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Thursday, January 08, 2009

How to Prepare for GRE

Loads of people ask me this question - How do I start my preparation for the GRE exam? I normally just point them to this blog. But even people who visit greghost.blogspot.com ask this question in the comments section. So i decided to write a short guide on preparing for the Graduate Record Examination.

Firstly, make sure that when you register for the test, you have at least 3 months to study! Anything less than that is educational suicide - unless you're in the IIT...

Secondly, there is no such strategy which says that you should start studying from the Verbal section and then move on to Quants or vice-versa. Start with whatever you are comfortable with! I started preparing with the verbal section because my language skills are far better than my mathematical skills. Starting your preparation with something you find easy helps defuse stress and arouse interest in what you're studying.
GRE preparation books
The GRE preparation study is never ending...you can't have enough practice in maths and almost nobody can memorize the meanings of all those thousands of words. So these 2 things - Quants and Words - should be universal in your preparation, i.e. you should study them every day even as you set up targets for the more particular sections.

Those who are good with English should not get overconfident. The reading comprehension section can be quite tricky. Its not like those simple comprehension passages that you get in your 10th and 12th standard board exams.

Some of the books I recommend for GRE preparation you will find on the right sidebar of this blog. Quite a few are available on this blog for free download if you know where to look (just click in the right places!) make your preparation a mixture of online and offline study. I always recommend number2.com for their short mock tests.

Finally, dont procrastinate (if you don't know the meaning of this word, your GRE preparation is lagging!). Laziness never did you any good and never will. If you find it difficult to study in the morning, then be a night bird and work hard.

Once you think you have studied enough, start giving the mock test in the ETS powerprep CD. That test will give you a good indication of where you stand. Identify your weak areas from the result of the test and try to strengthen them with practice. As the Bhagwad Gita says, "karma kar, Fal ki Chinta Mat kar" . May the force be with you!

Those who have already given their GRE are most welcome to share their experiences and provide tips in the comments section.

84 comments:

Anirudh Maitra said...

Hi,

Just browsed through your blog. Some neat stuff.

Me and a few friends have started an initiative called www.weboword.com [/link]
Vocabulary Visually

We are looking to spread the word around and want to change the way people build on their vocabulary. We quite hate the brute force way of doing it.It would be great if you can help us spread the word through your blog. Waiting to hear back from you.

Anonymous said...

Hi,
Am not able to download the books. Can u post the link for download.

Unknown said...

Hi! Sarthak,I would be very greatful if you could find time and send me the e-copy of GRE big book to my e-mail id-poojatihg@gmail.com. Kindly suggest me the best book to prepare for GRE math section as I dont ve an IT background.
Thanks in advance
Pooja

Narayana Rao said...

Dear Friends,

Wandflower, A Mobile Education startup based out of Hyderabad, presents iSTUDYMATE.verbal for GRE/CAT/GMAT aspirants.

iSTUDYMATE.verbal is a mobile application which comes with following content

* English Flash cards with about 800 words. For each word you can go through the definition, usage, synonyms and antonyms.
* You have the flexibility of book marking difficult words for you to refer at later point of time. You can also do a search to go to a particular word.
* iSTUDYMATE.verbal also has basic concepts on functional grammar with few limited practice questions.

iSTUDYMATE.verbal Mobile application is J2ME based client designed to run on all handsets that support the Java/J2ME/MIDP requirements. The mobile client is tested on wide range of GSM handsets that support J2ME/Java.

Go to link http://wandflower.com/products/istm_verbal.html for more details.
Posted by Wandflower

Ankur said...

Hey!
Nice work.

I was searching for blogs to help me in my preparation for GRE, and found this good blog: http://summer-of-words.blogspot.com/

Check it out.

Taken said...

Allo. Can I please have a copy of the Big Book mailed to taken.andhow@gmail.com? Thanks a ton.

Kirstin Airmet said...

Hey, good blog; the only trouble is that all of the items that you show in your photo must have cost quite a bit. I only bought and used the Barron's book, and it was great, but I also used two websites:

mygretutor.com and number2.comI found these two websites quite useful, especially the vocabulary parts of each. Mygretutor has tons of questions, so they were helpful, too. Good luck!

richa said...

hi, my gre exam is on 21st of july but i can start preparing only after 24th may after my pg entrance exam. as such i'm regularly giving an hour for grepreparation but i think its not enough..moreover even after 24th, i can give MAXIMUM OF 10 HOURS ONLY AS I HAVE INTERNSHIP ALSO...SO,tell me wat r my prospects or shall i cancel my test date...? also, suggest me some sites for math practice & links for download.

Long B. Nguyen said...

Hi, I have taken the GRE twice, and here's some of my advice:

- the Math section is ridiculously hard now, but it's still able to get 800. I didn't have time to finish my last question, but still got an 800. Don't panic if u face a hard question. Calm down and try solving it. If you succeed, u will prolly hit 800. If not, u still have a chance if u got the rest of the questions.

-You need to learn at least the whole barron's list to hit a good score. I learned the PR's hit parade and barron's 800, then ended up with a score less than 500, which is a damn blow. You should also practice alot alot alot.

- The writing is probably the easiest part. Just do a few practice to get comfortable with the process, and don't blow it because it can affect ur mind later on the verbal and math parts.

Srikanth said...

wow man!!
just went through your blog....amazing!!
never got so much info from 1 blog before!!
thanks a lot!!!

sumanth said...

hai can u plz sent me the gre ebig book to my id tkrishnasumanth@yahoo.com.iam unable to download,its showing error.

Anonymous said...

please email me gre big book. calvin80@gmail.com Thanks in advance..

Unknown said...

plz anyone send me the helpful ebooks at moments444@hotmail.com
thanks

Ravi Teja said...

Thanks man for ur informative blog I will surely chalk out my preparation for the Exam ;Can u send me the link of the best book which should be read so that it will help me

My id is "raviteja1901@gmail.com"
Thank's & byee
Take care

Unknown said...

hi Sarthak!

I was unable to download the GRE Bog Book. Would you be kind enough to send me an e-copy to roy.medha@gmail.com ? Am taking the GRE next month and I need it, really bad.

Waiting eagerly for the e-copy. Thanks a ton!

Anonymous said...

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doxic said...

Hi there,

Thanks for this wonderful blog. I am sure this will really help all GRE aspirants and all of us will be forever thankful to you.

I have downloaded all the material that you have put online, but realised that the BIG BOOK tests only contain English Tests. Is there another link for all the 27 Maths tests? If you haven't been able to upload the Maths tests from the BIG BOOK, would it be possible for you to send them by email? My email is poojasureshkrishnan@gmail.com

Thanks, pooja

Unknown said...

I have written GRE back in 2000. Verbal section was the nightmare for me. Root Approach of mastering vocab, as given in "Word Power Made Easy" book by Norman Lewis helped me a lot. Hope this helps!

kate said...

How recently did you update the information you have on studying for the GRE?

As I understand it, the exam undergoes major changes yearly, so I just wanted to be sure that I am learning the right stuff.

Thanks for the info!

Reethi said...

I've taken the onlne test at http://examville.com/examville/mainAllTest.jsp and found it to be great!!!

Recommend Examville.com

Unknown said...

Hi
please send me E-copy for GRE

jamuna said...

hi,
i have fixed my exam date on jan11....i am completely scared...I am following barrons. just started.... but i am not able to remember it. I find verbal very tough. Math part i can do it with some effort. but verbal is completely flustering. Will i be able to do it?? also send me the ebook to my mail id.

jamuna said...

hi,
i just downloaded your Kaplan verbal guide. I found words at the end of the guide. I find many words present in Barrons are missing here. IS it enough if i study from Kaplans word list?????????

Bane said...

You can find more than 60 GRE books and software (2009), all sorted in sections, with big description and contents,

here:

gre-download.blogspot.com



..

ExchiBunny said...

Just letting your readers know....Well this is a very recently started blog

www.eduandother.blogspot.com

It explains GRE CAT working and the GRE verbal section in detail and how you learn vocabulary in a short time


It also contains info on grad school applications.

Come drop by... :)

Jayshree said...

Hii

Can anyone please send me an ecopy of kaplan GRE math work book.
My email address is ag.jayshree@gmail.com.

Thanks in advance

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Bane said...

You can find more than 60 GRE books and software (2009), all sorted in sections, with big description and contents,

here:

gre-download.blogspot.com



..

ana said...

That was a really very good article. I am glad to know. Thanks!

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Sumit Jain said...

http://greghost.blogspot.com/2008/08/i-assume-you-have-already-downloaded.html

GradGRE said...

Good post. I agree with pretty much everything. Personally, I think that a combination of Baron's guide and some flashcards (homemade or bought) give 80-90% of what a test taker needs. One thing that I do not support is tutoring. I tend to think that it is usually a waste of money. Sure, it might yield slightly better scores than self-study alone, but the extra 20-80 points are hardly worth the $1000s spent on tutoring. I wrote a post on this if you are interested: GRE Tutoring vs GRE Books

Akshay Dugar said...

Hi,

Really great work with the blog.

For all people using android phones,there's this application made specifically for GRE vocab by Appkettle.Its available in the market for free
Here's a video link for it,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhfHxSJs3rA
I would greatly recommend it.

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shivgan joshi said...

Thank you!!!

There was another good site I came across:

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hepsi said...

hey hello .....i registered for the gre test in dec 2010...my slot is on june 14...its been two months since i booked my slot, but still haven't received my gre power prep cd...i sent a mail to the ets centre and they said to download it from the website....I was told that each gre power prep cd has its unique set of ques pertaining to that particular date of the exam?...and even the downloaded version is not compatible with my system....mine is windows7 @ 64 OS....the gre power prep software is only windows 7@32 OS....help

Abhi said...

I have started a blog on picture dictionary www.pixionary.blogspot.com which will be helpful for gre aspirants.
You get a daily dosage of words.
We took utmost care in handpicking of images so they encode in users brain forever.

Sure shot verbal in GRE

Test Prep Apps said...

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subbhuakku said...

plz can anyone tell what are the other requirements besides getting good score in gre to get into prestigious institutes like mit

subbhuakku said...

plz can anyone tell me about what it needs besides good score to get into prestigious institutions like mit

SKK said...

Hello,
I gave my GRE today and got a 570 in verbal and 800 in Quant, on the higher range. I found quant very easy in comparison with GMAT. Verbal was tough for me.
I was praying for quant as experimental section. But got the opposite -3verbal sections and 2quant sections! Couldnt finish the 3rd verbal section in time...was almost exhausted by then!
My preparation for GRE was for less than a month and i had very little resources. I started with Official Guide & McGraw Hill. McGraw hill has easy questions in both Verbal & Quant when compared to actual GRE. Official guide has very few quesns and is generally not sufficient for practice. I could lay my hands on Kaplan only 10days back and it proved to be very useful. I used to get similar scores in my practice tests in Kaplan. The free tests on www.majortests.com also helped me to a certain extent.
But i dont agree that one can do away with vocab in New GRE. Vocab is important and one should understand the intensity in usage of words that are similar. However, mugging up of 4300 words like in Barrons wouldn't help.GRE Verbal tests the comprehension skills rigorously and i guess the vocab from regular reading of newspaper or Economist would greatly help. One needs to have a lot of practice in verbal questions. Probably other publishers would release some more material very soon.

All the best

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nitishmohan said...

please tell me where to do the word list from i have both kaplan and barrons... kaplan has worlist at d end..is tha enough?? or i need to do sumthing else aswell???? please reply soon!

Anonymous said...

thanx buddy for your valuable info....i m in IIT and i read your comment that one should start at least 3 months before the test unless u r in IIT....
wht should an IITian do?

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