Week 9 · INTEGRATION PHASE · 25–35 hrs
Mixed practice & Mock 3
The first week in which you never know what is coming next. Topic-blocked practice overstates readiness, because recognising the topic is half of most questions and the block already told you.
Quant: mixed review
Quantitative
In a mixed quant set nothing labels itself. The classification step — deciding which tool the problem wants — is what the section tests, and it happens before you write anything down. Burning that step is the loss.
The disguises are cross-topic. A weighted average arrives as a mixture, a rate, or a class-average table. A ratio arrives as two counts with a known total. A constraint — "how many", "at least", "distinct", "integer" — sits in the final sentence and silently removes candidates from the answer set. Data Sufficiency statements that look sufficient are usually one case from failing: test a non-integer, a negative, or zero before you commit.
Three decisions separate the correct answer from the tempting one:
- Before computing, decide whether the question asks for a value or a comparison. If it asks which is greater, stop solving.
- In DS, ask whether testing cases settles sufficiency; it is often faster and safer than algebra.
- Fix the constraint set first. Half the traps are a solution those constraints exclude.
The mechanical loss for strong candidates: finishing algebra they did not need. Mixed sets frequently stop at "sufficient" or "greater than", and continuing costs the minute you needed two problems later.
Worth holding: for two groups, — group sizes sit in inverse ratio to their distances from the combined mean. It requires exactly two groups and a computable overall mean.
- In a timed mixed set you named the topic and the first move for each problem before writing, and still finished the section
- For every DS item you missed, you can state the single test case that would have exposed it
- You solved two-group weighted-average problems via the distance ratio instead of setting up equations
Verbal: mixed review
Verbal
Verbal on Focus is Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension only. Mixed review tests the switch between them, and the fact that neither arrives labelled: a stimulus never announces its conclusion, a passage question never announces that it is really a strengthen.
The disguises: an RC question that is functionally strengthen/weaken applied to one paragraph; a CR stimulus long enough to read like a passage, usually with two voices; a method-of-reasoning item decided by one structural word; a boldface question whose two phrases play different roles.
Three decisions carry most of the marks. Name the conclusion and its evidence before reading the choices — CR distractors are typically true, on-topic and silent about the gap. Ask what the question demands: "according to the passage" and "the passage suggests" license different degrees of confidence, and the trap for the first is a valid inference the passage never states. Match the strength of the language: a new term or a superlative needs explicit warrant.
The mechanical way strong candidates bleed points is carrying the previous question's mode forward. Ninety seconds inside a dense passage makes the next CR stimulus get read as prose to be understood rather than an argument to be attacked, so the answer is chosen because it sounds plausible rather than because it closes the gap.
Keep one tool loaded: the negation test. Negate a candidate necessary assumption; if the argument survives, discard it. It applies only where the answer must be required — not to sufficient-assumption or strengthen questions.
- For every CR question missed in a mixed set, you can say in one sentence whether the failure was naming the conclusion, naming the gap, or matching an answer choice
- You classify each RC question as stated or inferred before reading the options, and can point to the sentence that licenses your answer
- You notice and restart when you have read a CR stimulus as prose, and you use the negation test only on necessary-assumption questions
Data Insights: mixed review
Data Insights
Mixed review is where Data Insights stops being five topics and becomes one job: work out what a screen is asking before you touch the data.
The question types are not the skill. The skill is target-fixing — deciding in the first fifteen seconds whether you owe a single value, a comparison, or a yes/no verdict. A Two-Part Analysis can be a weighted average in disguise; a Graphics Interpretation can be a percent change; a Table Analysis can be pure logic where you sort and compare and never divide. Multi-Source Reasoning usually hides its decisive constraint in the tab you opened second.
Three decisions carry the marks. First, name the target before reading the evidence — candidates who read the data first drift toward whatever number is easiest to compute. Second, in Data Sufficiency take the stem's constraint literally; the trap is a statement that feels sufficient because it is consistent, rather than because it determines. Third, choose compute-or-bound deliberately. Many Graphics and Table items are settled faster by bracketing (above or below 50%?) than by arithmetic.
The mechanical loss is partial answering: every multi-part question is all-or-nothing, and a blank column scores as a wrong one. Never submit with a column untouched.
Worth having in memory: percent change , on the condition that 'old' is the base you are changing from, not the later figure.
- You can name the question type and the target quantity for each DI item before reading its data, on nearly every item in a mixed set
- You finished a mixed set with no blank columns and no half-answered multi-part questions
- You can point to specific items you solved by bounding rather than calculating, and say why that was the faster route
- On Data Sufficiency items you stated aloud whether the stem demanded a value or a yes/no before you judged either statement
Why mixed practice scores lower, and why that is fine
Exam skills
Mixed practice scores lower than topic practice. That is not a knowledge problem. It is the price of removing the cue. In topic practice, every question announces its type through the set you are in. In mixed practice, and on the real exam, the question does not. Your accuracy on any question is , assuming classification is all-or-nothing. The second term is what you have been training. The first is what mixed practice exposes.
The disguises are ordinary. A Data Sufficiency stem with a single value looks like Problem Solving. A short Critical Reasoning argument looks like Reading Comprehension. A Data Insights question about percentages looks like Quant. Strong candidates lose points mechanically: they carry the previous question's schema into the next one. After three DS items, they evaluate the fourth (PS) for sufficiency. After a rate problem, they see a ratio and set up the wrong equation. This is set-shifting cost, and it is invisible in topic practice.
Two decisions separate a correct answer from a tempting one. First, before solving, spend ten seconds naming the type and the task. Second, if the question resists your first method, abandon it; do not force the previous schema. Pacing also resets per question, not per block.
Why the lower score is fine: the real exam is mixed. Your mixed score is the honest predictor. The gap between topic and mixed accuracy is your integration deficit, and it closes with mixed sets, not with more topic drills.
- You classify every question in a mixed set before solving, and your classifications match the official types without correction
- You trace each wrong answer in a mixed set to either a knowledge gap or a switching error, and you can name which
- You finish a mixed set with no instance of applying the previous question's method to the current one
Mock 3: testing a section order
Exam skills
All three Focus sections run $45$ minutes and carry equal weight, so your order changes nothing about the clock — only the state you are in when each section begins. That is the entire variable, and it is what Mock 3 exists to measure. Treat the resulting score as evidence about state, not about ability.
The disguises are quiet. A dip in the third section reads to you as a content weakness. A sluggish first section reads as unusually hard questions. A rushed final five minutes reads as bad luck. All three are order artefacts, and all three will follow you into the real exam if you diagnose content instead.
Two decisions matter. First, where the single $10$-minute break falls: after section 1, both remaining sections start rested; after section 2, only the last one does. Second, identify the section most damaged by a cold start — by careless errors, not by difficulty — and place that one after the break rather than first.
The standard mechanical failure is moving several axes at once: new order, new break position, new pacing rule. Mock 3 then tells you nothing. There are $6$ orders $2$ break positions configurations; spend one per mock. And since every Focus section is question-level adaptive, its opening questions cost the most — you cannot warm up on question 1. Run a $30$-second checklist in the gap before each section: section name, pacing checkpoints, the one trap you keep re-entering. You can still change order at the test centre, so this is rehearsal, not lock-in.
- Before starting Mock 3 you wrote down the order, the break position, and the single axis you changed from Mock 2
- You ran the pre-section checklist in the gap before all three sections, and answered the first question of each at your intended pace
- In review you separated order effects from content effects by checking whether the dip tracked the break position rather than the topic
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Find the pattern behind your mistakes
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