Quantitative Preparation:
The material you will be using is extremely important for the GRE. I recommend going through the Scholar Den guides first to understand the topics that can be tested on the exam. After doing so, start revising concepts and then for the in-depth practice of your concepts. Many companies can help you in this process but remember, they are only there to provide you with the right guidance, and how much you score is ultimately up to you.
The most important part of your preparation phase is identifying your weak spots. What I used to do was I would mark all of the questions that I got wrong in any specific exercise and revisit them at the end to see if I was making the same mistakes over and over again. So I recommend you get a new register and note all the important concepts that are neatly related to any specific topic. Then, solve the exercise and mark all the questions you get wrong or face difficulty in. This way, you can identify and make amends for your weaknesses.
My GRE score detail is GRE 330 ( 170Q / 160V / 3.5 AWA). I will break this debrief into different sections so that the readers can get my perspective on everything related to GRE 330, from preparation to the analysis of the achieved score.
Verbal Preparation
For the verbal section, I suggest that you start reading, and by reading, I mean like a lot. I personally used Scholar Den, ETS, and LSAT practice questions. You can start reading articles from the Guardian, New York Times, or the New Yorker, but I recommend that you stick to Scholar Den and the ETS questions because they will provide a metric to test your progress.
For the vocabulary part, familiarize yourself with the ScholarDen words; you would also come across different American newspapers. They are good enough.
Practice Tests
Before you start taking the mocks, you need to understand the basic purpose of their existence. They are not there to tell you how much you will score on the D day. On the contrary, they are a tool for building stamina so that you can perform at your highest continuously for four straight hours. I only scored a maximum of 166 on the quantitative sections of all the mocks I took during my preparation. So don’t worry about your mock scores, and more importantly, don’t get cocky as well :P. The mocks I would recommend are listed below in descending order of importance.
ETS. They are good for verbal and to familiarize yourself with the actual GUI of the test.
Scholar Den mocks. They are a must for math.
Manhattan Mocks. They are a must-have.
Don’t skip the AWA section. Also, do your mocks at the same time when your test is scheduled. I can’t emphasize more on it.
Test Day
It’s all about being in your comfort zone. What works for someone else might not work for you. For example, most people suggest that you should stop doing mocks two days before your exam. I, on the other hand, did one 24 hours ago. So try to be in your comfort zone.
Score Analysis
When your test finishes, you will know whether you have done your best. If the answer is positive, then great, don’t worry about your score and focus on other aspects of your application. If the answer is negative, but you still score above 310, that is good enough. Focus on your application because your application is the one that will get you a scholarship, not just your GRE score. I wish I had known this back in my time.
So, work hard, do your best, and hopefully, things will fall into their place.
Preparation Time
2 months and 10 days to score 330 in the real exam.
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