JohnMiltonsStapler

Oh, as I said, I took the old one too. I miss the analogies, but I am a Structuralist so I suppose that comes with the territory.

So today was my second time taking the GRE, the first time with the new test format. I am applying to a top 40 university, but the opportunity to move to the area came up suddenly, so I had to get everything in my application together quickly. I wanted to take it again to see if I could improve my AW score from back in 2011 (4) and possibly bump up my verbal. I honestly did not care about the Quant, but paid it attention since it, too, had new sorts of questions that were interesting at the very least. My other scores in 2011 were: 600 (84th % for that year) Verbal, and a 300 something that I am embarrassed to mention. Then I had plenty of time to study. Because of the rush, I registered for the GRE 11 days ago. I took a ton of practice tests to familiarize myself with the format. That's about it. I did not study the GRE per se, I studied what makes the GRE tick and how you can crack it. And I developed my own methodology (for the verbal) that I want to share. It is quite simple. When you open each section, quickly go through each question and, just at a passing glance, rate its difficulty on a 1-3 scale on your scratch paper. If a question is particularly difficult ( like a sentence completion that you have no idea what any of the words mean) but a star by it. Some people say go for the reading comp sections first. I find that it can often let time slip away. I made very efficient use of time by using the review function to skip back and forth. I started with the most difficult questions. 12 minutes in, I had all of them done. I completed the rest of the section in 9 minutes, so when I finished I had time to spare. I then went *back* to the '3' questions and checked again, changing my answers on a couple of them. It plainly worked. I scored a 166 verbal (96th %). Will it work for everyone? Probably not, but no methodology does. My biggest impediment to sucesses on standardized tests has always been time constraints. So I worked out a way to neither rush, nor slug through, but prioritize. I used this same method on the Quant, and my jaw dropped when I saw that I got a 158 on the Quant. I had expected to christmas tree it. But, given the relaxed nature of my working and the inclusion of a calculator, I suppose I was able to crack that today as well. I say out of this not to brag (okay, I am bragging a bit) but instead to share this methodology with anyone who might be having similar problems with the time limits on the new GRE. The GRE is a beast whose nature we know, and so I think its high time all of us stated developing ways to combat it. Until, one day, it finally disappears and the monopoly of ETS-Prometric is broken. I am all for a post-undergrad standardized test. But it should test aptitude and not intestinal fortitude. Love to hear everyone's thoughts. Ill add my AW scores when I get them.

I would be very happy to help. I will send you a private message with my contact info.

I just took the GRE today so I really don't have the mind-steam for this, but, I do want to help you out here. Again, not personal, but your grammar is going to sink your score. I have some leftover "score it now" critiques that will put it through the ETS computer assessment. Here were the results (it does not catch that your response and the prompt for the particular practice test did not match). Score: 2. According to ETS: A 2 response largely disregards the specific task directions and/or demonstrates serious weaknesses in analytical writing. A typical response in this category exhibits ONE OR MORE of the following characteristics: is unclear or seriously limited in addressing the specific task directions and/or in presenting or developing a position on the issue provides few, if any, relevant reasons or examples in support of its claims is poorly focused and/or poorly organized has serious problems in language and sentence structure that frequently interfere with meaning contains serious errors in grammar, usage, or mechanics that frequently obscure meaning

This is a purely objective evaluation. I will use the ETS criteria and give you a brief rundown of what works and does not work. Let's get the bad out of the way: the grammar and syntax here is going to hurt your score. I have used the online "score it now" option, and the computer scorer that looks at the essay before a human does is unforgiving with even the slightest grammatical error. -Word choice in your second sentence should be "concludes" not includes. Be careful about poor word choice. The computer won't catch it, but the grader will. And it can kill an otherwise good essay. It happened to me on the old GRE and likely cost me admittance to a top school that I was otherwise qualified for. -Throughout you pluralize 'evidence' into 'evidences.' This is one of the nouns that is never pluralized by the alteration of its ending, there are "pieces of evidence" or simply "evidence." The singular can refer to a plural subject. You also overuse this word. The computer will catch this. -Your biggest grammatical problems seem to be with case, and possessives. Always make sure that your subject and verb agree in tense and always make sure that you indicate possessives correctly. -Finally, don't use "first" "second" etc at the openers of your paragraphs. It demonstrates to the reader that you lack the ability to think of more creative, and fluid, transitions. Your stronger area is your second "point." Here you are doing exactly what they ask you to do: identify the underlying assumptions that make the argument flawed and tease out the implications. To sum it up, if the issue were just the grammar, it is not extensive enough to effect meaning, so in that case you could possible be at a 3 here. But your essay itself is sparse. You need more meat to satisfy the reader and better grammar to satisfy the computer. So at present, the essay stands at a 2. Depending on what kind of program you are applying to, this could be just an eyebrow raiser that will be attenuated by a strong writing sample, or it could be a deal breaker. If you are trying to go into a non-humanties field, try to get up to a 3 or 3.5. If you are looking at the humanities, and I mean this with all sincerity and honesty, you have a long way to go. Often this is the score that they weigh the most, along with the verbal. It demonstrates your ability to construct cogent arguments under pressure and without pre-planning. If you can do this well, it can make an application. Even in a technical field, a 2 could sink you. But you can clearly improve. Work on grammar first. Then do some un timed tests or just answer prompts on your own time. If you PM me I can edit them in a word document for you and I will edit them more closely. I am a writing tutor and teach an ESL class so this stuff is helpful to me in learning to grade and evaluate.

Okay, I am going to use the exact same criteria that ETS lays out. None of this is personal, all of it is meant to help you. One of the first things that your scorer (the human and the computer) will pick up on is word usage syntax, grammar, and punctuation. So the first area of assessment: your control of standard written English. Your repetition of "Author," along with your continual omission of the necessary article "the," disrupts the flow of every sentence and makes them sound awkward. Your punctuation is just out of control entirely. In the first line the essay you have a period, followed by a word that is part of the preceding sentence, followed by a comma. Subject-verb agreement, in statements such as "author haven't." The author hasn't. And you should avoid using contractions in analytical writing anyway. You fail to put spaces after commas and periods. The computer is going crazy by now. Also remember to put a space after parentheses, but, given that it appears you struggle with this-avoid using them at all when you take the test! If in doubt, add a space. It looks better than no space at all, at least to the human reader. Remember that digits 1-9 are spelled out, not indexed with Arabic numerals. Organizationally, you also have problems. Your prose is not put into proper paragraphs. These prompts require simple five paragraph (at most) essays. In your intro, lay out the three or two things you plan to discuss. Discuss each in its own paragraph. Conclude by answering anything else left in the prompt rather than restating your introduction. Here is the tough part for me. In the second area of assessment, your engagement with the argument, your performance is not horrible. If all of these grammatical mistakes were gone, you would at least get a 2 on this. You are engaging critically with the prompt somewhat, but spend too much time summarizing before you analyze a given point. Some of your points are exactly the kind of reaching into the ideas that you need to do, but they all get lost in the grammatical mess. If you are taking the test soon, my advice would be to go to your local college/university and see about hiring a grammar tutor for some intensive study before the test. You won't be able to perfect it, but you can improve it given the effort. If you work the grammatical problems out, I think you will see more clearly how you are accomplishing the analytical task at hand as you write. Finally, on the test, give yourself plenty, of time to proofread. I am sure some of these mistakes could have been corrected if you thought about them. This essay would undoubtably receive a 1 on the test. I say this with the utmost hope that you can improve your score. If you don't mind my asking, is your native language English? If not, I believe there may be some accommodations for you provided by ETS. I am not sure, but you would need to call them to find out as they can't arrange these at the test center. Best of luck.