Here is the latest in our latest Strategy Series, by Chris Ryan, Director of Instructor and Product Development.<\/p>\n
You’ve just accepted your fate. <\/span>I have to take the GMAT,\u009d you admit to yourself. <\/span>And now you admit one more thing: No, I can’t walk in and take it cold.\u009d <\/span><\/p>\n So you contemplate all the research you have to do. <\/span>Tomorrow you’ll start trolling the online forums, talking to friends about their GMAT-prep experiences, and haunting the Study Aids\u009d aisle of your local Barnes & Noble. <\/span>But right now, you don’t want to buy<\/span> anything. <\/span>You want general principles. <\/span>Whichever books you pick up, whatever course you take (or not) \u201c how should you think about preparing for the GMAT?<\/p>\n Here are five tips to guide you.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1) Go to the source.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Many religions have holy books, right? <\/span>The Official Guides from the GMAC, in their orange, purple and green splendor, are the holy books of the GMAT religion. <\/span>Every other book, as good as it may be, is just commentary. <\/span>Only the Official Guides contain problems retired from the real GMAT. <\/span>Thus, your efforts must be centered on the Official Guides.<\/p>\n The other holy\u009d source is GMAT Prep, the free practice-test software that you should download from mba.com. <\/span>This software has its drawbacks, but it also has two unique benefits: it uses the real GMAT algorithm, and even more importantly, it contains retired GMAT problems, many of which aren’t in the Official Guides. <\/span>There are two tests offered on this software; you should consider \u02dcsaving’ at least one of them for later in your preparation to use as a measuring stick. <\/span>The GMAC folks have told us that they plan to release more products soon; these should also become part of your GMAT preparation depot.<\/p>\n Though the GMAC sources are the best, don’t ignore third-party resources. <\/span>Not surprisingly, I believe that the ManhattanGMAT resources are great. <\/span>For instance, our computer-adaptive exams supply crucial explanations and analytics that GMAT Prep lacks. <\/span>Our Strategy Guides break down the core principles and give you lots of relevant practice.<\/p>\n But one way to measure the greatness of any third-party product is the degree to which it reflects the content of the GMAT. <\/span>And when it comes to the content of the GMAT, GMAC products have no equal. <\/span>(This is why ManhattanGMAT’s curriculum is built around the Official Guides, which all of our students receive.)<\/p>\n 2) Build up, not down.<\/span><\/p>\n We see it all the time: whole herds of students go running off to find super-hard problems. <\/span>If I can crack these,\u009d the herds think, I can do any GMAT problem.\u009d<\/p>\n Don’t follow the herds.<\/p>\n How you do on the GMAT is determined by your floor \u201c the level of problem that you can absolutely, positively get right every time, without hesitation or anxiety.<\/p>\n So you should spend more time truly mastering the easier<\/span> problems. <\/span>And by mastering,\u009d I mean ensuring that you can do the problem, not only correctly<\/em>, but also quickly<\/em>, easily<\/em> and confidently <\/em>under tough exam conditions \u201c as if Dirty Harry were leveling his .44 Magnum at you and asking if you feel lucky.<\/p>\n By mastering,\u009d I mean knowing everything there is to know about the problem \u201c the underlying principles, the subtle application of those principles, the embedded tricks and traps.<\/p>\n I mean knowing how to teach the problem. <\/span>Knowing how to write a similar problem.<\/p>\n Once you have built this knowledge and skill, then progress upwards. <\/span>It’s like building a brick wall \u201c don’t put the next layer on until the current layer is in place. <\/span>Of course, for top scores, you’ll need to practice against some really tough problems. <\/span>But make sure all the lower levels are solid first.<\/p>\n 3) Turn enemies into friends.<\/span><\/p>\n Should you play to your strengths or attack your weaknesses?<\/p>\n Ideally, you’ll do both. <\/span>But if you have to choose, especially early on \u201c pick the weaknesses.<\/p>\n Let’s say you’re a genius on Critical Reasoning, but you’re terrible at Sentence Correction. <\/span>Which should you work on? <\/span>The Sentence Correction. <\/span>Why? <\/span>Because the test is adaptive. <\/span>If SC is weighing your performance down, you’ll never get the really hard CR problems. <\/span>You’ll never get a chance to prove just how brilliant you are with CR. <\/span><\/p>\n So face your demons. <\/span>Eat your vegetables. <\/span>You hate geometry? <\/span>Then do those problems first. <\/span>Consider them the enemy plans that have fallen into your hands \u201c and extract all the intelligence. <\/span><\/p>\n Then, as you master individual enemy problems, turn them into your friends. <\/span>Become totally comfortable with them. <\/span>Then, when you walk into the GMAT, none of the questions will throw you off your game plan. <\/span><\/p>\n 4) Mix it up.<\/span><\/p>\n You know you should do a lot of topic-based work \u201c especially in your weak areas. <\/span>And you know you’ll have to take practice tests to prepare for the GMAT’s adaptive format, which is both less familiar and more stressful than a paper-based format.<\/p>\n That’s all well and good. <\/span>But don’t limit yourself to topic-based work and practice tests. <\/span>Topic-based drills are indispensable, but they give you a crutch \u201c you already know what kind of problem you’re facing. <\/span>In contrast, the GMAT throws you problems in random order by content area.<\/p>\n So you need to develop your eye: your ability to recognize patterns, perceive key traits, classify problems and bring relevant strategies to bear.<\/p>\n In this regard, practice tests would seem to help you here \u201c and they do. <\/span>But you can’t, or shouldn’t, take a practice test every day. <\/span>You can burn yourself out all too easily. <\/span>After every practice exam, you need time to study the detailed game film,\u009d draw out lessons and fix the issues. <\/span> <\/span>That’s several days of work \u201c before<\/em> you take another practice exam.<\/p>\n So what should you do when you’re not taking practice exams?<\/p>\n Short drills of mixed-topic problems from the Official Guides. <\/span><\/p>\n The GMAC has already done the prep work for you \u201c they’ve jumbled up the problems by topic but arranged them in order of difficulty. <\/span>So do 5-10 problems in a row. <\/span>Don’t skip any. <\/span>Treat the exercise as if\u009d you were taking the GMAT. <\/span>And then spend double the time afterwards reviewing and mastering each problem.<\/p>\n You can do this kind of drill every day, especially as you get closer to the real exam \u201c and your GMAT muscles will grow strong.<\/p>\n 5) Know what you know.<\/span><\/p>\n It’s two weeks to the exam. <\/span>You’ve done a ton of work, and your head is kind of swimming.<\/p>\n Stop making your head swim. <\/span>Start reviewing and redoing problems.<\/p>\n At this point, it’s much less important to cram new stuff into your brain than it is to organize and strengthen what’s already in there. <\/span><\/p>\n Don’t worry about trying to cover everything under the sun. <\/span>Instead, go for depth over breadth. <\/span>Force yourself to revisit problems you think\u009d you know. <\/span>You’ll be surprised at what you don’t really<\/em> know. <\/span><\/p>\n Master a few<\/em> representative problems from each topic tested on the GMAT. <\/span>Know everything about these problems. <\/span>For each one, have a crystal-clear approach plan \u201c and also a Plan B, C, and even D \u201c that you can execute correctly, quickly, easily and confidently while taking enemy fire.<\/p>\n Now work those problems again until you’ve licked them. <\/span>You want to walk into the exam with a bunch of friends \u201c that is, Official Guide problems that you know cold, inside and out.<\/p>\n Oh yeah \u201c you should take one or two more practice exams in the last couple of weeks, but don’t overdo it!<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n With these principles in hand, you’ll be well-equipped to study for the GMAT in order to put your best foot forward on test day. <\/span>But bear in mind that nothing will replace good old-fashioned elbow grease \u201c statistics from GMAC show that the amount of time spent studying, both in terms of hours and weeks, correlates positively to performance on the test (100+ hours and 8+ weeks for the best average results, if you’re curious). <\/span>Let’s call this Tip #6 \u201c there aren’t any shortcuts to success on the GMAT! <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Here is the latest in our latest Strategy Series, by Chris Ryan, Director of Instructor and Product Development. You’ve just accepted your fate. I have to take the GMAT,\u009d you admit to yourself. And now you admit one more thing: No, I can’t walk in and take it cold.\u009d So you contemplate all the research […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[713],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-51","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-how-to-study","tag-study-tips"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18001,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions\/18001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}