Read the question first, delay the maths, protect momentum, stay mental where you can.
Quantitative Reasoning is a problem-solving-under-pressure test wearing a maths costume. Doctors have to read data quickly and pull out what matters for a decision — that is the skill being measured, not your ability to perform clever calculations.
That reframe changes how you fail. Students lose QR marks by rushing into calculations before understanding the problem, by getting stuck on a hard set and bleeding momentum, and by over-complicating questions that wanted one clean step.
One — read the question first. Not the table, not the stem: the question. Know what you are solving before you look at anything else.
Two — delay the maths. Plan the solution as a straight line before touching a number: I need X, then Y, then Z. Only then execute.
Three — prioritise momentum. Open with an easy set, refuse to get stuck, and skip and return rather than grinding. A rolling start makes the hard sets cheaper.
Four — use mental maths where you can. For simple operations your head is faster than the on-screen calculator; save the calculator for genuinely ugly arithmetic.
A clinic saw 240 patients in March. In April the number rose by 15%. How many patients did the clinic see in April?
Answer: 276 patients.
Every QR question is three steps: read, plan, execute. You cannot speed up reading much, and execution is capped by the calculator — so nearly all your improvement lives in planning faster and better. Drill the middle step deliberately: before computing anything, say the full route to the answer.
Questions arrive standalone, in sets of four, and in sets of eight off bigger data — but do not spend thought on the format; the three steps are the same. And expect the real exam to be shorter and more concise than practice banks, with keyword-hunting rarely enough: understanding the scenario is what carries you.
60p. One unit first: 18 ÷ 30 = 0.6. Reduce to one tablet before scaling anything.
No — ×0.8 then ×1.2 is ×0.96, so you're at 96% of the start. Sequential percentage changes multiply, they don't add.
Reading the question first kills calculator-first rushing — the habit of typing before you know what you are solving. Delaying the maths kills the wrong-thing answer, where the arithmetic is perfect but aimed at the size of a rise rather than the new total.
Prioritising momentum kills the slow bleed of a hard set, where one stubborn question quietly costs you three easy ones. And staying mental where you can kills the over-complicated one-step question — the one that wanted 18 ÷ 30, not a keypad.