Mission GMAT

I have been having with Reading Comprehension on OG Verbal book. I am unable to get anything more than 60-65% hit rate. Part of the reason might be that I am taking it very serious. I need to chill a little bit and trust my senses that it is eventually going to improve. The only thing I can do is to practice and practice and practice. I am going to work on the LSAT Reading comprehension as well and also am looking at National Geographic and New Scientist sites. I believe they have some very cryptic articles.

I am beginning to belive that the more practice I do, the more I will be familiar with the structure. At the same time, I want to familiarize with a variety of topics. Planning to read some science articles to get a hang of them. I am ok/good with social sciences and business articles. I have started reading articles already and planning to get back on the 700 train soon.

I am back with an update. As  I have stated in my earlier posts, I have successfully completed SC and CR from Purple book. I have embarked on the next major hurdle, RC. Looks like I need a lot of work to get this into shape. I am not able to perform according to the 700 level expectations that I have of myself. I guess practice is the key to get there. I need to reduce my mistakes. Presently I am at 70% hit rate for RC(which is pathetic ). I am going to hit on some LSAT books and also read more trips and tricks for RC from one of those guides.  Also, one more way to get going, is to use the helpful forums (testmagic and gmatclub). I better get going. I hope to have better news for myself the next time I blog in here.

Yes, I am done with the first round of Sentence Correction from the Purple book. As I have done before with my CR questions, I started out from the last question and ended with the first question. I was going at a comfortable rate and did questions in lots of  30 each. It took me close to 130 minutes ( a little over two hours) to complete 113 questions. I am satisfied with that number since I am still getting used to it. Ideally, I would like to shoot for a 50-second-a-question which will really help me in RC. And coming to the hit rate, I got close to 84% (95/113). Not a bad figure either. When I went through the questions that I got wrong, I realized that could have got at least 3 to 4 more questions right.  I will go over those questions again in my second pass along with CR. I hope to complete RC as well so that I can start the OG 11 by this weekend. Setting ambitious goals is working for me and I might as well make it a habit

After completing RC, I will also take my Princeton Practice test 1. I am not sure what the difficulty level is but I will let you know once I take it.

Must have book   : Manhattan SC

Must have quality : Trusting ourself

Must have score : 90% and above

Must know concept in SC : Parallelism

 I am happy with the progress I made with OG Verbal guide so far. I have completed all the 82 questions and had a 90% hit rate. I am happy with the progress but I did not do them in timed conditions. I would like to get myself more practice this time by doing OG 11 in timed conditions. Only then can I gauge my real progress. My friend is a constant motivating factor. He has been through the whole nine yards and scored a cool 750. Hope I can reach that kind of score.

I am planning to do RC and SC in timed conditions and see how it goes.

Notes

• Trust yourself. You will eventually get there
• Keep pushing yourself to the limit
• try to stay positive and if possible stay away from distractions even in your free time.
• Its only an exam. Just go ahead and ace it.

Must have book   : PowerScore Critical Reasoning Bible for GMAT

I have started working on the Critical Reasoning problems from OG Verbal review. Overall, it was definitely a morale-boosting exercise. I solved about 36 problems (though not under timed conditions) and could get almost 30 of them right. I am encouraged by the results and would like to continue my quest. In my mind, I secretly wish for a low hit rate however counterintuitive it may be. I believe you put that much more effort into learning when you go wrong. And, I also started working with another guy on a very limited basis (once in a week for two hours). This kind of setup seems to be working great. Because of the gap that we have between the meetings, I am able to assimilate most of the concepts that we discuss during the course of our discussion and hence am able to get through the rest of the problems at home with relative ease.

I hope to continue at a similar pace but would like to cross train. For example, I would like to work on either RC or SC tomorrow. I hope to keep myself up with all those fields.

Hello all. It’s been a long while since I posted anything. I was consumed with a lot of personal things. And, I had my share of all the personal bouts of depression about where life is going. I have come to the realization that its now or never for me. I have to take the proactive steps to change my life and hence started my prep again. I believe this time I am getting more confident than the last time around. I just hope to keep the momentum up. The last time around, I almost came close to taking the test but did not.

I have been practicing Sentence Correction from OG 11 and learning the ropes for CR and RC from PowerScore Critical Reasoning Bible. Looks like it did help me in my pursuit. I took GMATPrep 1 yesterday and scored 700( Q49 , V36). This was a vast improvement on my Verbal side. I am really happy that I am tackling the verbal questions in a confident manner.

Good luck to myself

• Every pronoun must refer to only one antecedent
• There are three pronoun cases :Subject , Object and Possessive
• Its is a possessive pronoun and It’s is a contraction meaning It is

Certainly, the 730 in my Manhattan test 3 has lifted my spirits. Looks like it also sharpened my brains

How else can I explain my sudden increase in accuracy in Sentence Correction questions from OG 11? Its a good feeling and I am enjoying it. I think I will take the test in a month’s time if everything goes according to the plan. I hope to have a lot accomplished by tomorrow.

Hurray, I have crossed the magical figure in at least one of the practice tests. The major difference between this one and the previous ones has been time management. I did not hurry up this time on the verbal part and still managed to complete it within the stipulated time. My performance of 0/4 on last RC passage really killed my score.

Quantitative 51 is really on the higher side especially on a test with tougher-than-GMAT type of questions. I still found some areas where I could improve on my Math. I have taken a complete break from GMAT prep for about three days now. Hopefully, I can work more on these things in the coming days and schedule for the test somewhere in the beginning of July.

Its really awesome to know that I could score 700 finally.

I am back again after a long break. I have been busy receiving my parents, who are on a visit to the US. I am totally consumed with being the guide to the NY City

Finally, I found some time to do a little preparation on one of my weakest links on the exam, Sentence Correction. I skimmed through the Comparisons chapter from the SC book, and also was very attentive in Wednesday’s class. It was the penultimate class and definitely had some very discussion on SC and Geometry.

As I noted in my previous posts about the GMAT Prep results, I have been losing heavily on DS, SC and RC. I believe that my skills on all those sections need improvement and it looks pretty much attainable. I need more practice on SC to logically  dissect the statements and use Process of Elimination.

Right now, my hit rate in SC is around 80% but I am hoping that it would improve in a few days.