I imagine there are tons of threads on this, but since search sucks I can’t look up “GRE.”
I’m looking at going to grad school, probably in some sort of International Development field. I am hoping to start in Fall of 2010. Right now, it looks like I will need to take the paper based GRE in October. However, if the timing on that is off for some reason it’d be possible to take the computer-based test in Thailand.
Any advice on how to study for this? I have not done a lick of math for years. I’m fairly confident about my verbal skills, but anything helps, right? I will probably be able to only buy one or two books, since they’d have to be shipped here. But anything I could download that would help would be great. What books are the best? What else can I do to prepare?
I took the GREs in October, mostly on a whim so I didn’t do all that much to prepare for it. I was also fairly confident about my verbal skills, particularly as standardised tests are concerned (I did well on the SAT verbal section), and a bit more wary about the maths portion.
The maths section appears to have been designed for people with high school algebra, tops. If you understand that, you’ll be golden, or at least do fairly well. I think this is perhaps more a reflection of education in mathematics These Days as opposed to anything else. HOWEVER. The verbal section is not centred around any version of English I am familiar with. It appears to be some hyper-evolved Super-English, and it kicked my ass. I would focus your priorities there.
In retrospect this is more reflection on the test itself than advice on how to study for it, but I seriously, seriously would not be worried about the maths part. If you can find practise reading comprehension questions from the GREs, that would help. The sentence completion part shouldn’t pose any problems if you’re reasonably well-read, but the analogies might be problematic.
It’s been a long while since I took the GRE, also on a whim - I’ve never attended grad courses. I just found a book in the local library on the GRE, read it, and worked out the math problems. This was several years after any math work in school. I did very, very well on it, better than I did on the SAT. It was, in fact, a lot like the SAT except you had less time to do the same number of problems, so you have to work faster. The only part that threw me at all was the logic section. There were some questions on hatboxes and putting this hat box in that hat box and such. I got kind of hung up on why someone would be stuffing hat boxes into each other (didn’t really even know what a hatbox was) instead of just working on the logic. Net, work quickly, don’t waste time on questions you don’t know, and you should do fine. Practice a bit before hand so you know how the test works. That’s it.
For me it was more about familiarizing myself with the types of questions rather than memorizing a bunch of words (for the verbal). Basically you have to become very good at guessing. I used prep books from Princeton Review and Barron’s and they were both quite helpful.
Don’t sweat it; it’s pretty easy with a good book. As Alex mentioned, the math section is a matter of refamiliarizing yourself with HS algebra. There’s a very limited scope of questions that they ask you. Math is definitely not my strong suit, and it was easy for me. Verbal is tougher, but all you really need to do is get a GRE book with a list (usu 300 or so words) and memorize them. A task, to be sure, but the lists they release are pretty good. I went in the first time with no list (as an English major) and screwed several of them up.
The essays are cake. Can you write the same essay that you wrote on the SAT? Good, that’s one of them. Can you pick apart an argument containing glaring logical fallacies? Since you post competently on the Dope, I’m going to assume that that’s a yes to that one, too.
Sorry I don’t have any specific book advice. I have to go back and take the GRE again myself when I finally go home.
Not just algebra–geometry too. Stuff like being able to figure out how big angle ABD is from knowing what angle EFG is. Using pretty basic information like line AB and line EF are paralell, and DG intersects them, and that sort of stuff.
For my personal needs, taking a practice math test, then reviewing the stuff which made me say “huh?” just by covering the material in the practice book I picked up (by Barron’s or somebody) and a few more practice tests was plenty to get me a perfect math score.
But I take tests well, do pretty well with math in general, and mostly was rusty because I hadn’t used geometry in years.
Get a prep book, take practice tests, and see how you do. Focus on areas where you’re struggling. Practice, practice, practice. It’s high school math and college English.
This is what I was going to say. When I prepared for the GRE I was still in college but had taken a break in the middle, so I was several years out of basic required math classes. I got a book that had, I think, six practice tests. I spent several weeks studying the material in the book, then, leading up to the test, took one practice test every week. I did OK. Since you have a lot more time than I did, you can do more practice tests. I WOULD recommended making your most intense practice test period close to the time of the actual exam, but it doesn’t hurt to start the review and some practices now.
The free math prep bookelet on the GRE website was the most valuable thing I did to prep. It made a huge difference.
If you do wind up taking the computerized version, make sure to revise your strategy accordingly. You can’t go back to questions. Also, you have to get the first few questions right to get enough points to get a really high score. Missing one of the first 5 questions can really set you back, so may want to do a little double checking on those.
The Princeton Review and Kaplan books are both good. They differ from one another mainly in tone – PR is a bit snarkier and more irreverent about the test, whereas Kaplan is more no-nonsense. Anyway, I’d recommend getting one of those, and also one of the books of actual tests from previous years that ETS puts out (note that the practice tests in other test prep books are designed to be as much like real test questions as possible, but they won’t actually be the real ones, since ETS owns the copyright to all the old tests).
The math section is easier than its counterpart on the SAT, but if you haven’t taken math since high school, it can be challenging in its own way. The verbal section is theoretically harder than the SAT, but shouldn’t pose too much of a problem for anyone with a decent vocabulary and reasoning skills. I can’t speak to the writing section, as it was the logic section back when I took it (and I still mourn the change – I got tons of fellowship money for solving a bunch of puzzles that I would gladly have solved for fun, and you can’t beat that for awesome).
The most important thing is knowing what to expect. Get very, very comfortable with the format for the test and the scoring, and you should be fine.
If you’re anywhere as near as bad at math as I am (unlikely, as I have special skills in that area), I recommend this book, which was totally worth the s&h to Eastern Europe. I guarantee you that without this book, there was totally a possibility that I would have missed every single question on the math section. Instead I got a 600, which I was ecstatic with. I also found a general Barron’s study guide in Sofia and that was helpful as well, esp. the tips on what they’re looking for in the essay section. (I didn’t really need a lot of help with the verbal section, as I am as good at that section as I am bad at the math.)
I also recommend getting your colleagues to go on strike for two months, leaving you with absolutely nothing to do but study for the GRE. Worked for me.
I liked the math review section on the ETS website. Princeton Review was good, I didn’t like Kaplan. For verbal, I subscribed to as many word-of-the-day emails I could.
I agree with the advice to just get some books, in your situation I’m sure online tutorials and such would also be helpful. One of the books I used was a general “Improve your vocabulary” book that my mom found at the goodwill, even that was useful.
You want to be prepared but at the same time keep things in perspective, it won’t be the most important part of your application. Especially in your case with all your international experience, I’m sure your resume and essay will be what people remember.
I actually took the GRE last week with the goal of knowing nothing about what was on the test before going in. No studying, no looking up what sections there were, what scores are possible, nothing. Apparently there is a math section with little above basic Algebra, a verbal section that has crazy words you’ve never heard of, and an essay portion. They say it is a 4 hour test, but I managed to get out in under an hour and a half, so unless you plan on taking the full time for each section (and you can’t go back over your answers) you can probably be done fairly quickly. YMMV
I ended up with a 620 verbal and 630 math, so not great but not bad either considering the effort put forward. The essay scores haven’t come back yet.
One thing I can recommend is that you read the directions. There is apparently a calculator on the computer you can use for the math section. I was unaware of this until the last question, and you can’t go back over your answers. Felt like a bit of a yutz doing all the long division by hand. Totally could have done better on that.
Learn and know your graphs. Those graph questions are harder than they look. Do a little research into using graphs to analyze quality quantitative questions quickly (OK, I’ll stop), and practice them. IMHO, these were the one things that none of the books I used explained well enough. There are a lot of different kinds of graphs out there, and I remember being taken by surprise the first time I saw a graph I’d never seen before anywhere along with a question that I couldn’t figure out. Looking back on it, that was the one thing I was inadequately prepared for on the GRE.
Captain, there was a calculator? Shit, now I feel like a yutz, too!
… I’m not sure I remember a calculator either. What the hell D:
For comparison’s sake, on the maths portion, I used my high-school statistics class to fill my college maths requirement so it had been more than five years since my last formal instruction, and that was a statistics class after I pretty much failed algebra. When I took the GREs, my 760 was only equivalent to the 88th percentile, which speaks to the comparative simplicity of that part of the test and how much experience or preparation you might expect to need for it. Thinking about it, I agree the graphs can be kind of a pain, though.
Are you allowed to use a calculator? Because I’m studying for my GMATs right now and I’m not allowed to use a calculator. One thing I’ve found to be really helpful is sitting down and rote memorizing a bunch of repeating numbers/fractions/powers to speed up the rate of calculation. So I re-memorized all the multiplication tables up to 20 (which brought me right back to childhood), I know the decimal/fraction equivalent (for instance, 7/8 is .875 etc.), all the squares from 1 to 20, all the prime numbers up to 100 blahblahblah. There are also a series of repeating styles of word problems-percents, work/rate etc.
Basically I’m all about identifying patterns and learning around them.
If you take the computer test be aware that the scores are HEAVILY weighted towards the first couple questions. I didn’t know that going in so I didn’t think about those more than any of the later questions.
It seems like quite a trend for people to take it on a whim. I wonder why that is.
In my case it was because I was unhappy with my job at the time and wanted to put the foundations together for going back to school. As things worked out I wound up actually applying, but at the time it was definitely more of a “well, see if you can get your foot in the door” sort of thing. I imagine in this economy, the fairly trivial costs of the test itself are something a number of people are willing to bear if they think it’s a more viable option than their current work.