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Anonymoose · 2009 September 22nd, 07:53 AM

Hello,

Well, first of all I, like many other posters I've seen here, did much better than this on the official practice tests (760 multiple times; only one question wrong on the verbal section multiple times). So, while I cannot necessarily confirm that the test has gotten harder recently, I can confirm another case of real score < practice score as of Sept 2009 (and while I suspect many reported practice scores are inflated as a result of people simply memorizing the answers, I can confirm that was not the case for me). However, also like some others, I only got about 2 hours of sleep the night before the test.

---BACKGROUND---

I was an econ major in college, so I had a decent background in math, and I practically minored in philosophy so I had a decent background in critical thinking.

---WHAT TO STUDY---

LOGIC/READING COMP: Given my background, I found that I did not need to study very much for the logic (critical analysis) or reading comp sections. In the interest of full disclosure, like some others I have taken the LSATs, so that probably helped me out here. However, unlike others, I would not recommend using the LSAT book as the questions are not only much more difficult (which itself would be fine), but also more abstract and tending to deal with formal logic -- I did not see a single formal logic question on the actual GMAT. In any case, if someone is not inherently good at logic or reading, I'm afraid I don't have much advice here -- you would probably do better to get tips and tricks from Kaplan or others.

SENTENCE CORRECTIONS: Regardless of background or intelligence, however, EVERYONE needs to study for the sentence correction section. The GMAT utilizes a special kind of language that can only be accurately referred to as "GMAT English." As evidence, I offer you this grammarian: (okay, I can't link anything. Google "non-errors Paul Brians"). I can count at least three points there* (that he clearly labels as non-errors) that the GMAT demands with an iron fist. Thankfully, this section is also the easiest to increase with a little studying. It may seem hopeless at first, but I promise that your score will increase significantly if you just keep doing practice problems and reading the answer solutions. Although this was not something I did with the logic or reading comp sections, it is imperative that you create a list of A-E for EVERY sentence correction question and then cross off everything until you have only one left; doing so will allow you to avoid careless mistakes and to really make sure that what you choose is the correct answer.

*"Hopeful," "between/among," and "'none' singular vs plural."

MATH PROBLEM-SOLVING: I do want to state up-front that my 44 was a bit of a rude shock, as I was consistently scoring around 49 in the practice exams; despite my low-ish score on the actual test, I promise my advice is still useful :P. Essentially, GMAT math uses a basic, low *level* of math, but makes questions difficult by forcing you to do all sorts of weird things with that basic level of math within a strict time limit. Arithmetic, strange as it may seem, ended up being one of the biggest areas that I needed to refresh. I mean, the last time I had to do something like 134.9/5.6 *by hand* with accuracy to the hundredths digit was back in elementary school! I would highly recommend that anyone practicing quantitative questions do so while timing themselves, as everyone I know runs out of time in the math section. So bottom line, regardless of background I would recommend at least a little time be spent on timed GMAT math questions, especially if English is not your native language (do you know what it means if something has an 8% interest rate compounded semiannually? if you don't, no matter how much of an engineering background you have, you will get it wrong!).

DATA SUFFICIENCY: This is the other portion that you should study for at least a little bit regardless of background. These questions are a bit weird, but will again be no problem for someone with a strong background in quantitative reasoning.

SUMMARY: Regardless of background, do many sentence correction questions. Depending on background, do at least a few questions from the other sections, but make sure to time yourself when doing math.

---MATERIALS---

Official GMAT book: I actually have a little story here. Originally, I had only purchased the Kaplan book, and upon noticing the controversial "special GMAT English requirements" I mentioned above, I emailed GMAC asking if they really did believe that "between" is the only word that can be used for two, and "among" the only word for three ("a treaty between France, Britain, and Germany" is wrong? REALLY?). I received the most ridiculous, flippant response I have ever seen from a (supposedly) professional company: "the only information available to the general testing public can be found at [link]," the link taking me to such beautiful test-taking tips as "don't eat sugary snacks" and "leave time for traffic when going to the test center." Basically, what the jerko was saying was that I would only be able to find out the answers to their completely arbitrary grammatical assertions was by purchasing THEIR book. So, my complaining aside, yes the official book is a necessary purchase for anyone studying for the GMAT. There are tons of real questions and the answer explanations are exhaustive, although expectedly lacking in tricks and shortcuts.

Kaplan: There is no need to purchase the "Kaplan Advanced" book which seems to have a subset of questions from the normal Kaplan book (i.e., you simply get fewer -- not different -- questions in the Advanced book). The Kaplan book is my favorite of the unofficial books, and it contains hugely helpful and necessary tips/tricks/shortcuts, including such gems as "A is usually the right answer in Data Sufficiency questions" (LOL) and "if the question starts with 'which of the following,' the answer is usually D or E." It's easy to see why the offical book would leave out such tips as these, lol.
Furthermore, the official book has a woefully inadequate section on the AWA, and Kaplan's template (which really imo is reducible to a list of keywords) is pure money (American slang there, sorry :P).

Princeton: I actually hated this book because of the sloppiness with which they wrote their questions. For instance, one of their questions says something along the lines of "a person starts to lay pickets down in even increments. If they lay down X more, how long will the picket fence be?" where YOU HAVE TO ASSUME that the next set of pickets will *also* be evenly spaced, in a test that PUNISHES YOU FOR MAKING ASSUMPTIONS. If you do official GMAC questions (which are excellently and carefully written) for a while and then do Princeton questions, you will notice things like this all the time. I'm seriously disappointed in Princeton for this and as such cannot recommend their book at all, which is a shame because I like the way they break their questions up into "bin" difficulties, and I especially like their AWA section.
Oh, and they have a whole spiel about a "Joe Bloggs" heuristic device in which you are supposed to firstly guess which bin you are in, then secondly guess what Joe Bloggs would guess, then thirdly remove that answer choice from your selection/choose it (depending on your bin). It has been stated that people are poor determinants of the relative difficulty level of questions on the GMAT, and so this Joe Bloggs advice is imo unnecessarily convoluted, unhelpful, downright inaccurate, and essentially garbage.

Manhattan GMAT: I don't know anything about this book because I didn't use it : D

SUMMARY: The official book is a necessary purchase, and I would highly recommend the Kaplan book in addition for various tips and tricks. I would also highly recommend against purchasing the Princeton book, and I cannot comment on the Manhattan GMAT books.
Oh, and the official book doesn't give a list of idioms, but if you do sentence correction questions and read the explanations, you can create your own list, which is highly recommended (I guarantee even English-major native speakers will not know all of them).
Expensive prep courses? They don't seem necessary to me since they shouldn't be able to give you any tips you couldn't just find online or in their books, but I suppose I can't really comment for sure since I didn't take one. I suppose they'd help if you were simply unmotivated, but really, that shouldn't be a problem for someone trying to get an MBA :P

---SUMMARY OF SUMMARIES---

Don't read only summaries, because doing so means that you lack the finer understanding necessary to completely comprehend a body of text. Slog through everything : }

eravi11 · 2009 September 22nd, 08:57 AM

Excellent score!..Congrats..

Shuck · 2009 September 22nd, 11:38 AM

Good Job.

I have a question though, Which edition of the OG did you use?

AdsCPA · 2009 September 22nd, 03:34 PM

Congrats for a great score... and thanks for your views......

grad.mad · 2009 September 22nd, 03:37 PM

Great Job !!!

Anonymoose · 2009 September 23rd, 03:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shuck

Good Job.

I have a question though, Which edition of the OG did you use?

I used the 12th edition of the official guide. I borrowed the 1st edition of official verbal guide from my friend as well, so I could do more sentence correction questions. Any other questions welcome, I would be happy to answer them.

zudec · 2009 September 23rd, 04:07 AM

Anonymoose- Can you please link to the Kaplan book that you studied or rather suggest what i can search for on Amazon? I find a bunch of Kaplan books when i Amazon search for Kaplan.

Anonymoose · 2009 September 23rd, 08:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by zudec

Anonymoose- Can you please link to the Kaplan book that you studied or rather suggest what i can search for on Amazon? I find a bunch of Kaplan books when i Amazon search for Kaplan.

Unfortunately, I cannot provide links until my post count is 30 (presumably a measure taken to avoid spambots).

In Amazon's site, search for "kaplan gmat comprehensive program 2009" and the first hit that comes up will be the book I used. However, I see that it is now outdated and no longer sold by Amazon itself, so I would recommend either:

-Kaplan GMAT 2010 Premier Live Online (Kaplan Gmat Premier Live) for 30 bucks
-Or, for half the price: Kaplan GMAT 2010: Strategies, Practice, and Review.

The Kaplan book that I used was similar to the latter; as I never did any computerized practice tests other than the official ones (I've heard varying reports about their quality), it was good enough for me.

As a tangent, the official computerized tests are weird, buggy programs. The first of them, I forget the name, glitches up and doesn't work if you don't install it in the default directory, and doesn't directly provide answers to your practice tests past the 30th question. The second, newer official program seems to yield a different set of questions for each practice test each time you install it, so saving the install file and then un/reinstalling the program seems to yield new questions.

For the AWA, this is helpful: (go to google, search: gmat awa template). Again, imo the template is basically just a list of keywords.

shp003 · 2009 September 28th, 08:55 PM

Hello Friend,

Can you please tell me whats the best way to start off with the GMAT. Do I need to prepare and improve my vocabulary like for the GRE ( Barrons wordlists etc). And then start doing the practice exercises?.

I purchased the OG and it will arrive anytime soon.
Thanks!

abhishek_mumbai · 2009 September 29th, 05:32 AM

what a verbal score.. great! congrats!

2009 September 22nd, 07:53 AM	#1 (permalink)
Anonymoose I JUST got here. Join Date: Sep 2009 Posts: 16	730 (44Q, 46V) on 17/09/2009 Hello, Well, first of all I, like many other posters I've seen here, did much better than this on the official practice tests (760 multiple times; only one question wrong on the verbal section multiple times). So, while I cannot necessarily confirm that the test has gotten harder recently, I can confirm another case of real score < practice score as of Sept 2009 (and while I suspect many reported practice scores are inflated as a result of people simply memorizing the answers, I can confirm that was not the case for me). However, also like some others, I only got about 2 hours of sleep the night before the test. ---BACKGROUND--- I was an econ major in college, so I had a decent background in math, and I practically minored in philosophy so I had a decent background in critical thinking. ---WHAT TO STUDY--- LOGIC/READING COMP: Given my background, I found that I did not need to study very much for the logic (critical analysis) or reading comp sections. In the interest of full disclosure, like some others I have taken the LSATs, so that probably helped me out here. However, unlike others, I would not recommend using the LSAT book as the questions are not only much more difficult (which itself would be fine), but also more abstract and tending to deal with formal logic -- I did not see a single formal logic question on the actual GMAT. In any case, if someone is not inherently good at logic or reading, I'm afraid I don't have much advice here -- you would probably do better to get tips and tricks from Kaplan or others. SENTENCE CORRECTIONS: Regardless of background or intelligence, however, EVERYONE needs to study for the sentence correction section. The GMAT utilizes a special kind of language that can only be accurately referred to as "GMAT English." As evidence, I offer you this grammarian: (okay, I can't link anything. Google "non-errors Paul Brians"). I can count at least three points there* (that he clearly labels as non-errors) that the GMAT demands with an iron fist. Thankfully, this section is also the easiest to increase with a little studying. It may seem hopeless at first, but I promise that your score will increase significantly if you just keep doing practice problems and reading the answer solutions. Although this was not something I did with the logic or reading comp sections, it is imperative that you create a list of A-E for EVERY sentence correction question and then cross off everything until you have only one left; doing so will allow you to avoid careless mistakes and to really make sure that what you choose is the correct answer. "Hopeful," "between/among," and "'none' singular vs plural." MATH PROBLEM-SOLVING: I do want to state up-front that my 44 was a bit of a rude shock, as I was consistently scoring around 49 in the practice exams; despite my low-ish score on the actual test, I promise my advice is still useful :P. Essentially, GMAT math uses a basic, low level* of math, but makes questions difficult by forcing you to do all sorts of weird things with that basic level of math within a strict time limit. Arithmetic, strange as it may seem, ended up being one of the biggest areas that I needed to refresh. I mean, the last time I had to do something like 134.9/5.6 by hand with accuracy to the hundredths digit was back in elementary school! I would highly recommend that anyone practicing quantitative questions do so while timing themselves, as everyone I know runs out of time in the math section. So bottom line, regardless of background I would recommend at least a little time be spent on timed GMAT math questions, especially if English is not your native language (do you know what it means if something has an 8% interest rate compounded semiannually? if you don't, no matter how much of an engineering background you have, you will get it wrong!). DATA SUFFICIENCY: This is the other portion that you should study for at least a little bit regardless of background. These questions are a bit weird, but will again be no problem for someone with a strong background in quantitative reasoning. SUMMARY: Regardless of background, do many sentence correction questions. Depending on background, do at least a few questions from the other sections, but make sure to time yourself when doing math. ---MATERIALS--- Official GMAT book: I actually have a little story here. Originally, I had only purchased the Kaplan book, and upon noticing the controversial "special GMAT English requirements" I mentioned above, I emailed GMAC asking if they really did believe that "between" is the only word that can be used for two, and "among" the only word for three ("a treaty between France, Britain, and Germany" is wrong? REALLY?). I received the most ridiculous, flippant response I have ever seen from a (supposedly) professional company: "the only information available to the general testing public can be found at [link]," the link taking me to such beautiful test-taking tips as "don't eat sugary snacks" and "leave time for traffic when going to the test center." Basically, what the jerko was saying was that I would only be able to find out the answers to their completely arbitrary grammatical assertions was by purchasing THEIR book. So, my complaining aside, yes the official book is a necessary purchase for anyone studying for the GMAT. There are tons of real questions and the answer explanations are exhaustive, although expectedly lacking in tricks and shortcuts. Kaplan: There is no need to purchase the "Kaplan Advanced" book which seems to have a subset of questions from the normal Kaplan book (i.e., you simply get fewer -- not different -- questions in the Advanced book). The Kaplan book is my favorite of the unofficial books, and it contains hugely helpful and necessary tips/tricks/shortcuts, including such gems as "A is usually the right answer in Data Sufficiency questions" (LOL) and "if the question starts with 'which of the following,' the answer is usually D or E." It's easy to see why the offical book would leave out such tips as these, lol. Furthermore, the official book has a woefully inadequate section on the AWA, and Kaplan's template (which really imo is reducible to a list of keywords) is pure money (American slang there, sorry :P). Princeton: I actually hated this book because of the sloppiness with which they wrote their questions. For instance, one of their questions says something along the lines of "a person starts to lay pickets down in even increments. If they lay down X more, how long will the picket fence be?" where YOU HAVE TO ASSUME that the next set of pickets will also be evenly spaced, in a test that PUNISHES YOU FOR MAKING ASSUMPTIONS. If you do official GMAC questions (which are excellently and carefully written) for a while and then do Princeton questions, you will notice things like this all the time. I'm seriously disappointed in Princeton for this and as such cannot recommend their book at all, which is a shame because I like the way they break their questions up into "bin" difficulties, and I especially like their AWA section. Oh, and they have a whole spiel about a "Joe Bloggs" heuristic device in which you are supposed to firstly guess which bin you are in, then secondly guess what Joe Bloggs would guess, then thirdly remove that answer choice from your selection/choose it (depending on your bin). It has been stated that people are poor determinants of the relative difficulty level of questions on the GMAT, and so this Joe Bloggs advice is imo unnecessarily convoluted, unhelpful, downright inaccurate, and essentially garbage. Manhattan GMAT: I don't know anything about this book because I didn't use it : D SUMMARY: The official book is a necessary purchase, and I would highly recommend the Kaplan book in addition for various tips and tricks. I would also highly recommend against purchasing the Princeton book, and I cannot comment on the Manhattan GMAT books. Oh, and the official book doesn't give a list of idioms, but if you do sentence correction questions and read the explanations, you can create your own list, which is highly recommended (I guarantee even English-major native speakers will not know all of them). Expensive prep courses? They don't seem necessary to me since they shouldn't be able to give you any tips you couldn't just find online or in their books, but I suppose I can't really comment for sure since I didn't take one. I suppose they'd help if you were simply unmotivated, but really, that shouldn't be a problem for someone trying to get an MBA :P ---SUMMARY OF SUMMARIES--- Don't read only summaries, because doing so means that you lack the finer understanding necessary to completely comprehend a body of text. Slog through everything : }

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2009 September 22nd, 08:57 AM	#2 (permalink)
eravi11 So far So bad! Join Date: Feb 2009 Posts: 631	Excellent score!..Congrats..

2009 September 22nd, 11:38 AM	#3 (permalink)
Shuck I JUST got here. Join Date: Sep 2009 Posts: 5	Good Job. I have a question though, Which edition of the OG did you use?

2009 September 22nd, 03:34 PM	#4 (permalink)
AdsCPA Eager! Join Date: Aug 2009 Posts: 51	Congrats for a great score... and thanks for your views......

2009 September 22nd, 03:37 PM	#5 (permalink)
grad.mad Within my grasp! Join Date: Mar 2009 Posts: 110	Great Job !!!

2009 September 23rd, 04:07 AM	#7 (permalink)
zudec I JUST got here. Join Date: Aug 2009 Posts: 6	Anonymoose- Can you please link to the Kaplan book that you studied or rather suggest what i can search for on Amazon? I find a bunch of Kaplan books when i Amazon search for Kaplan.

2009 September 28th, 08:55 PM	#9 (permalink)
shp003 GMAT newbie Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: NJ Posts: 3	Hello Friend, Can you please tell me whats the best way to start off with the GMAT. Do I need to prepare and improve my vocabulary like for the GRE ( Barrons wordlists etc). And then start doing the practice exercises?. I purchased the OG and it will arrive anytime soon. Thanks!

2009 September 29th, 05:32 AM	#10 (permalink)
abhishek_mumbai Done with GMAT - 700 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Pune, India Posts: 1,182	what a verbal score.. great! congrats!

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