GRE For Dummies

668 Pages·2012·19.5 MB·English

by  Ron Woldoff

® ®
GRE For Dummies , Premier 7th
Edition
Table of Contents
Introduction
About This Book
Conventions Used in This Book
What You’re Not to Read
Foolish Assumptions
How This Book Is Organized
Part I: Mastering the GRE Test-Taking Experience
Part II: Tackling the Verbal Section One Word at a Time
Part III: High School Math and Beyond: Math You Thought
You’d Never Need Again
Part IV: Penning Powerful Analytical Essays
Part V: Taking Full-Length Practice GREs: It’s All You
Part VI: The Part of Tens
CD-ROM
Icons Used in This Book
Where to Go from Here
Part I: Mastering the GRE Test-Taking Experience
Chapter 1: Knowing What to Expect with the GRE
Signing Up for the GRE
Breaking Down the GRE into Small Doses
Scoring Max: 340 and 6
Knowing how the scoring breaks down
Calculating your score
Knowing how your scores measure up
Playing the guessing game
Seeing or cancelling your scores
Gimme a Break! GRE Intermissions
Chapter 2: Owning the GRE: Strategies for Success
Making the Best Use of Your Time
Budgeting your time for studying
Budgeting your time for practicing
Beating the clock: Time management tips
Repeating the Test
Reporting Test Administration Abnormalities
Using Ancient Scores
Chapter 3: Gearing Up for Test Day
Gathering Your Stuff before Test Day
Knowing What Not to Bring
Training Physically and Mentally for Test Day
Staying active
Eating well
Relaxing
Test-Driving the Computerized Version
Bringing the GRE into Your Comfort Zone
Getting familiar with subject matter and questions
Reminding yourself of how fully prepared you are
Understanding that the GRE is only one of many
admissions requirements
Part II: Tackling the Verbal Section One Word at a Time
Chapter 4: Text Completion and Sentence Equivalence: The
Easiest Verbal Questions
Grasping Text Completion and Sentence Equivalence
Questions
Developing Your Skills for Finding the Correct Answers
Interpreting the sentence
Using vocabulary properly
Recognizing irony, figures of speech, and formal
diction
Attacking the Question Head-On
Read and interpret the sentence while covering the
answer choices
Fill the blanks with your own words
Eliminate answer choices that don’t match your words
Overcoming Tricky Sentences
Identify transition words and use them to get the gist of
the phrases
Break the sentence into smaller pieces
Check one word blank at a time to eliminate answer
choices
Getting Your Hands Dirty with Practice Questions
Text Completion questions
Sentence Equivalence questions
Chapter 5: Making Sense of What You Read: Reading
Comprehension
Recognizing the Three Reading Comprehension Question
Formats
Multiple-choice questions: Choose one answer
Multiple-choice questions: Choose one or more
answers
Sentence-selection questions: Choose a sentence from
the passage
Developing Strategies for Success
Using the context as your road map
Grasping the gist of the passage
Using keywords strategically
Avoiding traps
Acing the Three Commonly Tested Reading Comprehension
Passages
The biological and physical science passage
The social sciences passage
The humanities passage
Chapter 6: Analyzing the Argument Questions
Covering the Answer Choices
Knowing What to Look for in the Question
Reading the Passage with a Critical Eye
Identifying the premise and conclusion
Finding the hidden assumption
Spotting weaknesses in supporting details
Exploring common logical fallacies
Answering the Question in Your Own Words
Eliminating Wrong Answers to Find the Right One
Leveraging the process of elimination
Testing your skills
Trying some other examples
Chapter 7: Expanding Your Vocabulary to Boost Your Score
Brushing Up on Prefixes, Suffixes, and Roots
Prefixes
Suffixes
Roots
Memorizing the GRE’s Most Common Vocabulary Words
Part III: High School Math and Beyond: Math You Thought You’d
Never Need Again
Chapter 8: Brushing Up on Basic Arithmetic
Eyeing Integers, Factors, and Multiples
Factoring in Prime Time: Prime and Composite Numbers
Reading between the Lines: Absolute Value
Remembering the Order of Things: Putting PEMDAS to
Use
Measuring Up: Units of Measurement
Discovering the Point with Decimals
Adding and subtracting decimals
Multiplying decimals
Dividing decimals
Facing Off with Fractions
Adding or subtracting fractions
Multiplying fractions
Dividing fractions
Mixed numbers
Manipulating Percentages
Converting between percentages and decimals or
fractions
Finding the percent of change
Making Ratios More Rational
Considering the total number of items
Finding the amount of a specific term
Combining two or more ratios
Working the Numbers: Arithmetic Practice Problems
Chapter 9: Algebra: Finding What X Really Means
Tapping the Powers of Bases and Exponents
Working with Symbolism Problems
Substitute for the variable in the symbol question
Substitute for the variable in the function question
Mastering the Fundamentals of Algebra
Solving for x
Multiplying with the FOIL method
Unfoiling: Also known as factoring
Dealing with Roots and Radicals
Simplifying radicals and roots
Estimating the radical
Adding and subtracting radicals
Multiplying and dividing radicals
Working radicals from the inside out
Traversing the X and Y Axes with Coordinate Geometry
Using formulas to solve problems
Performing linear algebraic equations
Solving simultaneous equations
Recognizing Patterns in Numerical Sequences
Arithmetic
Geometric
Fibonacci
Sequential terms
Chapter 10: Shaping Up Your Geometry Skills
Exploring Lines and Angles
Lines
Angles
Recognizing the Many Sides of Polygons
Determining total interior angle measure
Finding one interior angle
Understanding Triangles from Top to Bottom
Recognizing triangle types
Noting key characteristics
Working with similar triangles
Calculating a triangle’s perimeter and area
Understanding the Pythagorean theorem
Identifying common Pythagorean ratios in right
triangles
Knowing Quadrilaterals Inside and Out
Recognizing a quadrilateral when you see one
Working with Circles
Recognizing a circle’s characteristics
Mastering essential formulas
Tackling shaded-area problems
Going 3D with Volume and Surface Area
Calculating volume
Calculating total surface area
Chapter 11: Translating English into Math: Word Problem
Strategies
Working a Word Problem Step by Step
Are We There Yet? Calculating Distance, Rate, and Time
Figuring Averages