What strategies can I use on the GMAT critical reasoning questions?

Host: What strategies can I use on the GMAT problem solving questions?

Jeff Glazer: There is a wide variety of strategies you can use or shortcuts or techniques, one of the first things you want to be sure you have is a basic background in the math, so that if you have to do a problem the long way that would make your high school teacher proud that is fine, but you also want to get used to some certain shortcuts that are widely accessible to different test questions. One is approximation where a lot of times you dont need to know the exact answer because it is multiple choices, so close is good enough. Another one is substitution where you get to avoid doing the algebra by just using some basic numbers in place of the variables and the last one which is very interesting is actually letting the answers kind of guide you because it is multiple choices on a lot of questions one of the answers has to work. So if you are not sure how to do it you can actually plug the answer back into the problem until one of them works. But again you want to get familiar with these and know when to use them and when not to so that you are not wasting time on test by using inappropriate short cuts.