OMG!! My GRE is in a month!!!!
I know the mental torture and frustration the word 'GRE' can cause in ur minds. I have been there and done that. Trust me...writing the exam is only the beginning.
I remember during my college days, my US frenetic friends always had this KAPLAN and BARRON'S and print outs of the word list in their hands. They used to have it where ever they went. I dont disagree with their approach or anything. But personally, I just dont feel the point in slogging over three thousand odd words and mugging it all up.
Come on, whats the point in learning that when most of u know that u are going to forget the list the moment u step out of the examination hall. There obviously has got to be a better way to approaching the verbal section of the GRE (the math section I will come to later :) ) What I did was, get some good English story books (like Sidney Sheldon's and Jeffrey Archer's). These books are not that hi-fi in english and yet, they help improve our vocabulary. Apart from this, one other option we have is something that we get but rarely do - READ THE NEWSPAPER!! There is definitely no better approach than the newspaper (But dont even think of reading the sports section or the movies section. That is going to get u no where than a good tea break gossip with ur friends :P )
And of course, u do have to read through the verbal list given in the ETS Barron's book. My point is, dont mug it up. A simple read-through through a couple of lists a day should be good enough (u wont be able to go through the entire list, but it should get u through)
Some of the word lists that u should be looking at are 'A','B','C','M','P','S','T'. U could also keep hand made flash cards that u can keep looking at once in a while just to refresh urself (Please refrain from going through that flash card 24*7 - u wil become psychotic :D )
Coming to the maths section, we Indians think that we are the Kings and Queens of Maths just because we were responsible for inventing '0' (or is it discovering '0'??) This is where we are misled. More often than not, we end up focusing on the verbal and lose on the math side. I agree, we dont need to spend too much revising the math concepts, but doing nothing at all is definitely a huge gamble. I have seen many students taking this risk and yes, few of them do get lucky. But what about the rest?
It is not necessary for us to go through the quantitative side and delve into complex functions like differentiation, integration and all (I am not sure how far this is true considering the fact the GRE pattern has changed). I guess the big R.S.Agarwal book that we used for prepping ourselves for our final year placement examinations should do just fine. You could also keep a sheet with all the formulas u think are important and go through it once in a while (as long as u dont take it into the exam hall - this is meant to be a joke :P and if u think it sucks, bear wit me :D )
There are plenty of test materials available online :) Just google 'GRE TEST MATERIALS '
The one mentioned above is just a sample. I am sure most of you are more talented in searching for better materials for practice. The most important thing to do is take a lot of practice tests before u enter the GRE test hall. That will give u a real boost in confidence. And please please don't pay money online for those sites which say 'Guaranteed scores of 1400+ - for more details register with XXX.com'. They end up just emptying Ur pocket.
Why waste money when u have so many materials online for free? :) As far as it comes to preparing for these exams, the best combination is GRE Barrons + Online Materials + R.S.Agarwal in my opinion. I guess i have dragged on enough for now :) I have had a long day at office and the weather here is too unusually Ooty-ish. So I shall go and relax with warm chai and some vadas :)
Cheers and Good luck :)