Hi folks,
I have been a passive member of gmat club for last 3 months. At the end of May 2005 I started my preparation for GMAT. I was always confident about my quantitative skill so I didn't worry much about the math section. I stated the verbal section with a Basic English grammar book. After getting done with that I got through the Barron's 2004-2005 GMAT preparation. I was doing very well in the math section, in the beginning I had little trouble with the sentence correction but in the later parts i did okay. I did very well in the reading comprehension (Although initially I got very scared of it). But I did horrible in the CR.
Then I started practicing Cliff's GMAT preparation.
I went briefly through the kaplan study guide and Peterson's GMAT.
I wanted to take the Power Prep before starting
the Official guide. But I tried the all the practice sections before taking the full-length exam. On my first exam I got 680 (34 on verbal and 48 on quantitative). I wasn't sure about the score because I made some careless mistakes in the quantitative and in the verbal there were some questions from the practice ones. In the second exam I scored 760 (46 verbal 50 math) in this one there were also some repetition.
Then I started solving
Official guide 13th edition. I found the math section to be really easy. sentence correction was okay. at the beginning I was making some mistakes at the very end I managed it very well. Critical reasoning seemed so easy that out of first 100 questions I got one 3 mistakes. But reading comprehension got me by the balls. the topics related to science or astronomy or crap like that i could make the inference questions right at all. To make long story short I was confident about the entire forum except for reading comprehension.
I took the power prep for the second time and I was delighted to score 800. I took it coupla more times and the range was between 780-800.
Then I finished Kaplan 800. I found the math part quite easy. Verbal challenged me little bit. I couldn't get time to finish the RC part.
Then the night before the big day I revised
Official guide as much as possible. My exam was in the morning at 8 A. M. and I am not a morning person at all. But I couldn't get an afternoon appointment. I tried sleeping early that night but I got up as early as 4 in the morning and couldn't sleep after that...... I don't know why that happened..
Anyways I reached the test center 40 minutes before the schedule. I started with Argument question and then the issue question. I finished both the sections almost 8 minutes to spare. Then I took a lick. My throat was running dry so I tried to find some water, but no luck there. I came back on time and started the math section. First few problems were average then it became little difficult in the middle. I almost made some careless mistakes but found my mistakes before making the wrong choice. I had one confusion however, regarding and DS on absolute value. Some problems took me little while but I was always way ahead of time. there were some coordinate geometry couple of progression but nothing from probability or combination. I finished the math section 10 minutes to spare..
Then again I took a break, went to the restroom for a lick. I was feeling little tiered by then. I came back for the verbal. First two questions were from SC. First one was fairly easy, in the second one I got stuck between "which" and "that".... I had to make a guess there. then 2 CR questions came. the questions were very simple but I couldn’t choose the answer form the choices.... that was so frustrating. then came a long 70 line RC. after answering the first question I realized that I picked the wrong answer. I forgot about that in a bit started going forward. I was doing good in the SC ( at least I thought so). but I wasn't too sure about many of the CR questions. I got back-to-back RC in the middle. I don't think I could make too many mistakes there. But I was always lagging behind the time. Finally i had 3 answers to finish in 4 minutes. Question # 39 was an SC. I spotted the problem but I ended up choosing the wrong one due to time pressure. I couldn’t think too much in the last to CR... coz ther were long...I thought I got one of them right and the last one wrong. I finished the test 17 seconds to spare.
When I was going though the survey, although I was so tiered, I was quite happy and hoping to get a good score. I couldn't wait to see my score. and finally when I saw it...... my jaws almost felt to the ground. I didn't expect this score even in my nightmare......
I got only 600.....
math 49 verbal 23
I had a hard time coming back home.... I am still not okay. I decided to take the test again and obviously in the afternoon slot.
But the problem is that I know all the questions in
official guide by heart now... I got done with almost all the available preparation material. So how do I start my preparation now. I guess LSAT materials and
MGMAT might be helpful, but I live in place where these materials are not available. So what do u guys suggest that I do?
I need to get at least 700. I will be spending at least over an hour every day on GMAT club.
I will really appreciate if some of you can point out the weakness i had in my preparation and what do I need to do in order to improve my score.
Sorry for such a long email.
Take care.
-nakib
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07 Sep 2005, 07:42
