TOPIC: Question on the PMP Exam Simulator

Hi Cornelius,

Great job on coming up with the exam simulator! I do hope that it's as close as it can get to the actual PMP exams which I will be taking next Tuesday. I've taken numerous Timed and Learning quizzes, including PMP Exam 1 (2x) today, for a total of 698 questions. I do have a question though about the PMP Exam simulator though, especially after taking PMP Exam 1 (failed on the first attempt and passed on the 2nd try). I failed on the first try (54%). I reviewed all the questions where I got the answers wrong. I decided to re-take PMP Exam 1 again and as expected, I passed it with a score of 88.3%. I was expecting when I re-took PMP Exam 1, it would be a different pool of questions altogether, but instead, it was the same questions all over again. Having a different pool of questions would have challenged my thinking rather than falling into the trap of 'remembering' the answers (after reading the explanations where I got the answers wrong). So my question is, what was the purpose of having the same set of questions for PMP Exam 1 on the 2nd attempt when after reading the explanations for the incorrect answers, the tester would easily 'remember' what the answer was rather than understanding what the question is all about. I plan to take the other PMP Exams in the next two days and hopefully I get a higher score on my first try. Here's hoping that this will help me in my journey of passing the PMP exams next week.

Cheers!

JVS

Joel,

Glad you like the simulator, but it looks like you expected something different regarding Exams 1-4. Let me explain:

Our simulator has two separate questions pools: (a) A pool with 4 pre-defined exams and (b) a pool with over 1,300 questions for quizzes.

In other words, Exams 1, 2, 3, and 4 are specifically designed to mimic the exam in terms of the number of questions and the percentages of the People (42%), Process (50%) and Business (8%) domains. Each of these exams is also designed so that they are roughly the same difficulty. In this way you can practice 4 exams under real-life exam conditions. The fact that you didn't pass it on the first try (54%) shows you that you are not ready for the real exam.

A good approach for you would now be the following steps:
- Review your results for Exam 1 in detail and understand why you got them wrong. My tip is always to spend at least the same amount of time reviewing as you did in taking the exam
- Continue your studies and test yourself by doing quizzes from the second pool
- Once you feel ready, then take exam 2

Exams 1-4 will always have the same questions (by design and intent) because on the real PMP exam you "get one chance to beat it". And these 4 simulator exams do exactly that.

I also thought Exam 1-4 would have different set of questions. And, it would also make sense to not to see the same ones over and over again. I would say using same pool of 180 questions four times will surely improve my score in subsequent attempts, but that would not be a good way of measuring my readiness for the real Test.
please think about it Cornelius.

NanR

Just to be clear: Exams 1-4 all have totally different questions. To be precise

Exam 1 has 180 questions that are different from Exams 2, 3 and 4
Exam 2 has 180 questions that are different from Exams 1, 3 and 4
Exam 3 has 180 questions that are different from Exams 1, 2 and 4
Exam 4 has 180 questions that are different from Exams 1, 2 and 3

So if you go through all 4 exams, you will see 180 different/new questions in each exam. So a total of 720 questions.