Improve Your GMAT Sentence Correction

The two GMAT question types that confound newer test-takers are Data Sufficiency and Sentence Correction. For Data Sufficiency, results often improve after students memorize the answer choices and learn a standardized method. On the other hand, students often struggle with Sentence Correction questions for quite some time.

There are two ways to rapidly improve your results on Sentence Correction. The first is to learn the simple technique of isolating the sentence core. The second is to learn to recognize the different error types.

Isolating the sentence core means to simplify the sentence down to its subject and verb, and check for agreement. The subject must also agree with any pronouns that use the subject as an antecedent. Very often, the GMAT will try to mask the subject by including a prepositional phrase. For example:

Neither of these cookbooks contains the recipe for New England-style clam chowder.

In this sentence, the subject is the singular noun Neither and the verb is the singular verb contains. The prepositional phrase of these cookbooks can be ignored and the sentence core is Neither… contains.

Consider the following GMAT sentence correction examples from the Official Guide:

1. Although a surge in retail sales have raised hopes that there is a recovery finally under way, many economists say that without a large amount of spending the recovery might not last.

(A) have raised hopes that there is a recovery finally
(B) raised hopes for there being a recovery finally
(C) had raised hopes for a recovery finally being
(D) has raised hopes that a recovery is finally
(E) raised hopes for a recovery finally

The key to this example is to recognize that the subject is surge. The prepositional phrase in retail sales can be ignored. Isolating the core of the original sentence gives Surge…have raised hope. This is incorrect, since the singular noun surge requires the singular verb has. Spotting this error leads us to the correct answer (see the end of this article.)

Consider another example:

2. As its sales of computer products have surpassed those of measuring instruments, the company has become increasingly willing to compete for the mass market sales they would in the past have conceded to rivals.

(A) they would in the past have conceded to rivals
(B) they would have conceded previously to their rivals
(C) that in the past would have been conceded previously to rivals
(D) it previously would have conceded to rivals in the past
(E) it would in the past have conceded to rivals

In this example, the subject of the sentence is the singular noun the company. We can tell that the company is singular because it uses the singular verb phrase has become. The sentence core is the company…has become. This sentence core maintains subject/ verb agreement. However, recall that any pronouns that refer to the subject the company must also agree. Therefore, the use of the pronoun they later in the sentence is incorrect. This eliminates A and B. Choices C is needlessly wordy, so we're down to D or E. (see the end of the article for the correct answer.)

Isolating the sentence is the first technique to identify errors in Sentence Correction questions. More important is the second technique: learning to recognize the seven different error types. The key to improving your results on sentence correction is to recognize these errors, and anticipate the correct version of the sentence. 

After doing dozens or hundreds of sentence correction examples, experienced GMAT students will see begin to see patterns and quickly find the correct answer. A focused lesson from an experienced GMAT tutor can help identify these errors.  For more questions, contact support@thegmattutor.com . 

1. The correct answer is D.

2. The correct answer is E. D has the redundant phrase  previously…in the past, so we are left with correct answer choice E.

I'm a GMAT Tutor based in Los Angeles, CA and the author of the DVD Advanced Tips for Data Sufficiency Success. Contact me for in-person GMAT tutoring in Los Angeles or online GMAT tutoring worldwide. I can be reached through www.thegmattutor.com.

The Importance of Timing on the GMAT

Timing is one of the biggest issues that GMAT test-takers encounter. It’s very common for students to reach question 33 on the Quantitative section with only 4 minutes remaining. If this happens, I recommend educated guessing for those last few problems, because it’s critical to finish to every question. However, it’s best to avoid this situation entirely. If you’re rushing through the last 5 problems, it means you didn’t budget your time properly throughout the whole section.

The first thing you must realize is that you’re not supposed to answer every question correctly on the GMAT. I just took a practice exam using GMATprep (the most accurate test prep simulator) and scored a 760 (Q48, V45, 99^th percentile). Yet, despite my Quant score of 48, I still missed 10 questions out of 37. So, it’s possible to score very high on Quant while still missing a few questions.

The reason for this is the adaptive nature of the exam. It’s designed to keep challenging you until you start missing questions. Naturally, students want to meet this challenge and spend time solving every question correctly. However, this will not lead you to achieving your highest possible score, and may actually hurt you if you run out of time!

The situation you absolutely want to avoid is encountering questions at the end of the section that you know how to solve, but don’t have enough time. You’ll have to guess on problems that you could easily solve if you had another 30 seconds or 1 minute.

This leads to a couple of key strategy tips for the exam:

1) As you get closer to your test day, do your practice problems at a measured pace of approximately two minutes per question. Work with a timer and make sure you get into this rhythm as you’re doing your test prep. Try to simulate exam conditions as much as possible.

2) On the actual exam, do not spend more than 3 minutes on any problem. Only exceed this amount if you’re absolutely certain you know how to solve the problem, or are very close to the answer.

3) If you are completely clueless on a question (i.e. have no idea how to approach it), simply make an educated guess and move on! At the one minute mark on a question, you should have a clear idea how to solve it, and should have your algebraic equations set up if necessary. If you’re still reading the question, forget it! You’re wasting valuable time. Even students who score 700+ wind up using this strategy. As I pointed out above, it’s possible to miss 10 questions on Quant and still score a 48. So, any single question is not that important.

Remember, the GMAT not only tests your ability to answer questions correctly, but also your ability to complete each section in 75 minutes. In order to achieve your best possible score, recognize that you may have to essentially “skip” some very difficult questions by guessing and moving on.

I'm a GMAT Tutor based in Los Angeles, CA and the author of the DVD Advanced Tips for Data Sufficiency Success. Contact me for in-person GMAT tutoring in Los Angeles or online GMAT tutoring worldwide. I can be reached through www.thegmattutor.com.