My GRE is on the 16th! nervous, any advice?

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daisies2

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I just registered for the GRE for this Wednesday and i'm so nervous. I didn't memorize any vocab...i feel it's a waste, where does one start? I'm not good at memorizing, and whose to say what words will actually show up... I have been focusing on math, but i'm not good at word problems. Does anyone have any advice, helpful websites, or words of wisdom?? I did the powerprep and got 150 Q and 157 V. Thanks in advance🙂
 
I studied Kaplan vocab and a LOT of their vocab was on the exam both times I took it. I had the Kaplan book and the vocab flash cards and they helped me a lot.
 
I studied Kaplan vocab and a LOT of their vocab was on the exam both times I took it. I had the Kaplan book and the vocab flash cards and they helped me a lot.

Absolutely this. I'd estimate that >90% of the words I saw on my GRE were in the list in the back of the off-the-shelf Kaplan book. Hard to learn them all in a day though.
 
Wow. I have a kaplan book, but haven't studied the vocab. I will definitely get to memorizing as much of those words as i can! Thank you both SOOO much!! 🙂 The advice i've heard till this point is that it's a crapshoot, and most people see just a few of hundreds (which isn't worth it if you ask me). Now, onto that vocab! Any advice w/word problems?
 
Wow. I have a kaplan book, but haven't studied the vocab. I will definitely get to memorizing as much of those words as i can! Thank you both SOOO much!! 🙂 The advice i've heard till this point is that it's a crapshoot, and most people see just a few of hundreds (which isn't worth it if you ask me). Now, onto that vocab! Any advice w/word problems?

In the back of the Kaplan book is a list of most commonly used words and that helped me a ton and majority of those words were on the exam. The math section was straight forward, and in the Kaplan book in the back there is also a little section that gives tips and they were also useful.
 
Wow. I have a kaplan book, but haven't studied the vocab. I will definitely get to memorizing as much of those words as i can! Thank you both SOOO much!! 🙂 The advice i've heard till this point is that it's a crapshoot, and most people see just a few of hundreds (which isn't worth it if you ask me). Now, onto that vocab! Any advice w/word problems?

I agree with everyone else regarding the vocab; it's wicked helpful--I studied a set of 400 words for about two weeks, and although that is clearly not the extent of the GRE vocab words, it helped me out so much because on the actual GRE, a lot of the time I either knew the words, or could use the vocab to at least eliminate answer choices and find the correct one.

For the verbal vocab word problems, I found that if I covered the answer choices with my hand, and had an answer in my head, I could go to the answer choices and just look for the answer(s) that were the most similar. I got some weird looks from the testing center staff doing so, but it helped me because I feel like a lot of the time I (and others) know what the answer should be, but get thrown off by the deceptively-good-looking wrong answer choices. (So it helped me from second guessing myself, I guess)


By studying my vocab set and going through the test that way, I went from a 159 to a 162 on my retake.

I'm terrible at math, but found reviewing the basics helped. Good luck! 🙂
 
For the verbal vocab word problems, I found that if I covered the answer choices with my hand, and had an answer in my head, I could go to the answer choices and just look for the answer(s) that were the most similar. I got some weird looks from the testing center staff doing so, but it helped me because I feel like a lot of the time I (and others) know what the answer should be, but get thrown off by the deceptively-good-looking wrong answer choices. (So it helped me from second guessing myself, I guess)

This is a great strategy and it's actually exactly what the Princeton Review book tells you to do. I've found in general their advice is good because it's aimed at strategies that improve both speed and accuracy, which generally produces results faster than studying alone.
 
I memorized over 600 words and I actually saw many of them on the test. Even though I memorized the words for a test, I am filled with joy whenever I see these words in everyday reading, whether they're news articles on sports and finance or research journals in science, and know the meaning!

My strategy was to memorize the words from the Kaplan GRE words book and find words with similar meanings. Luckily, the new format of GRE has eliminated analogies and is mainly based on reading comprehension and filling in blanks with words, so memorizing words are still important but doesn't impact your score as much as the old GRE. Your practice scores are pretty good. Since you don't have much time to study, I suggest just memorizing a few more words and doing more practice questions. Good luck! :luck:
 
I took the GRE today. It's EXHAUSTING!😱 I'm not too thrilled with my scores. i got 152Q and 155V. I was surprised at how little the prep books helped. there was SO much coordinate geometry, which is despise. I read the Dummies, Cliffnotes, and Princeton and worked thru them cover to cover. I also perused the Kaplan briefly. I saw maybe 2 words from Kaplan's vocab list in the end. While i didn't spend months on end, studying, i couldn't help but feel like my energy was wasted. The actual GRE questions are not straightforward, and very tricky, especially considering the crazy time limit. I randomly guessed on about 10 math questions. I don't feel like studying for this test makes a lot of sense. I was an English major, and feel disappointed in my scores. I can't imagine going thru that horrid experience again.

Anyways...i guess i'm just happy i'm done. I'm hoping this doesn't reck my chances of getting into an MHA program at either Minnesota or Michigan.

I otherwise took statistics and econ, and got As in both, and have about a 3.7gpa, and some healthcare experience. Anyone know if I stand a chance? Also, how long did the official gre scores take? thanks!
 
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