Got my scores 114: 30R, 30L, 26S, 28W
prep time: 4 weeks (speaking 3 days)
I think you have to find a strategy and learning material that works best for you. Here are my comments:
I found buying the test material to be very confusing because every publication has so many variations of the material that they sell. Before buying any book online, go to pubs website and find out how many versions they have. No matter which prep book you buy make sure that you get the title "with audio cds" and not just "with cd".
Studied: Kaplan(Full), barrons(7 Tests), mastering(S,W), Longmann(L), ets(Nothing) and barrons sample essays.
I read kaplan cover to cover. It has some good tips for all sections. I took Kaplan and Barrons practice tests.
Listening: Longmann's listening is good for practice. I found it to be very easy, but it helped me in developing notes taking strategy(it proved to be useful even during the integreted Qs in speaking section). I think Barrons listening was very close to the real test.
Speaking: I haven't found any book that is useful. Listen to jason's advice (video on his website) for all questions then modify it to whatever works for you. For Q1, Q2, and Q5 I followed his instructions.
Q1: pick a few qualities and examples to support them about ppl, place and event. jason has quite a few samples
Q2: practice a few toefl writing topics about "you agree or disagree" statements.
q3-q6 focus on how well you summarize and para phrase info. for q4 and q6 i wrote down as much as possible while listening. then during the prep time, i just placed a tick mark next to the main points. Remember, you have very little time to speak. so, you can't speak about every thing. Again, focus on summarizing skills.
Writing: barrons sample essays will give you a lot of ideas. kaplan has some very good tips on writing a cohesive essay. mastering skills has 20 odd essays (with only 3 paras -- on real exam you have to write 5 paras 300+ words). try to identify COMMON spelling and grammatical mistakes that you make during practice. The text editor in exam has a word count feature. i think ets should wake up and add a spell checker also.