Introduction 1 About This Book 1 Icons Used in This Book 2 Beyond the Book 2 Where to Go from Here 3 Part 1: Getting Started with the Gre 5 Chapter 1: Knowing the GRE 7 Knowing the GRE Sections 8 Knowing the GRE Scores 9 Calculating your score 10 Checking your score 10 Seeing or canceling your scores 11 Taking advantage of the ScoreSelect option 11 Bringing the GRE into Your Comfort Zone 11 Getting familiar with what''s on the exam 11 Understanding the other admissions requirements 12 Using Old Scores 12 Chapter 2: Planning Your Time 13 Planning Your Prep Time 13 Planning your study time 13 Planning your practice time 14 Planning Your Exam Time 14 Planning your question time 14 Throwing a mental dart 15 Planning your intermission time 15 Planning your computer time 16 Planning Your Mental and Physical Time 17 Staying active 17 Eating well 17 Relaxing 17 Scheduling Your Exam 18 Scheduling for the testing center 18 Scheduling for home 18 Chapter 3: Planning for Exam Day: Everything Outside the Exam 21 Planning the Night Before 21 Knowing what to bring 21 Knowing what not to bring 22 Planning for Contingency 23 It''s Them, Not You: Testing under Adverse Conditions 24 Part 2: Tackling the Verbal Section One Word at a Time 27 Chapter 4: Upping Your Best GRE Verbal Score 29 Building Your Core Skills 29 Managing Your Time 30 Chapter 5: What Are They Saying: Text Completion and Sentence Equivalence 33 Clinching Text Completion and Sentence Equivalence Questions 33 Keeping it straight 34 Trying it out 34 Developing Your Skills for Finding the Correct Answers 35 Interpreting the Text 101 35 Getting the gist of the text 36 Taking the Best and Only Approach 36 Interpret the text without looking at the answer choices 37 Complete the text with your own words 37 Eliminate wrong answer choices 38 Interpreting Trickier Sentences 38 Use transition words to get the gist of the phrases 39 Start with the second or third missing word 40 Getting Your Hands Dirty with Some Practice 41 Text Completion questions 41 Sentence Equivalence questions 44 Chapter 6: Getting the Gist: Reading Comprehension 51 Recognizing the Three Reading Comprehension Question Formats 51 Multiple-choice questions: Choose one answer 52 Multiple-choice questions: Choose one or more answers 52 Sentence-selection questions: Choose a sentence from the passage 53 Developing Strategies for Success 53 Using the context as your road map 53 Grasping the gist of the passage 54 Avoiding common traps 54 Answering the question yourself 55 Acing the Three Commonly Tested Reading Comprehension Passages 55 The biological and physical science passage 55 The social sciences passage 58 The humanities passage 61 The social sciences passage redux 63 Chapter 7: Critical Thinking: Argument Analysis Questions 67 Covering the Answer Choices 68 Reading the Question for What It''s Asking 68 Reading the Passage for What the Question Is Asking 68 Identifying the "because" and the "therefore" 69 Finding the unstated assumption 70 Exploring common logical fallacies 71 Answering the Question in Your Own Words 72 Eliminating Each Wrong Answer 72 Applying the process of elimination 73 Testing your skills 73 Chapter 8: Expanding Your Vocabulary to Boost Your Score 77 Brushing Up on Prefixes, Suffixes, and Roots 77 Prefixes 78 Suffixes 80 Roots 80 Memorizing the GRE''s Most Common Vocabulary Words 82 Part 3: Math You Thought You''d Never Need Again 97 Chapter 9: Raising Your Best GRE Math Score 99 Managing Your Time 100 Typing an Answer 100 Selecting Two or More Answers 101 Choosing among three answers 101 Choosing among more than three answers 102 Selecting the Quantity That''s Greater 102 Chapter 10: Working with Numbers and Operations 105 Working with Integers, Factors, and Multiples 105 Working with Math Terms 106 Working with Prime and Composite Numbers 106 Working with the Units Digit 107 Working with Absolute Value 108 Working with one absolute value 109 Working with two absolute values 109 Working with Order of Operations 110 Working with Fractions 111 Adding and subtracting 111 Multiplying 113 Dividing 113 Working with mixed numbers and improper fractions 113 Cross-multiplying 114 Working with Decimals 115 Adding and subtracting 115 Multiplying 115 Dividing 116 Working with Percentages 118 Converting 118 Calculating percentage of change 119 Working with Factorials 121 Working with Ratios 122 Working with total numbers 122 Working with amounts in the ratio 123 Maintaining the ratio 124 Combining ratios 126 Chapter 11: Solving Algebra and Functions 129 Solving Bases and Exponents 129 Solving Math Operators 132 Solving for X 133 Solving for x with a Number 134 Solving with the FOIL method 135 Factoring back out 137 Solving Square Roots and Radicals 139 Simplifying 139 Adding and subtracting 140 Multiplying and dividing 141 Simplifying first 142 Solving Coordinate Geometry 142 Solving common problems 143 Solving linear equations 145 Solving two linear equations 147 Solving graphed circles 151 Solving Patterns in a Sequence 152 Solving f(x) Functions 153 Chapter 12: Drawing Geometry 157 Drawing Lines and Angles 157 Drawing lines 157 Drawing angles 158 Measuring Polygons 161 Measuring total interior angles 162 Measuring one interior angle 162 Drawing Triangles 163 Drawing three types of triangles 163 Measuring key characteristics 164 Drawing perimeter and area 165 Measuring with the Pythagorean theorem 168 Drawing common right triangles 169 Drawing Quadrilaterals 172 Drawing Circles 174 Drawing parts of a circle 174 Drawing the circumference and area 176 Drawing the arc and sector 178 Drawing overlapping shapes 182 Drawing 3D Shapes 184 Drawing a cylinder 184 Drawing a rectangular solid 185 Drawing a cube 186 Chapter 13: Simplifying Word Problems 191 Simplifying the Steps 191 Simplifying Time and Distance 192 Simplifying Units of Measurement 193 Simplifying Averages 194 Simplifying missing-term averages 194 Simplifying evenly spaced integers 195 Simplifying weighted averages 196 Simplifying Work Problems 198 Simplifying Team-Work Problems 199 Simplifying Mixture Problems 201 Simplifying Sets and Groups 203 Simplifying the Venn diagram 203 Simplifying the sets formula 204 Simplifying Probability 204 Step #1: Set up the fraction 205 Step #2: Multiply consecutive probabilities 205 Step #3: Add either/or probabilities on a single event 206 Simplifying probability in sets and groups 207 Simplifying Counting Methods 208 Basic counting methods 208 When order matters: Permutations 210 When order doesn''t matter: Combinations 211 Chapter 14: Interpreting Data and Graphs 213 Interpreting Basic Stats 213 Interpreting the median 213 Interpreting the mode 215 Interpreting the range 215 Interpreting the mean 216 Interpreting standard deviation 219 Eyeballing standard deviation 220 Interpreting mean deviation 222 Interpreting the distribution curve 223 Interpreting Tables and Graphs 223 Interpreting tables 224 Interpreting graphs 225 Chapter 15: Comparing Quantities 235 Comparing Exact Answer Choices 235 Comparing Steps 236 Comparing via Strategy 237 Comparing similar appearances 238 Comparing drawings 238 Comparing concepts 240 Comparing identical terms 241 Comparing ranges 245 Comparing estimates 246 Comparing with Four Square 247 Comparing with a hundred 249 Comparing multiple unknowns 250 Part 4: Getting the Essays Right 251 Chapter 16: Writing the Essays Well and Fast 253 Setting Your Sights on a Perfect 6 254 What the essay scores really mean 254 Key methods to scoring well 255 Writing the Issue Essay 256 Step 1: Read and understand the prompt 256 Step 2: Identify examples you already know about the issue 257 Step 3: Take a position that''s in line with your examples 257 Step 4: Write your Issue essay 258 Tying everything together with smooth transitions 261 Writing the Argument Essay 262 Step 1: Read and understand the prompt 262 Step 2: Identify the position stated in the argument 263 Step 3: List the reasons given to support the stated position 263 Step 4: Identify the flawed assumptions behind each reason 264 Step 5: Write your essay 265 Chapter 17: Practicing Your Essays 269 Setting the Stage for a Realistic Experience 2.