Happy to report that I got “Above Target” all across. Below, my $0.02 about my study approach. I can provide more details upon request.
• I was going to do Rita’s and PMBOK as suggested by lots of folks. Could not focus with ‘reading’ only, so decided to get an online lessons set and promptly noticed Prep Cast Elite was the one I wanted.
• Once I got the videos, I reformulated my whole plan:
o Watch video by video (one or two per section), following along on PMBOK.
o After completing a full chapter (video, PMBOK), do the self-assessment from videos.
o Go through the same chapter on Rita’s. Fast read, highlighting what by this time I knew from the videos and PMBOK. When done, do the Rita’s practice exam for that chapter.
o Finally, did a Quiz for that Knowledge Area using the Prep Cast Exam Simulator. I did 30 questions at the time, with a rule that if I scored less than 75% I had to do a fresh set of 30 questions. Luckily, a second exam was necessary only twice and after scoring 65% and 73%.
• I only watched the videos that ‘matched’ the PMBOK. I will watch the ‘extra’ videos now. I did not want to add noise to an already crowded curriculum.
• After I finished videos, PMBOK and Rita’s, I did a first Full Exam on the simulator with a little help of my notes (not much, honestly, only for the formulas) and got an 89%. Remember I was doing the 35ish questions from Rita and at least 30 from Prep Cast plus the self-assessment after each chapter, so I had some practice.
• I did a second full test on the Simulator and got 82%, with no cheating or help.
• Was planning to do more full exams, but since I had done 80%+ on those two and timing had not been an issue (had at least 35’ to spare on each, taking 2-3 quick breaks for water or bathroom or just to stretch), I decided to refine my notes. From about 100 sheets, I went down to 5 and then to one single sheet with the most important stuff for me. I never intended to learn the 49 processes by heart and even less the details of ITTOs… I trusted that common sense and experience would help to best complement the education acquired through the videos and the reading of PMBOK and Rita, and that worked fine.
• By this time, I was very clear that the BEST tool in my box was the Exam Simulator. Even 10 question quizzes. It was evident that as valuable as the videos and the books were, the concepts and everything were better ingrained after seeing them on exams. So, I went ahead and started quizzing on the Simulator as often as I could. 10, 20, 30, 50 questions at the time. In fact, after getting comfortable that the 4 hours were going to be plenty for me based on all the exams I had done to this point, I preferred to do quick ones, so I could get feedback and review the explanations on the wrong answers faster.
I think that is it. Apologies for the long write up. I definitely recommend the Prep-Cast Elite and the sequence of tasks I did worked beautifully. I respect those folks that read the PMBOK, Rita’s and other books from cover to cover and several times. I could not. Having the videos to steer the process was great and definitely, the very best tool was the Exam Simulator. In all, I did 2 Full Exams and 57 quizzes, which encompassed 1120 questions out of the 1610 available. Plus the self-assessments plus the Rita practice exams.
Good luck, y’all!
