Test Day Tip: Mental Math Warm-Up
Come GRE test day, there isn’t much left to do in the way of studying. Cramming new material on the day of your exam is stressful and won’t give you much of a positive return on time invested. However, there are some things that you can do on test day to further your GRE success. One thing that I found very useful when I took my GRE was performing a math warm-up. Read more
Testing Center Dos and Don’ts
As we’ve mentioned before, the GRE testing center can be a stressful place. Showing up for the GRE is much like arriving at the airport. You will have to empty your pockets, present a photo ID, and maybe even go through a metal detector. Sometimes, students make the mistake of preparing for the test content without ever considering the test experience. To help you prepare for the full experience, we’ve put together this list of testing center dos and don’ts.
The Math Beast Challenge Problem of the Week – January 16th, 2012
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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.
Quantity A Quantity B x + 5 (x “ 2)2
Flashcard Sneak Peek: Martinet, Hawk, Chauvinist (Words You Probably Shouldn’t Use in Your OKCupid Profile Name)
Take a sneak peek into Manhattan Prep’s 500 Essential Words and 500 Advanced Words GRE flashcard sets!
When writing these cards, we wanted to make sure that everyone could get something out of every card — even if you already know the word on the front. So, you may know martinet, but do you know doctrinaire, hawk and the real meaning of chauvinist? Read more
The Myth of “Not Smart Enough”
Yesterday, Study Hacks pointed us to a Reddit thread titled I’m not as smart as I thought I was. In the initial post, a Redditor was concerned that poor standardized test scores had revealed he was really not that intelligent, and would keep him out of MIT. The responses came in vast numbers, and many of them crystallized around a unifying theme: academic success doesn’t depend solely on smarts but rather requires hard work and dedication.
We sometimes encounter student with similar concerns. Some students become dejected after struggling with an initial practice GRE, and start to feel that they just aren’t smart enough to succeed on the exam. And we’re here to say STOP! Don’t get discouraged. The GRE is not The Sorting Hat; it does not magically divine your intelligence and then dictate your academic future.
“130 Quant and 130 Verbal? Hufflepuff.”
Vocab in the Classics: To the Immortal Memory of the Halibut
I came across 18th century poet William Cowper in the Slate article “Why are William Cowper’s poems so witty?”
For instance, this one (source):
Read more
The Math Beast Challenge Problem of the Week – January 9th, 2012
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.
Per Serving of: Calories Cost Snack A 200 $1.70 Snack B 350 $0.60 Choosing from the snacks in the table above, a group consumes 3250 calories of snacks that cost a total of $11.
Quantity A Quantity B The number of servings of Snack A the group consumed 4
Friday Links
Here is what happened in the world of the GRE this week…
- About Graduate School Guide wrote about goal setting and new year’s resolutions.
- AOL’s Daily Finance wrote about which graduate degrees are worth the cost.
- Finally, in case you missed it, our very own Taylor Dearr wrote about three reasons to start your GRE prep in January.
Have a great weekend, everybody!
Three Reasons to Start Your GRE Studies in January
So, you made your New Year’s resolutions based on the fact that you are currently reading a GRE blog, I’m guessing that one of yours involved applying to graduate school. Let me be the first to say, excellent decision! Now what do you do?
I’ve looked at a number of online Graduate School Application Timelines, from a number of different sources, and one thing that nearly every timeline suggests, is a starting date that falls between May and September BUT WAIT! Don’t stop reading.
Yes, you could spend the next five months slogging through your Netflix instant queue waiting for those calendars to start, and you would still be able to complete you applications. However, I would recommend starting now by knocking out the GRE, and here is why.
1. Less to worry about in the fall
My biggest complaint about timelines that suggest a May-September start date is that they place Take the GRE on a single day in October. Most people, however, will spend more than one day on the GRE. Here at Manhattan GRE we recommend that students spend roughly three months on their preparation, but even students with a modest study plan will usually set aside two or three weeks to take some GRE practice tests and review their areas of weakness. Now, imagine these 2-10 weeks overlapping with the time you spend writing personals statements, requesting letters of recommendation, and refining your application. It sounds needlessly overwhelming.
A Classic “Donut” Problem
This comic from XKCD is not only hilarious, but presents a remarkably GRE-like scenario:
So, here’s a question — what is the area of the “donut” shape in which the man in the comic is legally permitted to move?
Answer the question yourself before clicking “More.”