not to return to those details when

we get the actual corresponding questions.

And that's where those assumptions come into play.

I mentioned briefly, kind of big picture, we didn't cover a multi-source reasoning question, but I mentioned really briefly the idea that multi-source reasoning isn't going to burn you by giving you a detail in one set of terms in one tab and then saying, haha, JK, did you read this parenthetical? It's actually in another set of terms, right? But what they are going to do is they're going to test us on making sure that we don't use our drive for context to just fill in the blanks with our own assumptions, right? So it's not reading with too little precision in a vacuum that burns people and multi-source reasoning.

It's filling in the blanks with what we think is probably true, is likely, right? It's uncertainty that should prompt us to dig a little deeper, to look with a slightly closer eye.

So we're gonna move a little more big picture through this section, because I mostly wanna call attention to some of the things that were happening here, just more broadly speaking, right? So again, really substantial extent to which she got very intimidated by how much time multi-sourcery thing was taking her.

And it caused her to move a little too briskly through spaces that caused her to kind of misstep for language reasons more than anything else, right? I always tell people with these kind of yes-no dichotomy questions, there's going to be a column that's the more severe.

much higher degree of success.

Um, so I just sort of wanted to open up with this idea of what happens if you don't approach it with a plan? Um, how do you, you know, adjust or change your prep strategy as you approach test day?

Yeah.

It's a really, it's a really cool question, particularly because up until this point, we've talked a lot about making sure that in early stages of your prep, you're giving yourself a lot of grace, you're doing a lot of due diligence, and building good test-taking technique before we start to incorporate considerations like pacing, before we start to kind of shift the topic area question by question and have to think on our feet really briskly and, and be really, really thoughtful about how we invest our time.

And I think that that shift can feel really abrupt for a lot of people, and that in terms of how they approach thinking about practice testing, they'll create a very abrupt shift in some spaces.

So, you know, a lot of people look at practice tests as basically this, you know, this predictor, marker, indicator of whether or not they're test ready and then more or less leave it at that, right? It's either a positive indicator of I've made progress, or it's a not so positive indicator of, oh no, I'm not where I expected to be, where I want to be, where I need to be with the exam.

And it's so important to contextualize that first and foremost, practice tests are, are data.

Really, really valuable insight into not just what to expect from the exam, but also what to expect from yourself under pressure.

[laughs]

It's timing, right?

Well, yeah.

I cannot tell you how often I have students feeling pretty frustrated up front coming into discussions about data insights saying, man, if I just had unlimited time, I'd get every single one of these questions right.

I understand what's in front of me, and I feel like if I just didn't have this limitation of the pacing, I'd be able to tackle absolutely everything.

And it That's a fair feeling to have, but it's also a lot of the challenge and intent behind the section, right? It's more so than perhaps anywhere else in the exam.

We've spoken a lot about digital math being a resource management exam, and that resource management is tested in some pretty unique ways in data insights.

There are certain question types where... much like reading comprehension, they're going to try to bait us into trying to learn everything there is to know about a particular field of history or prehistory or a particular subset of science, or even to bring in our outside bias, which was something that burned us a little bit in that verbal lesson, making sure that we're looking at things from the perspective of the open book, right? Context we've been given in front of us and focusing on the task at hand, finding the path of least resistance and making sure we're not getting distracted by a lot of the content that feels perhaps most unusual or in some cases even intimidating.

So this also would mean that the months are not maxed out.

And I don't know if you have any experience with that.

Yeah.

So this is a really interesting question because I would argue that my guidance may be a little less universal than some of the other things that we've spoken about.

I think that in cases where maybe English is a second language for a particular candidate and they need to kind of refine their English speaking and reading chops, there's certainly some space for that.

When I have students who are curious about reading and they like to read in their spare time, there are certainly some spaces where I might direct where that leading would head, in particular in spaces like lateral thinking exercises, spaces that challenge their preconceived notions about a particular topic because it helps them to think outside the box a little bit.

But in terms of asking hands-on study time that's being invested in their verbal preparation.

I typically wouldn't be inclined to swap out their active preparation time with additional just broad strokes reading time, whether it's scientific journal posts or articles in the newspaper.

And if the nursery sells more than 10, then obviously 10 would probably be the highest.

I think the thing that confused me, and I'm not confused now, but in the moment, I was like, how can you... multiply both sides by something and like one side is is time the other time is side is a percent do you know what i mean like yeah

yeah this is no this is a really cool point because a lot of times even some of the more foundational things that we've learned back in the day math wise that we technically knew at one point and just kind of have to resurrect resurface for for the purposes of the gmat because we didn't necessarily learn why they worked back in the day They can feel tricky to bring attention to now.

So an equation is just saying the same thing two different ways, right? Like that's in a nutshell what an equation is.

So we've expressed the... 90% of our total, right, the readout when it indicated 24 minutes and 18 seconds as a constant, 24 minutes and 18 seconds.

And we've also expressed it in terms of the portion of her total exercise time.

And the reason it was useful to set up this way, this is another big issue I see people run into with percent questions in particular.

is they learn a formula at some point along the way that tells them, okay, percent change is new minus old over old.

How does all of that relate to what we have done today?

So I'd love to hear your insights on how you can really piece up that time.

Yeah, so a couple of things right up front.

The way that I like to tell candidates to think about their preparation breaks down into two major phases.

So you'll have your kind of content and strategy review phase.

And this might be the phase where whether you're exploring using the official resources, maybe you're supplementing with a class or even working one-on-one with an expert, you're moving through the foundations of what you need to know and why it's important.

And interestingly, a lot of people will index a good bit of time on the what we need to know and not a ton of time on the why it's important.

So making sure that you're digging into a resource that allows you to move topic by topic, sure, through the expectations of what the GMAT wants you to know, the knowledge base they want you to have going into the process.

So how does one benchmark their progress, especially in terms of the why?