DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum Anyone taken the GRE?

So I've signed up to take the GRE on August 21st. Have any of you taken it before, and do you have any advice on preparing?

I've downloaded the test prep software from ETS's website, which has test taking advice as well as two practice exams. Can anyone recommend any books or other software that might be helpful?

I'm not getting too worked up about the test because I know that grad schools usually weight your letters of rec and personal statement more than your GRE scores, but I'm definitely not taking the test lightly either. Any advice on how to prepare for it would be helpful. It's been over five years since I've taken a standardized test.

I took it last fall and did reasonably well...

I think preparation for the test greatly depends on what you are trying to get into. For Grad Schools that want a lot of critical reasoning ability (econ, business school, engineering, etc.) a high math score is very important. The math section is very similar to the SAT math section. The percentiles are very highly skewed (it's taken for granted that those going into science/math/engineering grad school should get a perfect score or very close, so being in the 75% or so is really good if your going into more of a liberal arts school)

The english section, in my opinion is a lot harder than the SAT english. The types of problems are the same (analogies, fill in the blank, etc.) But the words they ask you to use are really difficult to deal with. The overall scores on this section are much worse (i.e. a 640 in math will get you around the 60th percentile, while in verbal it gets you into the 91st)

The writing section isn't that bad at all, do a few practice runs where you get there writing prompts and quickly write a paper. Typing speed helps a lot in this section. So if you're a slow, two-finger typist, that might be something to fix, especially if you're going into a writing oriented field.

Overall it's not that bad, i didn't study much at all (I'm a science person, so I didn't need to study much for the math section, and grad schools don't care much about verbal/writing). I think what you should work on definitely depends on what you want to get into. But for english, study vocab, for math, go through geometry and algebra I, for writing, make sure you can type, and respond to a prompt in an appropriate 5 paragraph essay.

Hope this helps,

~Lyuokdea

Thanks for the advice. I'm going for a MA in German, so the math section won't be too important for me (or so I would hope.)

I'm a fast typer, and I'm pretty good at writing essays fairly quickly, so I'm not too concerned about the writing. Lately I've taken to looking up every word I'm not familiar with in every book I read because I'm sure that if I don't, it'll show up on the exam

I've got a really good transcript and some great letters of rec (at least that's what my professors tell me ), but I don't want this one test to mess up everything else. Thanks again for sharing your experience.

basically it's like the SATs... just do the practice tests and I think they do have a study book/guide... I bought the book and just went through it and did the practice tests...

i'm being really lazy about it...i need to take it soon

Not sure what your undergrad grades are but mine were average and a very good GRE score is the only thing that got me into grad school... I studied hard for it. No internet when I took it 18 years ago but I went through 2 or 3 of those study books cover to cover... the biggest help in them is the sample test questions... study hard and you'll be fine.