How to plan your study for GRE in 8 – 12 weeks?

A timeline of 8 – 12 weeks should be sufficient to get prepared for GRE. Depending on your strengths and weaknesses, here is how you can proceed. Before starting, it is not a bad idea to take a full length test just to analyze your good and bad points. See which category you fit in.

My math is strong, I suck at verbal
If you are from engineering background, most probably, you would fit in this category. Start your GRE preparation by working on your vocabulary. One good way to achieve this is by means of flash cards. Various companies like Barron’s, Kaplan, Power Prep, THE BIG CD have FLASH CARDS of their own. Pick any which suits your style. Flash Cards by THE BIG CD are the only ones which have the complete 4000+ wordlist in a single pack for a perfect price. Here's a look at the actual Flash Card with Front and Back layout.

To make sure that you are always in touch with your word list, you can also install the word list in your mobile phone. You can use software like “The Complete Mobile Word List” for this purpose. For completing the word list, you can easily afford to utilize 45 days or even 2 months. But make sure you know most of the words at the tip of your tongue.

If you are good at math, you can skip going through the norms of revising the concepts that are required in the first month. Instead, you can utilize this first month for verbal section exclusively.

In the second month, practice more application based problems. For more challenging math questions, you can refer to quant books from Kaplan, Vibrant Publishers, Barrons or use practice software like Power Prep and THE BIG CD.

The good thing about THE BIG CD software(s) is that they simulates the GRE exam in terms of the exam screen, content, adaptivity, overall look and feel etc. which no other provider (except for Power Prep of course) does.

I can appear for verbal half asleep, math gives me sleepless nights!
People from non technical background who have lost touch of math since school days would surely endorse to this idea. As far as Quant goes, you can utilize the first month for getting your concepts right. The Quant books from Kaplan can be used for this purpose. This book even comprises of the solved examples so that you know how to apply the formulae that you have learnt.

I am bad at math, but am equally bad with verbal!
Well, in that case, you really need to pull up your socks. Devote your time equally for both. For verbal, get a good set of flash cards. Start reading quality English books for RC section. For math, get your basics right. The first 2 months would be very testing as you have to cover up a lot.

I am done with the studying part, what next?
Ideally, the last month should be meant for practicing test papers. The tests from power prep are a lot similar to the actual GRE and your performance here will give you a glimpse of what you can expect in the final exam. The “All About GRE Computer Adaptive Test” by THE BIG CD is also handy. It features 5 to 7 full length practice tests without any repetition of questions. Its feature of progress tracker can help you to gauge your progress. In each test for each section and for each type of question, you can know your performance as compared to previous tests. This helps you to analyze whether you are working in the right direction or no.