<p>i tried memoorizing every word in the GRE high frequency word list in the book by Barrons in the summer. Now that its winter break, I figure it'd be good to study more for the GRE verbal by relooking at that list. Turns out, that I remember less than half of those words!!!</p>
<p>What can I do? this is extermely frustrating. I absolutely hate memorizing words, and with all that studying in the summer went to no use!</p>
<p>Why bother putting a lot of effort into this? A general GRE score won't make or break an application. Maybe you should agonize over something more important to the process.</p>
<p>hahaha... true true, although doing badly WILL hurt you (doing well only matters so much). what kind of scores are you getting on mock GREs?</p>
<p>How can doing well on the gre not bolster your app for grad school? My ugpa isn't so stellar, so I'm hoping to do quite well on the test to offset that. If that doesn't do it what can?</p>
<p>I say this graduating from a UC and would like to go to other top schools for grad (Ivy). So what can help with that to offset the gpa?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Maybe you should agonize over something more important to the process.
[/quote]
What would that be?</p>
<p>research, sop, and raising your ugpa</p>
<p>What kind of research? example? Sop should not weigh more than GRE; and how can you raise you ugpa when in my case you just graduated this year?</p>
<p>My impression is that, in some fields at least, the order of importance goes like this:</p>
<p>a) first, getting a GRE that meets the cut-off for your schools;
b) second, having an awesome SOP and sample;
c) third, getting a GRE that is excellent relative to the rest of the field.</p>
<p>In other words, if your GRE is relatively low, then, yeah, you better see what you can do to raise it. Also, if you feel like your writing is as good as it can get, and you don't see any research opportunities on the horizon, the GRE is kind of the last step of the process that you have any control over. On the other hand, if your GRE is in the right ballpark and your SOP has any room for improvement, or you can think of a feasible research project to undertake, you shouldn't stress about the score.</p>
<p>I tutor the GRE and the SAT, and I will say that your situation is completely normal: I tell my students that it's normal to forget about 70% of words you learn unless you review regularly. Tricks to help:</p>
<p>a) Use a spaced repetition schedule to review. If you're curious, there's an article in Wired magazine about spaced repetition, etc.:</p>
<p>Want</a> to Remember Everything You'll Ever Learn? Surrender to This Algorithm</p>
<p>You can pm me for my spaced repetition calendar if you want, or if there's interest, I'll post it here: it's not fancy, just a review schedule. It's a pain to follow, but it'll work.</p>
<p>b) Read a lot: always important.</p>
<p>c) Make sure that you're learning enough medium-difficulty words: those are the ones that you'll find easiest to remember because they're the ones you'll actually see. Focus on the relatively common words you don't know instead of the hardest ones you can find.</p>
<p>I'm sorry you're frustrated, and I hope that it turns out you don't need to retake the GRE Verbal after all, but even if you do, there's hope!</p>
<p>Roxkal got it. Those are the things that would be more valuable uses of your time. I don't know anything about what field you are interested in, but in the biosciences, a high subject GRE can allay the fears that an admissions committee would have upon seeing a low GPA. If you are in fact, in the biological sciences. Research, research, research. This is so vital to the admissions process. Get lab experience, design a project, show some initiative and turn a dish washing job into a learning experience. And yes, I believe that a strong personal statement would make a heck of a lot more difference than a strong general GRE score would.</p>
<p>my mock gre verbal scores are in the 450-500 range. I'm not an international student, I was born and raised in US. </p>
<p>do engineering and science grad schools care about Statemtn of Purpose that much?</p>
<p>lotf629, how do u follow the spaced repetition during the school year? i find myself far too busy to find time to study vocab words</p>
<p>Usually I tell people to learn 10 new words a day and review 50: it takes about 15 minutes. You have two options: a) treat it like any other daily obligation; or b) put your flash cards on a ring and carry them around with you all the time, so that you're putting your random minutes to good use. Honestly, b) will work okay even if you aren't following a schedule rigidly: as long as you can flip idly through your cards at several points throughout the day, you will be surprised what you retain. What you can't do is to shelve them for months on end. :)</p>
<p>I don't know anything about the programs to which you're applying; it could be that your scores will be good enough? Are you sure that they will keep you from getting in? </p>
<p>I'd say that engineering and science will care a lot about your research. Can you beef up that section of your application in any way?</p>
<p>Newton, if you're graduating this year and you don't yet have research experience. Get a job as a lab tech at an university. You won't be competitive in admissions without research experience. Besides, being a lab tech has a lot of benefits and is in no way a negative thing. There is salary, publication, conferences, depending on your supervisor-independence, health insurance and free classes. We get paid more than a grad school stipend to boot.</p>
<p>Belevitt, I'm more interested in International Relations/Public Policy or Political Science fields. I am a humanities/social science major so does what Rok said also apply to these fields? How can I offset my gpa if I want to attend an Ivy school (I come from a UC)? Does the GRE not count as much then? How can I get involved in research programs if I just graduated college this year?</p>
<p>I am sorry, I really know nothing about the non biomedical science world. Best of luck though.</p>
<p>i already have research experience and plan on doing another REU or similar research this summer. should i do research during this school year too? i graduate next fall</p>
<p>isnt my GRE verbal really bad though? i checked a few sites and the avg verbal for those accepted is around ~550, and im sure that includes internatinoal students who should have much lower scores</p>
<p>lotf629, im REALLY bad with learning new words. it usually takes me an HOUR or so to learn 10 new words! when you say learn 10 new words in 15 minutes, do you learn those new words well or forget them easily?</p>
<p>Newton, do you use flash cards, or do you try to learn the words directly from a list?</p>
<p>Also (somebody else correct or confirm this?) I think that you can often find out directly from your programs how your scores may be perceived. You might consider giving them a call. If the schools don't look much at the Verbal section, then the average doesn't mean anything. Some English programs, for instance, may technically have Quant averages but 550 or so, but the programs don't even record the Quant score in the file. (I mention English because I know more about English).</p>
<p>P.S. My gut instinct is that you should basically do as much research as you possibly can, though again, somebody in the sciences can confirm...</p>
<p>i dont use flash cards and try to memorize them from a list...im trying to memorize 100s of words so it would be too many flash cards to make</p>
<p>Yeah, but the reason it takes you an hour to learn 10 words is because you don't use flash cards. :) As soon as you told me your rate of memorization, I guessed what was going on. If you're memorizing 100s of words, you don't have time <em>not</em> to make cards. I'm speaking as a medievalist here: I've got to read in four languages, so I have experience with this problem as both a student and a teacher. The flash cards are non-optional.</p>
<p>The other thing is that once you make the cards, you can use 'em to review, so they keep paying dividends. </p>
<p>The fastest thing is to find a good set of preprinted cards. If you can't, you have to make the cards yourself.</p>
<p>P.S. At one point I made 1100 cards for a single translation final. Twenty hours to make the cards, five hours to learn all the words: that's how it goes. Then, when I needed to review the texts nine months later, I just dragged out my flash cards, and I was good to go in five hours again.</p>
<p>belevitt- as a lab tech you get free classes and health insurance? </p>
<p>what kind of classes do you take? the ones offered to the grad students?</p>
<p>Also, if you're going to make flashcards can I suggest a software called jmemorize. You type up the "cards", and it reviews them on a timed schedule (like the SAT review person mentioned). The card goes up in stacks based on how well you know it, and then is reviewed a little less often. It's free, and you can even upload your GRE vocab list for others to use if you want to contribute (I've sent in a few of my lists). I've been using it for a while and have found it greatly improved the speed of making cards over actual index cards, and worked better for me.</p>
<p>Good tip, zuzusplace. There are a handful of such websites out there, I think.</p>
<p>Even if you are making paper cards--for instance, so you can carry them around during the day--you still want to type 'em up and print 'em instead of writing 'em out by hand.</p>