原作者寄托名儿| erencie
其实我GRE是去年年底考的，当时考完很累，又在忙着申请大学，没有机会写一篇总结。但是说真的，准备GRE的备考过程，本身就是一段值得回忆的人生经验。筒子们，不要把GRE当成一件让人痛苦的事去做，而要想想过程中的所获所得，这样子你的学习效率会更高，而且你不仅仅是在准备一个考试，更学到了很多东西，打开了一个新的视野去看待。
1）选用好的工具去准备复习。
我们生活在一个有各种方便学习工具的年代，应该好好利用这些东西来准备GRE。在这里我推荐以下几种我用过的：
a.有道词典 （这个APP可以装在手机上，可以装在电脑上，不管android/iOS还是windows/Mac都有版本，里面最有用的是一个叫有道单词本的东西，记过的单词，可以储存起来，随时随地都可以看，还可以自行customize测试题）
b.你的手机里的各种GRE做题程序。尤其推荐iPad上一款叫GRE+, 由Arcadia Prep, Inc准备的数学题。非常好。
c.EverNote （一个我放在iPad上可以随时记作文灵感的app，手机上也有，记录了所有的作文题，没事翻出来一个看看然后想points）
2）浏览有用的网站
寄托、CD这些国内知名的GRE备考网站我就不提了。
推荐Magoosh GRE blog。这个网站真的非常好。大家应该去看。比什么Kaplan, Princeton Review来好得多，对GRE的分析很到位，很细腻。
3）看一些英文的新闻
比较简单的英文文章可以在The Atlantic, Good Magazine, New York Times看到。还有比较晦涩难懂的，譬如Barnes & Noble Review。鉴于GRE经常时不时考一些book review的文章，看这个会有帮助。
啊，有点扯题了。我好想本来应该讨论作文的，结果讨论成笼统的整个gre了。好吧，我现在开始讲我怎么准备作文的。
1）首先是搜集材料。
写GRE作文里面有一个很有用的论证方法就是举例论证。当然有很多更抽象的方法可以来证明我们的观点。但是举例论证无疑是最容易的。那么例子从哪里来呢？与其去学习其他GRE作文的例子，不如自己搜集例子，这样可以避免抄袭。而且自己得来的资料自己也比较熟悉。不会说临时忘记时间人物地点什么的。例子不宜多。太多记不住。每个分类的记录几个正的反的。比如，关于政治家的ethic problem，可以用克林顿，或者尼克松来做例子。每个分类都应该有自己的例子。政治有政治的例子。历史有历史的例子。教育有教育的例子。如果能用时下最新新闻里报道的一些事来做例子，那是再好不过。让改卷人耳目一新，而不是一直看着那几个翻来覆去反复使用的旧故事。
2）分类准备points
这里我强烈推荐大家去用《谁来拯救我的GRE ISSUE》一书。寄托里有人分享下载。当然，我没有那么多的时间，去整本看完。我主要是看它的分类。一共有五大分类：历史文化传播， 思想文化行为，成长学习教育，政治法律社会，科技生活时代。每个大分类之下，又把类似的文章分成几个小类别。所以，只要这些小类别，你都去想想一些points，正反的观点。然后看看你那几个自己备用的例子能不能adapt上去，就相当于整个题目你已经提前审题好了。
我来一个example吧，关于政治家的道德， 有以下两个小题目：
104: To be an effective leader, a public official must maintain the highest ethical and moral standards. (Claim)
107: To be an effective leader, a public official must maintain the highest ethical and moral standards. (Statement)
我的提纲是这样的：
Introduction: I fundamentally agree that public officials must adhere to high ethical and moral standards which are beneficial to the their leadership as well as the society, although it is not their political duty to pursue the highest uprightness in morality.
First of all, public morality and successful leadership are for sure closely connected.
Consider many leaders, such as Hitler, whom most people would agree were egregious violators of public morality -> such leaders forfeit their leadership as a result of the immoral means by which they obtained or wielded their power.
Watergate scandal (a break-in into Democratic National Committee offices before American election and the subsequent attempts in cover-up by Nixon; Nixon administration's abuse of power toward the goal of undermining political opposition). President Nixon, whose contempt for the very legal system that afforded him his leadership led to his forfeiture of it.
The leader has a social responsibility to be morally upright in order to set a good example for the society
All the people who deal with him, whether those working under him or the common people , look up to him. He has responsibilities that he has to fulfill. Such an official needs to be exemplary by setting moral standards . This is because a good leader should act as a motivator and the best motivation to adhere to rules and regulations can be provided by a leader if he practices the regulations himself.
Bill Clinton: Although he was involved in the Lewinsky Scandal , he was considered to be an effective leader. But immorality is very infectious and could creep into the system very quickly . Thus people who would not support my stand could have Mr. Clinton as an excuse for being effective without being a man of morals and integrity. If moral values are compromised by leaders or if they are found to be involved in scandals , their image is smeared in the eyes of the people . Their decisions are scrutinized and their motives will be doubted. This would lead to ineffective leadership. He could have been a more effective leader if he would not have been involved in such a scandal. He admitted his mistake and finally he ,too stuck to morality to salvage his lost pride .
However, it is unrealistic to demand highest or complete pureness in politicians' morality.
In Machiavellians' political thoughts, it is of most importance for politicians to maintain his power and orderliness of the state instead of pursuit of justice.
Politicians are ruling a world which is itself not morally good.
Some prominent figures lie, not for self-serving reasons, but in attempt to secure what they saw as morally important political goals.
In those elections, you can't expect whatever the candidate says is true. They are using political tactics or tricks to convince the electorate to vote for them.
As long as ... then it is okay.
这个提纲可能过于详细了。但是你要知道，经常这样去brainstorm，有时候一个题目总是忍不住就会有很多想法，于是灵感就来了。东西也写出来了。再给一个比较难的提纲，关于艺术的。同样，是《谁来拯救我的GRE ISSUE》那本书的一个分类，叫“艺术与可理解性”。
55: In order for any work of art—for example, a film, a novel, a poem, or a song—to have merit, it must be understandable to most people. (Statement)
Introduction: I fundamentally disagree with the claim because there are many invaluable artistic works which are not understood by most common people. （首先想好自己的立场）
1.The artists might be ahead of time and produce works which are not appreciated and understood by contemporary people. （灵感来了，记下）
1.Visual arts, Vincent van gogh. （梵高的例子。这个例子去wikipedia熟悉一下，以后艺术的题还可以重复用）
2.Nowadays people appreciate the impressive strokes and colors used in his paintings. Many works received high acclaims such as the starry night.
3.However his works were ignored when he was alive.
2.The artistic beauty of a good piece of work might be appealing even though people do not truly understand it's meaning.
1.song can be merited even if its lyrics are not understandable. The music of the song can be appealing even though it is in a different language. The synthesis of sounds of various musical instruments can create an extremely mellifluous tune attracting people and surpassing the fact that they do not understand its meaning. This explains songs being popular globally.
2.People feel the emotions, although they interpret it differently in mixture with their emotions.
3.Sometimes the merits of a work can only be judged by select group of people.
1.Shakespeare's works.
2.There are very few people who understand Shakespeare’s plays in its original form. Yet it is truly known work of merit. This is because people need a level of literary skills to be able to comprehend it. This brings it to a higher than the ordinary literary works and sets it apart. The very fact that most people cannot understand some literary works grants it merit, as it needs skill to understand it.
还有法律方面的提纲，一个小分类叫“不公平的法律”。
Every individual in a society has a responsibility to obey just laws and to disobey and resist unjust laws.
Introduction: I fundamentally agree that we should obey just laws and stand against unjust laws, though the definitions of 'just' and 'unjust' should not clearly stated.
Just: agreed by the majority of rational adults and has an intended purpose to maintain stability and prosperity of the society.
Unjust: disagreed by majority and are meant to harm the society as a whole.
People need to strictly abide by the just laws to ensure orderliness of the society, and consequently benefit each of us.
speed limit in highways. Anyone violating it must be fined or jailed.
Need to obey to ensure safety and well being of all road users.
2. Some laws are based on racial or gender discrimination and are inherently unfair.
Women in Islamic countries
According to no. 308 in Jordanian criminal laws, rapist can be exonerated if he wants to marry with the victim. Otherwise, killed by her brother or father to protect the reputation of the family.
The women are not treated equally as men. They have very little freedom and those women who breach the laws are inflicted various punishments. If they submissively accept these baseless restrictions then their life would become even more miserable. The women there need to open there eyes and protest against these biased rules.
laws never consider the well-being of women.
3. Some Laws are meant to protect the interests of the authority, instead of the people.
China prohibit public to protest, even if it is peaceful.Disallow people to voice out their own opinions on governments.
This is to force people to accept whatever the government has done and citizens have no right to complain or protest when they think it is wrong.
Conclusion. Most people would naturally respond with outrage to unjust laws which violate the common moral standards.
3）以上讲了怎么去搜集材料，怎么去根据文章分类来brainstorm和列提纲。不过最重要的，是你要有几次练笔的机会。很多人因为对写作文本身就有一种恐惧感，总觉得“不知道怎么写啊”，于是迟迟不去动笔。这是错误的。从来不去尝试，根本找不到感觉，就算你列再多的提纲，看再多的范文，也很难有那种考场上笔很顺的感觉。另外一个极端的情况是，不停的写，不停的写，却从来不去问自己有哪些地方需要improve，这也是错误的。对于语法错误，当然找个朋友帮忙看一下是没问题。但是有一些逻辑上的错误，其实平时不一定要直接把作文给朋友看（朋友可能很忙），而是跟朋友讨论一下，这样一个题目，我这样一个思路，逻辑对不对，好不好，会不会很幼稚，会不会很怪，有没有更让人耳目一新的表达手法，等等。关于开写，最需要把握的是自己的时间。
有两种写作时间的掌控方法。
3.1）一种是按部就班。先花五分钟涉及全文思路，然后开始introduction, paragraph 1, paragraph 2那样写个梗概。例子先不写。论证先不写。但是有个文章的枝干在那里。直到所有的points都列出来了，开始填进去例子和论证。
3.2）有些人容易在introduction那里卡半天。这种情况我建议直接开始写paragraph 1，然后文章轴心部分写完了，回头填一个introduction。可以避免浪费时间在introduction上，导致文章主干部分没时间写。
我个人是属于3.2比较适用的。大家可以根据自己的情况酌情进行处理。
关于上篇中的一些注解以及FAQ
1.上篇中的3.1) 3.2)的写作方法就是在Magoosh里面video讲解看到的，觉得对自己用处特别大，写出来让那些没机会看到的同学们看。
2.拯救我的新GRE Issue里面说的比较宽泛，所以要我们读者自己去学会取其中对我们有用的部分。就像字典一样，我们没时间和精力整个读完。但可以挑里面你个人觉得比较容易记的部分去看。
Q1：每一类写了多少篇？
每一个大分类的文章其实写一篇就够了，找到那个类别的文章的感觉就成，小分类要是各写一篇会写死的。我是说大分类，即历史，教育，科学，政治。如此这般。
Q2：我写GRE的硬伤就是打字太慢，基本只能写别人的三分之二。
慢慢来，多练习打英文字，可以培养速度。建议上一些英文论坛跟人argue。如果实在太慢了，就不要写三个points。宁愿花多点时间好好illustrate two points，会让人觉得你每个idea都论证得很饱满，而不是有很多idea但每个都是走马观花。
Q3：能不能介绍下句式语言和词汇怎么提高，我目前在看新4然后练笔的时候尽量模仿做过的阅读的句子用法。
如果是verbal的句式语言和词汇，那当然是越千奇百怪越好。但是在写analytical writing，我比较推荐用简单直接的语言，表达复杂的思想。平时看一些英文的新闻。仔细看作者表达的方式。然后用自己的语言表达出来。看看自己写的东西是不是看起来很直接很好懂，同时又能表达出原文的意思。Verbal里面很多倒装句，有时候ETS会故意把原文搞复杂来考你。如果你的英文造诣很高，当然可以用到writing去。不过如果不行，就会弄巧成拙。所以我建议用简单句子、简单词汇，加以适当的、可以控制的复杂度，去写analytical writing。
我来说两句排行榜