Feedback on study plan

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

I need a suggestion regarding improving on my weak areas as per analysing the mock CAT. For instance I realised I struggle in absolute value/inequality combos or certain DS questions in algebraic equations. So I just searched forums and picked questions for these topics. However I am still not 100% clear conceptually on absolute value inequalities. How should I strengthen my weak areas since in the guide also there are not enough examples/concepts of big absolute value inequalities problems. Likewise there are other weak areas such as inference in RC , assumptions/weaken in CR etc. So how should I improve upon them even if the theoretical portion of guides does not suffice after a point?

[StaceyKoprince]

There aren't that many absolute value + inequality problems on the test - that's why there aren't that many examples. You may not see even one. If you do see one, it's by definition going to be a harder question, since it's combining two already-decently-hard concepts.

So, if this is a weakness, why not just decide that it will be a "guess and move on immediately" problem? You can't master every last possible thing the GMAT might test. (Nor do you want to! You just want to get a good-enough score for the schools of your choice.) This is a good candidate category for the "not doing it" bucket.

For CR, have you tried this:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2015/12/ ... stion-type

You can do something similar to the above for RC inference, since inference questions are on both CR and RC. If you can learn to tackle inference on one question type, then you can apply your lessons to the other type.

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

So just to add on to this I wanted to precisely know the most effective ways to improve on my weaker spots, for instance should I review the theory again and then do attempt the already covered questions or if I understand the concept then should I find more questions on the topic and how. I mean should I just use the official questions from the area and practice them or should I search for related questions on forums from different sources and practice. So in general what would be the most effective way to improve on a weak area and actually retain the content and be comfortable with it since there are topics which you anyhow have to improve on as they are frequently tested.

Apart from this I have few other queries:

a) I wanted to know if I am going right in my preparation and some tips would help. Now I have still the number properties guide left to complete which is in progress right now. In CR I have couple of chapters left. RC and SC have been completed from the guides and some practice is in progress from OG. I started out in march and I haven't completed the study material (entire guides) till now. Also on weekends when I get more time for instance I do two sets of hard problems (as listed by manhattan prep) from different guides from OG and for instance take the entire day (5 hrs) to attempt these in timed manner, then try to solve the incorrect questions on my own and then reviewing every question. This actually took an entire day of study. So based on the above instances do you think I am going slow and need to speed up? Is there a risk of forgetting previous concepts of I go slow like this?

B) Secondly during weekdays I try to put in 1-1.5 Hr of study and then offlate I carry my notes with me when I travel to office and just go through the notes/attempted problems in the train/metro that I board to commute to office. My travel time is 1.5 hrs and though it is crowded and conjusted I still try to sneak in as much time as I can to scan through the notes. So will this help me to revise/refresh on the concepts covered earlier since mostly in mornings at home I am just focusing on completion of the left over study material. Once that is done then I can just focus on practice and review all the time.

Kindly provide your feedback on the above.

[StaceyKoprince]

It depends on why something is weaker. There are many reasons why you might miss a question.

You might not feel totally comfortable with the content (facts / rules) being tested, in which case you want to do more "pure" skill drills to feel comfortable with that thing, whatever it is.

You might feel fine with the content, but not with the process (eg, how to test cases on DS, or how to find and eliminate trap answers on CR Find the Assumption). In that case, you want to pick apart / work slowly through on old problems that you've done in the past until you feel that you understand the process, then test yourself on new problems of the same tape.

You might feel fine with the content and process, but still feel that you struggle to decode what the GMAT is really asking or what they are trying to hide from you. Then you pick apart the types of problems on which you feel shaky until you can say to yourself, "When I see XYZ, I should think or do ABC." Basically, until you can decode what the test is really asking you to do.

Or you might have certain areas in which you are more prone to careless mistakes. Then you figure out what is driving the mistakes and what new habits would help you to minimize those mistakes. And then you practice those new habits until they become second-nature.

You might have a tendency to stay with certain questions much longer than you should - you should have guessed and moved on faster. Then you go back over the problem to figure out what the clues / triggers should have been (earlier in your work!) to tell you that this problem is not worth your time or is too hard.

I want to make a special point about that last one. Your question assumed that all weaknesses should be improved by learning how to get more right. That's not the case. Some weaknesses are improved by getting them wrong faster and using that time elsewhere.

I don't think you are working too slowly, no. After you finish your first pass through the material, you'll want to make sure that your further review really mixes up topics and question types, so that you are getting frequent review across most areas. And, yes, your review on your commute is helpful - keep it up!

If you start to feel burned out, though, then give yourself a mental break. You can do too much and then your brain just refuses to do more.

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

I took another CAT 2 weeks back but again stuck on the same score i.e. 580 with V31 (1pt improvement) and Q38 (score went down suprisingly from Q42). Now I reviewed and reattempted the CAT reviewing solutions where I got stuck. I have to admit I made a mistake by actually going overboard with time in around 7 questions where I had put in much more than 3 min (some even 6-7 min) and actually got all of them wrong. My accuracy went really low in 600-700 and 700+ questions despite spending time. I actually rushed through the end and guessed a lot in the last 6-7 questions and got them wrong. Now i improved in Algebra and Geometry (both 80% accuracy) but suprisingly went down in Numbers and word problems (really poor performance). I believe whatever questions I got wrong atleast around 70% were solvable while attempting the CAT. Now there were questions of certain types which I did not see before but since I learned the associated concept I tried solving them but got stuck. This actually wasted my time. But then if I kept skipping questions then also my score would have been low since I would keep answering lower level questions.In word problems I believe since the questions are lengthy to read I get a little unsettled since I also think about the time factor but I am unable to skip them quickly since I feel I am comfortable with the underlying concept and hence try to solve the problem. My way of approaching a problem is that I note down the variables/data as I am reading the question and then start approaching it. But I have to admit the quant questions are lengthy and tricky in the MGMAT CATs and perhaps this is what gets me unsettled. The challenge I encounter mostly is to read and unveil a question that seems tricky in language and data which is a bit difficult in a timed environment. In Verbal my RC improved(but inference and main idea questions still are low on accuracy) but CR again went down (has been my weak spot). The performance in SC was more or less the same. Overall I my accuracy was quite low in the 600+ level questions in the CAT.
I actually took more than a week to attempt and review the CAT questions since I am able to devote about just an hour or so in a week day (mornings) owing to my work schedule which requires me to travel for 4 hrs to and fro. I take some notes along and review them while commuting since practicing questions is virtually impossible. At times when I am not able to devote time in the mornings I make it a point to atleast revise/review guides or my notes while commuting. I have also in the past few weeks worked on some of my weaker areas (like absolute values etc.) and cleared certain concepts and tried to practice those.
Now my plan is to complete the OG guide since currently I have attempted less than 50% of the guide till now (In verbal really less portion of questions covered). I think I will try to finish atleast the quant portion of the book as soon as possible and keep doing the verbal portion simultaneously. I think this will perhaps expose me more to various question types and hence I could do better in the CATs having seen such questions before since attempting a new question type entirely takes time in a testing environment which unnecessarily consumes time and compromises accuracy. Do you think practicing more with the official questions will help me get more comfortable and unveil the layering in the questions tested in the CATs?
Now I am left with 3 more MGMAT CATs which I think I will attempt once I am able to practice more and complete a fair portion of the OG guide.
I also think I should then attempt the other two official guides as well.
I also needed advice for practice. Should I practice like 20-30 questions at a stretch or go as per the OG sets by Manhattan with 10-12 questions?
Do you think I should also complete the advanced(extra chapters) of the manhattan guides since I haven't touched them. Will it help add value to improve my scores in MOCK CATs??
My plan was to appear for GMAT in beginning of July as I started out in March however with so much practice left along with more Mock CATs to do it seems a bit difficult. Kindly provide your feedback and guidance regarding the above analysis and best ways to improve the score in the MOCK CATs and optimizing my time for efficient studying.

[StaceyKoprince]

going overboard with time in around 7 questions where I had put in much more than 3 min (some even 6-7 min) and actually got all of them wrong.

But then if I kept skipping questions then also my score would have been low since I would keep answering lower level questions.

You've got to stop thinking about this like a school test. In the moment, while a single question is sitting in front of you on the screen, you either know how to do it or you don't. It doesn't matter whether you studied this material before. It doesn't matter whether you guessed on the last 2 questions. Nothing matters except this: can you do this question in a reasonable amount of time?

And now you know, unequivocally from the data, that when you spend a bunch of extra time, you get the questions wrong anyway. (Which makes sense when you think about it: if you actually knew how to solve those problems in a reasonable amount of time, you wouldn't have needed more than 3 minutes in the first place...)

So you've got to change this mindset. Do not think about how you are doing on the test or how hard or easy you think the current question is or how many times you've guessed so far or when those guesses were. That kind of thinking leads you to spend 6 minutes on a question and get it wrong anyway. (And, even if you got it right, you would still run out of time at the end of the section and your score would go way down anyway.)

That way lies badness. Stop going there!

Please don't try to solve all of the OG questions. Please stop trying to "get through" lots of practice questions in general. You've got to learn how to approach this test overall - if you don't, then all the practice problems in the world aren't going to make things better. The real test will ALWAYS give you things you haven't seen before. You will NEVER be able to answer everything that they've given you. That's how the test is constructed.

For the next 2 days, don't do any practice problems at all. Seriously! Not one! Do this instead:

(1) Read this: http://tinyurl.com/executivereasoning
(2) Read the Scoring section of our free e-book The GMAT Uncovered. There's already a free copy in your MPreP student center account.
(3) Read this: http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2016/02/ ... n-the-gmat
(4) Think back over your decision-making during the test. Look at the last post that you sent to me and my response above. Think about how you need to change the thinking that you exhibited in your last post.
(5) While doing #4, re-read 1, 2, and 3 as many times as necessary. You can also look back over recent problems or CATs that you've done as you think through what you need to change with respect to your timing and decision-making.

If you think you need more than 2 days to think about this, take more than 2 days. Take as much time as you need. Then reply back to tell me your thoughts.

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

Based on your comments I have come up with a certain approach/strategy to invest my time efficiently during a mock CAT. I need to save time and treat it as a business test rather than anything else. If I do not figure out the question in 1 min skip it. I need to perhaps have a mental clock where I get a sense to move on. At times although I figure out the approach but while executing it midway I get a little stuck but then again I pickup and solve the problem. This happens more so since at first glance of the question I think I can attempt it and start working towards understanding the question and getting down to an approach of solving it. I think from now on if I feel that perhaps this is not my comfort zone (though I can attempt to solve it based on the basics that I have gone through in the chapter) I will not be spending more than 45 to 60 secs to make a decision of either attempting or skipping it. If the question falls in my area of strength then probably I can afford to spend a little more time. This can also include the first ten questions where I will be more careful in ensuring accuracy and in case I go overboard with time then I will balance it out in subsequent questions wherein I will be more conscious of not exceeding the time limit or perhaps if I get a sense that the question is not doable in 2 min on first glance then I will skip it immediately with a random guess.I shall be more careful with these approaches particularly when dealing with word problems which tend to take up time in comprehension as they are more wordy as compared to for instance a question dealing with exponents etc. Overall maximum time I am willing to devote to a question at any point will not be 3.5-4 min (this is when I feel I have time or the question lies in my area of strength). Let me know your feedback on this.

I also wanted to ask that I am done with the general chapters 1 month back and currently working through OG, shall I start with the extra chapters of each guide (specially quant) or you think that practicing official questions will cover those aspects while reviewing. What proportion of OG guides make use of concepts of these extra chapters? Are the extra chapters really important to score in the range Q49-51 or it can be done via practice and review of more questions and relying on basics.?

[StaceyKoprince]

Agreed that the main decision comes about 1 minute in.

If you (a) understand the question completely and (b) have a pretty good plan (even if you're not 100% sure it will work), then it's worth spending another minute. Then re-evaluate again. If the plan you tried hasn't worked, dump the problem. If the plan is working well but you have just a few more steps to go, give it another 30 or 45 seconds. If the plan does seem to be working but it seems like it's going to take you another 2 minutes to finish, bail. And so on. Basically, actually think about how things are going and react appropriately.

By the way, let's say you're 1 minute in and things aren't going well. Ask yourself one more question before you move on: is there a way to identify wrong answers so you can cross them off? If so, maybe you do want to spend the next 30 to 60 seconds doing that before you move on. That's the business equivalent of "We built this technology but consumers don't actually want it. Oh but wait! This big tech company could actually use certain pieces of the intellectual property for something else entirely! Let's see if we can sell it to them to cut our losses." If so, yay! If not, cut your losses now.

Basically, for any problem, you're thinking, "What's my angle to get a good ROI?" Just be aware that sometimes your best ROI is to stop.

This article talks about more of the above:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... -the-gmat/

Look in section 4 of this article to develop a 1-min time sense:
http://tinyurl.com/GMATTimeManagement

And try this series to help you learn how to use it:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2015/09/ ... gmat-quant

Overall maximum time I am willing to devote to a question at any point will not be 3.5-4 min

You have the word "not" in there. But from context, it seems that you are saying that you are willing to spend up to 3.5 to 4min. Is that right?

I'd say anything beyond about 3m is too long on a quant, CR, or RC question (not including the read-through for RC). And anything beyond about 2m is too long on SC.

If you're going that long, you don't understand something. On verbal, it usually means that you either don't understand some meaning, so you can't really do the full problem, or you are agonizing back and forth between answers - don't do that. Pick and move on.

On quant, going that long usually means either that you don't really know what you are doing or that you aren't seeing the "elegant" solution, so you are trying to push through a textbook solution that is really cumbersome. That uses up mental energy that you could better spend elsewhere getting easier questions right / avoiding careless mistakes - and cumbersome solutions are much more prone to mistakes, so you might not get this one right anyway.

At the *very* least: never go to 3+ minutes on a question on which you are thinking any form of "But I'm good at this. I should know how to do this. If I just spend some more time, I'm sure I'll figure it out." If you are going to spend *extra* time on any problem, it should be because you know exactly what you're doing, but the problem is objectively going to take longer than average to solve. Maybe it requires a few more steps than typical or something like that. But at 2.5 minutes, you know exactly what you need to do and you are most of the way through doing it.

If you want to score 49 to 51, you will likely have to learn some of the material in the extra chapters but not all. So concentrate on your areas of strength: learn how to do even harder problems in those areas.

This can also include the first ten questions where I will be more careful in ensuring accuracy

It is a myth* that the earlier questions are worth more than the later ones, so if that's why you want to ensure accuracy more on those questions...don't bother. (At least, it's a myth if you are going for a 600+ score. There can be a very small effect down around 500 or so. But you're not going for that score...)

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

Thanks for the feedback. There have been a lot of things going on since our last discussion. This month I virtually could not study much. I had gone on a trip in the first week of July for almost a week. After coming back I haven't been able to get back to study mode though just did a couple of small practice sets on mobile app. Another reason for this gap is that I haven't been able to settle well in my new job since I did not really like my role and could not devote 100% to it resulting in negative feedback from my manager. I believe this role does not suit my personality and skill set and thus has failed to generate my interest. This has really unsettled me and considering the travel time of 4 hrs in addition to the 10 HR work schedule I really got confused whether this was the right profile for me. All this has distracted me and I could not focus on my GMAT prep. I took up this job thinking that I would get some kind of experience and would be able to prepare well for GMAT which for the past 15-20 days has not been happening. I just want to clear the confusion and arrive at a decision so that I can peacefully focus my energies on studying. I was contemplating quitting this job as the situation has become really awkward apart from the travel time taken into account. Kindly let me know if I get back soon to study mode how to approach the preparation hoping I do not forget the concepts. Thanks.

[StaceyKoprince]

I'm sorry that you're having a tough time with your job. It's okay to take some time off from your studies; lots of people do that. If you can get the job situation resolved, then you will be able to be more focused when you restart your studies.

Once you are able to start again, you can go back to what you had been planning to do before. If your break is more than about 6-8 weeks, then you may need to do some general review of major math and grammar rules, math formulas, and general question type strategies (SC, RC, CR, DS, things like smart numbers, working backwards, etc.).

Good luck with everything!

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

I have started this week by going through the flashcards and quickly revising the topics from the Quant Mgmat guides and quickly attempting certain questions from exercises to get back on track and keep the concepts intact. I am only left with the geometry portion which I will be completing in couple of days. Then I plan to do the same for the verbal part. I also plan to quickly go through the error log I had prepared. Now after this is done please advise how to go ahead. Shall I continue the OG questions from where I had left off or do I need to reattempt all the questions again from OG and then proceed further? I thought if I complete the left over OG I can then focus on the Quant and verbal OGs. Meanwhile before this I can attempt an MGMAT Mock CAT in another week or so.

1) Do you agree with this strategy or you suggest to complete the left over OG and reattempt it again rather than doing quant/verbal OGs?
2) I also went through some of the extra chapters content in some guides like algebra and number properties which I thought was important. Also I have noticed that Manhattan CATs do come up with questions from extra chapters. So I have decided to focus on extra chapters from numbers, algebra and FDPs and maybe word problems if required.

Kindly provide your feedback on this.

[StaceyKoprince]

It could be a good idea to re-do some of the OGs you did a couple of months ago to see how much of your takeaways you've retained. If you've retained your main takeaways, then great. If not, then you know you need to do more review before you move on to new questions.

The goal isn't so much to "get done" with lots of questions. The goal is to learn (a) how to think your way through new problems, and (b) how to make the best decisions to maximize your ROI, as we discussed in my post dated 25 June. Take a look at those articles again and then I want you to tell me how you think you should move forward in order to internalize the 1-minute time sense and the ability to make effective decisions about what to do (and how to do it) and what NOT to do.

Re: the extra chapters, yes, the CATs do have some questions that cover material from those chapters. You don't necessarily need to learn all of it though (unless you want a 760+ score!). Learn the extra / advanced material in your areas of strength, but don't necessarily try to push that in weaker areas.

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

Another post after quite a while. I really need your guidance. I attempted two mock CATs since I returned to study mode after a gap (in August). I quickly revised the fundamentals and continued solving the OG. On the first MOCK I finally managed to break 600 and got 640 (Q44 V34). I encountered 23 700 level questions (which is overwhelmingly high). I had to guess on quite a lot of questions. Mostly combinations, probability and positive negative has low accuracy. There were again 5 questions where I spent more than 4 mins. In verbal critical reasoning has been my weak area in the MOCKS and my accuracy has been low even though at times I felt I was doing not too bad and I understand the concepts. I do not really use pre-thinking to get answers and rely on answer choices always. Today I again I took a MOCK however my score again went down to previous level (580 – Q39 V31). Found the test difficult. I also got exhausted and couldn’t attempt last 2 questions in quant. The IR portion has been going really bad for me and I think it exhausts me since I haven’t really done any practice on that front. In today’s CAT I spent more than 3 mins (6.5 on 1) on 8 questions and got all of them wrong. I got just 8 questions of 700+ level. In previous CAT got really low accuracy on algebra and numbers (40 and 33%) but average difficulty level of questions attempted were higher compared to day where accuracy increased (50 and 57%) but average difficulty level of questions was low. I am concerned as there isn’t consistency in the topics. Got really low accuracy in FDPs today which I feel is comparatively stronger sections. But in verbal clearly Critical reasoning is going bad (43 and 29%) for me whereas Sentence correction has been going fine (65-75% accuracy) and can be improved. I had to take these CATs soon (only 1 more left) since my access is about to expire on 7th October. I am mostly through with OG questions in quant and about to complete verbal part (20-30 questions left in each section). I have also started with quant review book but felt it was quite easy till now (attempted around 30 questions in sets of 10-12). I take almost a week to review and solve questions from the CATs and understand the solutions to questions which I am not able to solve at all. I think I will have to take the final MOCK CAT on 2nd October irrespective of my position currently since I do not want any CAT to expire. Kindly provide your feedback regarding my strategy and streamlining my preparation since I will not book a test date till I get a score close to 700 on mocks. What else do I need to do apart from solving OGs? I am not really going too deep for areas like permutations/ combinations/probability (my weakest) in quant or method of reasoning/Parallel reasoning in verbal. I am however bothered by inconsistency and variation in sectional scores in quant especially for numbers and FDPs. Kindly also let me know once my MOCK CATs expire will it be wise to purchase them again?

[StaceyKoprince]

When you're evaluating the data, you have to look beyond percentage correct—that's still the old school mindset.

In other words, what you describe here isn't actually inconsistent:

In previous CAT got really low accuracy on algebra and numbers (40 and 33%) but average difficulty level of questions attempted were higher compared to day where accuracy increased (50 and 57%) but average difficulty level of questions was low. I am concerned as there isn’t consistency

When the average difficulty was higher, you didn't do as well, so your percentage correct dropped. This makes sense. When the average difficulty was lower, your percentage correct increased. This again makes sense: you're more likely to get easier stuff right and more likely to get harder stuff wrong. So look back at the rest of the data while taking difficulty level into account.

What that data is telling you is that your fundamentals are okay in both of those areas (yay!), but when you get harder questions, you're struggling. So what is it about those harder questions that you can't do / would need to learn to be able to do *some* of them in future? (Not all: some should be fast guesses. But, to improve your score, you want to improve your ability to handle *some* of the things that you can't handle right now.)

Next, notice that your focus when describing your 640 test was how many times you had to guess and how you got really hard questions...yet you still got a 640! That's what doing well on this test feels like: it feels hard, you have to guess a lot, you see a lot of hard questions...but you make the right executive decisions and so you get a better score. (And you might have done even better by guessing a little sooner on those 4m+ questions...

On your 580 test, you weren't making quite as good decisions (you went >3m on 8 questions and got them all wrong anyway, plus you ran out of time at the end...so you didn't guess as much as you could / should have earlier in the section).

It sounds like mental fatigue also played a factor. IR can be an issue, as you mentioned, and possibly you've also been over-studying? On your first test, you might not have been too burned out yet, but by the time you got to your second test, you might have been a lot more burned out.

So you have part of the answer already: you need to do some work on IR so that it doesn't tire you out so much on the test.

Next, think about your study habits. Are you burning yourself out in general? You had to do IR on the 640 test, too, so why else did you feel so much more exhausted on the 580 test?

And go back to look at the decisions you made on both tests. Where could you have made better decisions? Where should you cut yourself off next time? How will you know, so that you don't spent 3+ minutes again (and get it wrong anyway)!

Finally, among the problems that you got wrong or that you got right but took a bit too much time: look for the low-hanging fruit:
- careless mistakes
- alternative approaches
- problems you could partially do
- explanations that do make sense when you read them

Don't spend a bunch of mental energy banging your head against the wall on problems that you couldn't do at all and for which the explanations don't even make a ton of sense to you. Instead, learn how to guess more quickly on those and move on faster!

Re: your expiring test access, send an email to gmat@manhattanprep.com to find out what your options are for extending your access. There may be a way to do so without having to pay the full price for them again—I'm just not sure what the procedure is.

[RAHULZ400]

Hi Stacey,

In order to improve my weak areas, from where else can I practice. I already did OG for quant and right now working on quantitative review book.Would that suffice?
In addition, since I have only 1 CAT left which is about to expire does it make sense to take it in a hurry or shall I again purchase the MGMAT Mocks. Shall I do my previous mock questions or wait to buy the set again and then attempt in a test mode as this way I may not risk remembering previous questions. Finally the other option would be to just keep practising and improving weak areas and then only write the gmatprep exams?? Let me know your feedback.