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I was at a dinner party the other night and we started discussing the four uses of the word “that”. Apparently, I hang out with a lot of nerds at dinner. Not only did I impress these nerds with my grammar skills, but I also came up with a great idea for a blog post! So, from time to time, I’m going to write about some of the important GMAT grammar rules that I like to cover in my classes. Read more

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It might be! And I’m not talking about the value of the top-10 MBA that your GMAT score might help you get—I’m talking about the knowledge that you gain from your GMAT studying. Check out this sentence: Read more

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This is the first in what I hope will be many student-question inspired posts. Allyson from Philadelphia was wondering whether “nor” had to be paired with “neither” or whether it could be used on its own. The answer was far more complex than expected, so here it is. If you have an idea for a GMAT grammar blog post, or just have a question that you want answered, email me at emadan@manhattanprep.com.

To begin, you’ll need to understand the essentials of parallelism. You can get in-depth coverage of parallelism in our Sentence Correction Strategy Guide, but here are the basics. Two (or more) things in a list have to be both structural and logically parallel. Let’s start with the positive form: either/or. Read more

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Subject-verb agreement is fundamental to correct sentence construction. It’s commonly tested on the GMAT, but is overlooked far too often. Today, we’re going to focus on the subject of the sentence in GMAT grammar.

The subject is the actor of the sentence. It performs the action described by the verb. For simplicity’s sake, I’m going to use “subject” to mean the main subject of the sentence, used in an independent clause, though, of course, a sentence can contain multiple actors/subjects. For example: Read more

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Last time, we talked about how to read for meaning and spot redundancy traps on GMAT Sentence Correction.

I’ve got another trappy SC for you; this one is from the GMATPrep® free exams. Go for it! Read more

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Possessive Pronouns

Pronouns are nifty little tools for consolidating your writing. Instead of repeating a noun over and over within the same sentence, you can simply replace it with a pronoun. The meaning stays clear and the message is concise. Compare the following sentences: Read more

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The word “that” is one of the most flexible words that the GMAT tests. It can take several roles and could easily be misused. More commonly, it serves as a red herring that forces readers to stop and think about the wrong things. That said, let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of how “that” can be used and why. Read more

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In short; passive voice is acceptable on the GMAT.

If only it were that easy. Read more

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If you’ve been following these posts, you already have one kind of  noun modifier safely stashed away – opening modifiers. Let’s expand your repertoire using the same sentence: Read more

Did you know that you can attend the first session of any of our online or in-person GMAT courses absolutely free? We’re not kidding! Check out our upcoming courses here.

Modifiers can seem overwhelming. They have lots of rules, impact meaning, and come in different kinds, each of which is restrictive in different ways. So why not throw modifiers out the window? They are the grammatical spice of life! Consider this simple sentence:

The dog ran down the street.

Basic. Boring. Factual, but unimportant. Now compare it this sentence: Read more