dvader Posted September 11, 2008 Share Posted September 11, 2008 This forum was great help for me and I would like to give back to the community by answering any questions there might be. My score isn't above 1500, but I am very happy with it. Background I'm an Electrical Engineer at UT Austin and this is my last year. Study Materials (Number of Practice tests taken: ~30) Princeton Review: Word Smart for the GRE 2nd Edition Princeton Review: GRE Prep Kaplan: Verbal Workbook Kaplan: Comprehensive Program 2007 Edition Book Kaplan: Higher Score CD Cambridge Review MyGRETutor.com (Just do the first free test. The remaining tests were horrible.) PowerPrep Story I started preparing for GRE on May 10th 2008, and my last GRE was September 9th (I took it once on Aug. 9th and got 1300). I was working full-time as an intern at a major semiconductor company, so 3 hours a day on weekdays was the best I could do. Weekends were all-out GRE though. Over the course of the 4 months, I barely went out with friends, and the only movie I watched was The Dark Knight. Mark my words: In retrospect, this was absolutely unnecessary, so please balance your time and spend some time with buddies. Anyway, I tried to learn 30 words per day, but ended up averaging about 15 words per day because on certain days, my brain was just too saturated. I started off with the wonderful Word Smart for the GRE by Princeton Review. It has a lot of examples and mnemonic devices that helped me memorize not only the definition of the words, but also the context. This is very important for analogies. After I was done with that book (~600 words), I decided I needed more vocabs. So I used the Kaplan word list (~1000 additional words)and eventually finished it. By the end, there were only about 2 or 3 words in tests that I didn't know. I made word cards for every word because it allows me to shuffle words and make stacks of words I learned vs. words I forgot vs. words that are still too fresh to tell for sure. As an engineer, I'm not good with verbal. The strategy I used for the verbal section is this: 1-2 seconds for Antonyms, 10-15 seconds for Analogies, 15-20 seconds for Sentence Completion, and that leaves ample time for Reading Comprehension. Note that if you don't learn enough vocab words, this strategy won't work as you'd be missing antonyms, analogies and sentence completion left and right. For Reading Comprehension, read quickly the first time. If you encounter something that's hard to understand, don't worry about it because there might not even be a question about that part. The purpose of the first run-through is to get the structure, tone and general idea of the passage. That takes care of the general idea and tone questions. With practice, you'll also be able to, on the first run-through, spot keywords that should come up in detail questions. Make a mental note of where the keywords are so that when you encounter them in a question, you can immediately skip to that section of the passage. Repeatedly read 5 lines above and 5 lines below the keyword until you get a gist of the right answer. There is rarely a need to read more than 5 lines above and below. There is also no need to write anything down for reading comprehension. Some prep books tell you to do so, but in my opinion, it's a waste of precious time that you can use to confirm your answer choice for a particular question. Last hint, and I mentioned it a few times in my story: Practice ALOT. Each set takes only 1 hour 15 minutes, so it shouldn't be that tough time wise. After each practice test, go over what you missed, BUT EQUALLY IMPORTANT is going over what you got right. This is crucial because this allows you to look back at how you nailed a tough one. My strategy for reading comprehension was the result of analyzing how I got things right. I started with getting only 40% reading comp correct, and by the end of things, I was consistently getting around 90% right. Well, I hope my guide to the verbal section helps. I didn't write anything for math, but let me just say that even if you are proficient at math, do practice because GRE comes up with the weirdest questions. Good luck! dvader Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sephornia Posted September 12, 2008 Share Posted September 12, 2008 Congratulations Dvader!! That's a laudable score. I'm glad all your studying paid off! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ruchia Posted September 12, 2008 Share Posted September 12, 2008 hey.. congratulations.. ! thats an awesome score. how did your AWA go? were the topics from the ETS pool? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goldust Posted September 12, 2008 Share Posted September 12, 2008 Congrats dvader, excellent debrief! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dvader Posted September 12, 2008 Author Share Posted September 12, 2008 Thanks, all of you. I've been studying for so long, even now when I wake up each day, I first go for my vocab cards and then realize I don't need to cram vocabs anymore. Then I feel happy but also sort of sad. It's like I've had a girlfriend named Georgina Reba Edwards for the past 4 months, and now that I've figured her out, we break up (although it was a friendly break-up). In a way I miss Georgina. Call me crazy, I come up with the most dumb analogies :) Withdrawal symptoms! AWA was good. I think, hope, I did well. I'm not sure if the topics were from the pool. I haven't looked through the entire pool yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
qgh Posted September 12, 2008 Share Posted September 12, 2008 "BUT EQUALLY IMPORTANT is going over what you got right." I will try this way. thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dvader Posted September 12, 2008 Author Share Posted September 12, 2008 No problem qgh. Best of luck to you. What university are you from in China? I'm a Chinese dude from Hunan, but left when I was 4 years old. My cousin came to Texas A&M a year ago for grad school. He's from Zhejiang University. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
qgh Posted September 13, 2008 Share Posted September 13, 2008 No problem qgh. Best of luck to you. What university are you from in China? I'm a Chinese dude from Hunan, but left when I was 4 years old. My cousin came to Texas A&M a year ago for grad school. He's from Zhejiang University. Hi, dvader. I'm very happy to know you. We can be friends if you don't mind. I'm from Jiangxi (In china we call each other "laobiao":D). Now I'm studying math at Northwest University, in Xi'an(not the one in American which I dreamed of :D). And I'm a senior. I have this American idea after I saw many of my friends going abroad not long ago. So I know little about how to do these things. Moreover, my english basic is not good. I really appreciate your help.:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dvader Posted September 15, 2008 Author Share Posted September 15, 2008 Hi, dvader. I'm very happy to know you. We can be friends if you don't mind. I'm from Jiangxi (In china we call each other "laobiao":D). Now I'm studying math at Northwest University, in Xi'an(not the one in American which I dreamed of :D). And I'm a senior. I have this American idea after I saw many of my friends going abroad not long ago. So I know little about how to do these things. Moreover, my english basic is not good. I really appreciate your help.:) Sorry I haven't replied sooner. Yeah, sure. PM me for your personal contact. Do you have Facebook? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MonaD Posted September 16, 2008 Share Posted September 16, 2008 Great score dvader, congrats. Nice debrief. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dvader Posted September 17, 2008 Author Share Posted September 17, 2008 Thanks :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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