to take home: my profit.
Revenue “ Cost = Profit
The 5 lb. Book: How to Study Text Completions
We’ve very excited because our latest book, the 5 lb Book of GRE Practice Problems, is about to hit shelves! The book contains more than 1,100 pages of practice problems (and solutions), so you can drill on anything and everything that might be giving you trouble.
Let’s try out one of the problems! This Text Completion (TC) problem has just one blank, so give yourself approximately 45 seconds to get to your answer. Afterwards, we’ll solve the problem and also discuss how to approach TC questions in general.
After many years of war and bloodshed, some become ____________ suffering, casting a blind eye to scenes of misery around them.
inured to exempted from dominant over effusive towards maudlin over © ManhattanPrep, 2013
There are several important steps that help us to answer TC questions both effectively and efficiently.
(1) Read only the sentence
Read all the way to the period, but do NOT then jump to the answer choices. Instead