Certificate in GRE Preparation - Part 1 (Verbal and Analytical) Online Course

Introducing the GRE® Revised General Test

You may have heard that you can’t study for the GRE. But that’s not true! There are a bunch of things you can do to prepare for the GRE, and the more time you spend preparing the better your scores will be. This lesson tells you what you’ll need to know about the general makeup of the GRE so you’ll know exactly what you’re getting into come test day. You’ll learn how to relax if you start feeling panicky, how to eliminate the wrong answers the tests try to entice you to choose, how to guess when you’re not sure of the right answer, and how to manage your time during the test.

Overview of GRE Verbal and Analytical Sections

If you're not familiar with the kinds of GRE questions that test your verbal skills, you'll know exactly what to expect once you've completed this lesson. We'll give you a taste of the reading comprehension, sentence equivalence, and text completion questions and fill you in on what’s in store for you in the analytical writing section. Then we'll cover the information in much more detail in upcoming lessons.

Approaching the Analytical Writing Section

The first section you'll see on the GRE is the analytical writing section. You'll write two essays in 60 minutes, so you need to be well prepared. This lesson gives you the essentials to be your best on exam day.

Writing Style Review for the Analytical Writing Section

Grammar and punctuation count on the analytical writing section. If it's been awhile since you've opened a grammar book, we have a treat for you. This lesson covers tips for improving your writing style and reviews the important rules of Standard English so that you can perform your best.

Practice for the Analytical Writing Section

If the thought of writing a complete analysis of an issue or argument within a half an hour has you running for the hills, don't despair. Here's a specific plan for making the most of your time so you can prove to the admissions committee of your favorite graduate program that you can create a cohesive, interesting essay. Before you impress the GRE essay readers, you'll get a chance to wow your peers by composing sample essays and sharing them with your instructor and classmates for review. You'll also get the chance to read what others have written and provide them with your enlightened commentary!

How to Interpret a Reading Passage

About half of the questions in the verbal reasoning sections require you to answer questions based on reading passages. The GRE reading passages come in all sizes and topics. In this lesson we'll walk through the process of examining passages efficiently so you can quickly soar through the reading questions.

How to Answer Reading Questions

The reading questions on the GRE revised General Test come in a variety of formats with several objectives. You'll learn unique approaches to various reading question formats that will maximize your performance on exam day.

Practicing Reading Questions

The best way to improve your performance on the GRE reading questions is to practice them. This lesson gives you that opportunity. You'll take a mini reading practice exam and then carefully examine the strategy for answering each question correctly.

How to Answer Text Completion Questions

The fill-in-the-blank GRE text completion questions test your reading ability and knowledge of vocabulary. You'll learn the tactics for dissecting each sentence to extract its exact meaning so you'll know which answer choice makes it complete.

Practice Answering Text Completion Questions

Take a mini practice exam and become familiar with text completion questions. Then we'll explore how best to answer each question.

How to Answer Sentence Equivalence Questions

In this lesson you'll discover what to expect from the third question type in the verbal reasoning section, the sentence equivalence question. This question requires you to evaluate sentences and recognize synonyms. We'll show you how to accomplish both tasks.

Practice Answering Sentence Equivalence Questions

Test your prowess on sentence equivalence questions by taking a mini practice exam. We'll follow with detailed explanations on how to answer each question.