Believe it or not, GRE scores can be one of the real deal makers in case of admission to the best colleges for MS in the US. To get high GRE scores, you must perform well in all the three sections, namely GRE math, GRE verbal and GRE AWA (Analytical writing assessment).

Getting high GRE verbal scores is no easy task, especially if you do not hail from native English speaking country or have not pursued your undergraduate education from university where the official medium of instruction is English.

However, this is no reason to worry because the GRE has been designed for the test takers to solve the questions and not get scared because of them. If you follow a strategic verbal study plan with dedication, you can surely get a high GRE verbal score. Are you curious to know what you have to do to score 700+ in GRE verbal? Read on! Read more…

This is the last post in the series of posts on conditional clauses and conditional sentences. The reason why so much emphasis is being laid upon the knowledge and concept of conditionals is that they are used extensively in the reading comprehension and verbal reasoning sections.

Conditional Clauses with the Past Perfect (unfulfilled conditions in the Past)

These types of conditional clauses contain a condition that was not fulfilled in the past. In such clauses, the past perfect form of the verb is used. The simple past form indicates an unreal or unlikely condition in the present or future point of time. The past perfect shows an unfulfilled condition in the past. Read more…

In the previous post GRE Verbal Ability: Understanding Conditionals (I), we discussed open conditional clauses and sentences. These are of the kind, “if this happens, that will happen” or “unless this happens, that won’t happen”.

Taking the discussion one step ahead, in the current post we will discuss the Hypothetical Condition Clauses. Something that is hypothetical exists in theory only, for example, the Perfect Competition Market in Economics or Equitable Distribution of Income and Resources in the Society.

A Type- II Conditional Clause contains a condition that may be theoretical, combined with improbability or unreality. The condition stated is not likely to be fulfilled. There are called ‘Unreal’ or ‘Hypothetical’ conditional clauses. In such clauses, the simple past form of the verb is used.

Examples:

• If she lost it, I would be very upset.
• If they were here, they would come to our house
• If I were you, I would challenge him
• Even if you were a President, I would not care for you.

Read more…

Knowledge about conditional clauses and their use in sentences comes in handy while solving the sentence completion, sentence correction, reading comprehension and the analytical writing part of the GRE exam.  Basically, conditionals form an important part of the English language and since GRE exam gives so much importance to English and verbal ability, it is important that you know the conditional clauses and their uses in the sentences well. Read more…

Sentence completion questions are very scoring and if you want high GRE score, then you have to be a pro at solving these kind of questions, not only accurately, but also quickly. This will make sure that you have sufficient time for reading comprehension questions.

1. In the months and years ahead, we intend to build both kinds of strengths; during times of ___ as well as tension, during periods of cooperation as well as conflict, until the world w pass on to our children is truly ___ and fosters diversity and freedom to flourish.

a)      Peace…insidious

b)      Détente…safe

c)       Perdition…conducive

d)      Tranquility…perfidious

e)      Safety…insular Read more…

You have to devise new and innovative ways to learn the GRE words. Agreed that there is nothing innovative about solving these filler sentences with the most appropriate words, but it is amongst the best ways to remember the GRE vocabulary words.

1. Many educators believe that bilingual education has proved to have definite ___ education Read more…

GRE will be reasoning based from August 2011 and this is in news all over. Here, we are giving a short introduction of what reasoning based verbal GRE is going to be like. It is no more about knowing some 1500 GRE words and marking antonyms and synonyms. You will now be required to read between the lines and do things you did not imagine you will have to.

In these questions, a short passage is followed by a question. It is important however to remember that the passage usually consists of certain facts. They may also contain conclusions that can be drawn or inferences that can be made based on the given data. There may be certain assumptions that act as a bridge relating the fact to the conclusions. Critical reasoning questions call for the student’s skill to evaluate and analyze the arguments or a given situation.

Let us take a few examples:

Example 1: “The streets were deserted. A curfew was imposed in the locality following stray incidents of violence.”

We may connect these events to come to the conclusion – streets are usually deserted when a curfew is Imposed.

Example 2: “With the rapid invasion of our lives by the electronic media, sound engineering as a profession has an infinite scope and offers an aspirant several avenues of employment.”

An assumption, which is made in this statement is – the rapid advancements in the electronic media has been influential in bringing forth sound engineering as an employment option.

Example 3 : Let us work with the options now. Read more…