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We continued going over the verbal section of the assessment. Towards the end of the session we returned to the math section.

Today, we started by going over the hard English sample problems. Vocabulary is her biggest obstacle, as she is remarkably strong at analyzing the reading passages. We talked about how to quickly pick the structure of a reading passage apart by following transition words and looking at the start and end of each paragraph. Then, we continued to develop vocabulary and talked through the triple-blank passages, as they are proving trickiest for her. Finally we began going through a basic math review to identify any potentially problematic areas. We're going to look at probability and statistics this week, as she has a really strong grasp on the rest of the math fundamentals, and only needs spot reviews in other areas.

We primarily focused on the quantitative portion of the test. The student had read the section in her book on data analysis problems and showed huge improvement in that area.

GRE math: sequences, sets, right triangles; GRE verbal: text completion (fit grammar, style, etc.), analysis (understanding author's intent, beliefs, etc.). The student has the most trouble at this point with text completion questions. She needs to review all the relevant questions in her study guide. The test is fairly soon but with concentrated study she should be okay.

During our first meeting, the student shared his graduate school plans and goals for the test with me. We talked about the benchmarks that he should be aiming for and prioritized which section of the exam he wanted to focus on. I introduced him to the overall structure of the test and the anatomy of each section/question type, answering his questions on what to expect on exam day. We then began our review of the math concepts tested on the test, first covering basic arithmetic/algebraic vocabulary and then looking over the principles of exponents. The student tried a few practice problems, and we will do an intensive exponent drill when we meet tomorrow.

The student and I continued to work through the geometry questions from the quant guide. She is performing well on the harder problems, considering their difficulty. She seems to be weakest at coordinate geometry, but there are few practice problems of that type. She is going to complete critical reasoning 9 for homework. We will finish the geometry questions next session.