How to come up with a strategy after initial low GMATscores

[koraljka.de-carina]

I have started preparing for the GMAT September 1, 2009 and have taken two official tests scoring 420 and 410. The last one was March 6, 2010.

I am an international from Croatia and have taken 2 week preparation courses in verbal and quantitative in Croatia. I have OG + additional official verbal and quantitative books, Powerscore and the full set of Manhattan review books as well as Wren and Martin Grammar book. For the last three months I have reviewed the Manhattan books and practiced on OG and Grockit questions. I have literally done 1000's of questions including spending 2-3 hours alone on Grockit since mid January 2010.

Initially I thought math is a problem so I started working with a math tutor right away in September 2009. He is a mathematician and interested in helping me learn math but is not into how GMAT works. I did improve math from scoring 6% the first time to 29% the second time. When we met we worked out problems I could not solve in OG.

With the Verbal I totally freaked with the sentence correction. I didn't know what to look for in a sentence (particularly frustrating after all the review I did - I wanted to shoot myself). With the reading comprehension I was so tired that I kind of gave up. I read the passage but did not comprehend it at all. The critical reasoning I don't remember what I did but somehow they were all too difficult. I don't understand the first time my Verbal percentile was 43% and the second time 12%. I thought math was more of a problem so I focused on practicing and reviewing more math than verbal.

Writing was not a problem and my overall raw score was 5.6 out of 6. At least one thing I don’t need to improve!

Perhaps the problem is that I graduated from undergrad.10 years ago and my current full time job is slow paced and does not require difficult problem solving skills. I simply feel I also need to be exercising my mind in some way, but I haven't figured out what that would be.

I will be taking the test again in early September 2010. I need to come up with a good strategy to attack studying for GMAT but because of low scores I feel my approach needs to change. Could you offer helpful advice?

Here are a few things I know I will do:
1. I plan to take full time practice tests once a week (I did not do this the last five months at all)
2. Must improve verbal -reading with speed and comprehension - plan to take speed reading course in Croatia (do you have something better to suggest?) Of, course continue doing the OG, Grockit and go to public library to read text.
3. Review Manhattan sentence correction and Powerscore critical reasoning books (practice on Grockit and OG, Kaplan
4. Continue doing Grockit studies once a day, verbal and quant
5. Meet with math tutor twice a week (perhaps better study approach ??)

Thanks for your help!

[StaceyKoprince]

I'm going to start with some things you said in your post; after that, I'll tell you what I think you need to do.

What's your goal score? That makes a lot of difference in terms of length of time to study, etc.

1. I plan to take full time practice tests once a week (I did not do this the last five months at all)

No, definitely don't do this. Practice tests should be taken once a week only when you're almost done studying and are very close to your final test date (maybe 2 to 3 weeks away).

CAT exams are really good for (a) figuring out where you're scoring right now, (b) practicing stamina, and (c) analyzing your strengths and weaknesses. The actual act of just taking the exam is NOT so useful for improving. It's what you do with the test results / between tests that helps you to improve.

For most of your prep, every 3 to 4 weeks is more appropriate.

2. Must improve verbal -reading with speed and comprehension - plan to take speed reading course in Croatia (do you have something better to suggest?) Of, course continue doing the OG, Grockit and go to public library to read text.
5. Meet with math tutor twice a week (perhaps better study approach ??)

Maybe, maybe not. Are these courses / tutors geared towards the GMAT? Your time is going to be a lot more efficiently spent if you're specifically targeting everything for the GMAT.

3. Review Manhattan sentence correction and Powerscore critical reasoning books (practice on Grockit and OG, Kaplan)
I have literally done 1000's of questions

As you've already found out, the quantity of your study doesn't necessarily guarantee a better score. In fact, I'll venture to say that the people with whom I speak who mention having done 1000s of questions are almost always the same people who also feel they aren't making much progress on improving their score and don't know why.

Basically: you're focusing on quantity of study at the expense of quality of study.

So, what should you do? Start by reading The GMAT Uncovered, our free e-book. If you've already signed up for our free practice test, then this book is already in your Online Student Center - just go look it up. If you haven't already signed up for our free practice test, go here: http://www.manhattangmat.com/storeitemshow.cfm?ItemID=158&catid=4

Then, read this article:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/02/09/developing-a-study-plan

That article talks about taking and analyzing an MGMAT practice test. This article helps you to analyze the test: http://www.beatthegmat.com/a/2009/09/23/evaluating-your-practice-tests

Then, you're going to need to start analyzing your work in the right way. These articles will help you learn how to study / analyze individual practice problems:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/a/2009/10/09/how-to-analyze-a-practice-problem

http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/01/23/how-to-analyze-a-gmatprep-cr-question

http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/02/25/how-to-analyze-a-reading-comp-inference-question

http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/01/31/how-to-analyze-a-gmatprep-problem-solving-question

http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/03/13/how-to-analyze-a-gmatprep-data-sufficiency-question

On Sunday (this Sunday), a new article will be published at Beat the GMAT that goes through how to analyze a sentence correction question.

Okay, that should give you something to do for a while. :) Check in and let us know how it goes.