A pleasant surprise!

Grockit is offering 5 practice CATs to those who purchased the standard membership and beyond! For more details visit this link! I'm thrilled!

Today's Progress

Feeling so sleepy even before reviewing all the 17 mistakes in Quant. I'm searching for the solutions in the forums and categorizing the mistakes. So far I've managed only 10. Rest for tomorrow morning.

On the study front, I've marked this month for Kaplan. 

• Kaplan Verbal Workbook
• Kaplan Math Workbook
• Kaplan 800
• Kaplan Premier Program

Regardless of whether I follow the plan or not, I'm crazy about making plans. I made a note of all the chapters in a diary and am checking the chapters as and when I complete them.  Gives me a feeling of being in control!

Moreover, I end up feeling really low when my scores dip. So I need to be prepared before taking those brutal Kaplan CATs. That's the reason I'm trying to finish up Kaplan. I think Manhattan GMAT and Knewton CATs may not be all that bad. So those are reserved for the month of October. I'll be out of town this weekend, so can't take another CAT during the weekend. Maybe I can fit in a PowerPrep CAT just before leaving.

GMAT Prep I - 640 (41Q, 36V)

As I mentioned in my previous post, I lost the test data because of a system re-install. So I took the GMAT Prep I again and here's my score. Will review the incorrect questions tomorrow.

Quant Total : 37 Q - 20 correct, 17 wrong, 0 unanswered - 54%
Verbal Total: 41 Q -  30 correct, 11 wrong, 0 unanswered - 73%

GMAT Test Analysis

Finally, I've done a consolidated analysis of the practice CATs that I've taken so far. One mistake I made was that I waited too long to log those mistakes into an excel sheet, which resulted in me spending the last two days fretting, putting all this stuff (4 Practice CATS) into an excel sheet and getting the pivot table generated  I couldn't include the Veritas Prep CAT (since it didn't give me a category of the mistakes) and my GMAT Prep data (lost this information because of a system re-install). Anyways, I'm thankful to Princeton Review and Manhattan GMAT for giving a nice breakup of the mistake categories, which made it easy to enter into the excel sheet and get the graph generated. If you might find this useful, here's the link!

All Practice Tests - Verbal Mistake Categories

All Practice Tests - Quant Mistake Categories

Princeton Review - CAT 2 - 580 (36Q, 34V)

Scored 580 (36Q, 34V) in the Princeton Review CAT 2. 

Quant Total: 37 Q - 26 correct, 11 wrong, 0 unanswered - 70%

8/22 mistakes in PS - 64%
Problem Areas: Geometry, Averages/Rates/Statistics, Plugging in
3/15 mistakes in DS - 80%
Problem Areas: Geometry, Puzzle pieces

Verbal Total: 41 Q - 31 correct, 10 wrong, 0 unanswered - 76%
This time it was CR, where I made most of my mistakes. Was especially careful with RC, making notes and found the passages to be quite easy.
3/15 mistakes in SC- 80%
4/12 mistakes in CR- 67%
3/14 mistakes in RC - 79%

Princeton Review - CAT I - 620 (37Q, 39V)

I took the Princeton Review Practice CAT I today. Scored 620 (37Q, 39V). I was happy with the slight improvement in scores. Made a total of 8 mistakes on quant and 9 mistakes on verbal.

Quant Total: 37 Q - 29 correct, 8 wrong, 0 unanswered - 78%

One thing I'm happy to say is that I've eliminated the timing problem altogether. I finished on time and there was not a single question where I had to guess. So these mistakes are sure to be careless ones.

Verbal Total: 41 Q - 32 correct, 9 wrong, 0 unanswered - 78%
On verbal, I finished ahead of time as usual.

Got to get back to analysis now. I will take a short break of 2-3 hours and work on this. I'm sure that I can take my score to the 700+ level, provided I continue at the same pace of preparation.

Knewton Free Course!

I'm a big fan of Knewton and think that they have enthusiastic, lively, knowledgeable and entertaining instructors.

Knewton is giving away a free GMAT prep course in their Back-to-School Facebook Giveaway sweepstakes. If you are interested, visit http://knewt.ly/fbgiveaway. The contest ends September 10, 2010.

Here's a little more background on what winning their course would mean:

•    Live and interactive web-based classes
•    One-on-one attention from world-class GMAT instructors
•    5 full-length CATs created by the architects of the actual GMAT
•    Live office hours and 24/7 academic support from GMAT experts
•    Hundreds of concept videos
•    Flexible 1-year membership
•    Guaranteed 50-point score increase

Change in Plans!

Adekku and other fellow bloggers and friends, thanks for enquiring about my disappearance :-). I'm not dead studying, though there have been changes in plans.

I've decided to apply in Round 2 and rescheduled my GMAT date to the second week of November. I was getting too stressed about the unfinished chapters in GMAT, work deadlines and dismal test performances that I figured that it is better to reschedule. I'm taking Knewton classes too and find that they're fun! My time these days is mostly spent on Grockit. I've completed the easier questions on PS and DS in all areas in Quant and I'm moving on to the moderate section. Grockit has Quant and Verbal challenges (10 questions in each) which give you the percentile ranking based on your recent performance, performance in the challenges and the performance of other GMAT students. Each challenge is unlocked when you solve 20 group questions. I find that the challenges are a pretty good indicator of my performance so far. Since my Veritas prep test, I haven't taken any other test in a couple of  weeks. Was out of town last week and back after a refreshing vacation time with family. I will get  to the Princeton review test this weekend.

Veritas Prep Free Test (580, 36Q, 33V)

In this test, I didn't have any issues with timing. Made a couple of guesses on quant, especially in probability and mixture problems. In both quant and verbal, I made 13 mistakes. In quant, I got a bunch of questions wrong, in a row. Noticed that a lot of questions were similar to OG, only they had been slightly re-worded. Will analyze the mistakes tomorrow. Off to bed now.

GMAT Study Status

There seem to be a million things to be done.

• Kaplan - Math Work Book - 4 Chapters 
• Kaplan - Verbal Work Book - 4 Chapters
• Kaplan Premier Program - 6 Chapters
• Kaplan 800 - 13 Chapters
• Manhattan Advanced Chapters - 22 Chapters

1. Equations, Inequalities Guide 3 - Chapters 8 through 14 - 7 chapters
2. Manhattan Word Translations Guide 4 - Chapters 9 through 13 - 5 chapters
3. Manhattan Geometry Guide 5 - Chapters 6 through 9 - 4 chapters
4. Manhattan Sentence Correction Guide 8 - Chapters 9 through 14 - 6 Chapters

• OG - 12 - 10 Chapters
• OG - Math Work Book - 7 Chapters
• OG - Verbal Work Book - 7 Chapters
• Powerscore CR Bible - 14 Chapters
• Peterson ARCO - 14 Chapters

Total -  102 chapters

The easiest way to blog?

I love stuff that inspires. Sometimes, I find a quote that is so inspiring, funny or downright true, that I'm compelled to note it down. I've made a note of these in my mini blog. Check it out!

Progress in week 5

I haven't been keeping well and progress had slowed down last week. I couldn't muster enough energy to give a full length test, so decided to focus on error analysis instead.

Looking back at the consistent, dismal performance over the last three tests I've decided to spend more time on reviewing the basics. I've entered all the incorrect answer choices, answer choices that were correct but consumed too much time into an error log and am revising the error log. Back to the basics!