PMP Certification in 26 days

A summary of my preparation and the PMP certificate in 26 days,

1. PMP exam preparation course & mock exam - 6 days
2. Revision of the PMBOK 5th edition - 6 days
3. Mock exams and sample questions from online (~1600 questions)- 12days
4. Rest(out of the books and questions) - 2 days
5. The exam day

During the PMP exam preparation course & mock exam, the trainer- Ms. Lavanya is very experience and given us quite plenty of tips and strategy to pass the exam. The exam preparation training is a 5 days course and the trainer perform a good job in conducting the class. The training is pretty fun with little lecturing and memorizing but more to team work and brain storming among the classmates. The training center provided us with Kim Heldman exam study guide as the extra materials at the end of the training session.

To apply for the exam, you are recommended to become the PMI member. Once you have registered as PMI member, you can start filling the application for the exam. If you are the member, you can download the PMBOK and other materials for reading.

During the preparation weeks, i did most of my study on the PMBOK, the slides from the exam preparation course and notes on Kim Heldman's Study guide(exam spotlight). I print out chapter by chapter whenever i have completed the previous. To make it more fun during study, i try to notes down the key points from PMBOK by highlighting it in the paper and written it down to my blog pages, it is one of the good way for me to memorize and review the key points which i have taken down.  I also listen to Kim Heldman's Audio in the car during my daily travel to office and back to home. Usually, i will repeat the audio chapter for 2-3 times in the car to catch the keywords.

my schedule,

On average, i spend around 1-2 hours on the reading per day, 2-3 hours on the exam questions per day and some days 1 hour on audio.
How did i reserved 4-6 hours for these activities?
I wake-up at 5.30am in the morning, started the reading at 5.30-7.00am. At office, i try to browse thru some pages in PMBOK whenever i have free time. During the traveling to office and home, i spend around 30mins on each trip on the audio. And the rest of the time in the evening(usually 8.00-10.30pm), i will do the most of the exam questions and trying to review it. Sometime, i will review the answer on the second day to test if i can remember it. At some points, when you got lower score than expected, you will feel down but nether-less, try to catch up the review to understand your weak points and focus more to it.

Some of the days, the activities are overlapping between the reading and taking the sample questions.
Sometimes, going thru the sample questions are quite exhausting especially those very lengthy and questions with very close answers. Whenever i feel tired or bored, i will start to listen to the audio again or try to browse thru if any interesting part in PMBOK.

My score for the mock exams and sample questions from online,

Date	Qs No.	Source	My Score	Difficult Level
06-Aug-2015	75	Kim Heldman, Study Guide Assessment*	58%	Moderate - Difficult
08-Aug-2015	50	BrainBok Online	64%	Moderate
09-Aug-2015	50	FirstHeadLab Online	70%	Moderate
10-Aug-2015	50	BrainBok (almost 70% questions same like 08-Aug)	82%	Moderate
10-Aug-2015	200	FirstHeadLab PDF	70%	Moderate
11-Aug-2015	100	iZenBridge	68%	Moderate
12-Aug-2015	75	Oliver Lehman Online	59%	Moderate- Difficult
14-Aug-2015	200	PreparePM	80%	Easy-Moderate
15-Aug-2015	100	Kim Heldman, PMP Practice 1*	58%	Moderate-Difficult
15-Aug-2015	100	Kim Heldman, PMP Practice 2*	50%	Moderate-Difficult
17-Aug-2015	50	BrainBok ( almost 70% questions same like 10-Aug)	61%	Moderate-Difficult
17-Aug-2015	171	Free PM-exam simulator(Exam1-2 is very difficult)	64%	Moderate-Difficult
18-Aug-2015	175	Oliver Lehman PDF	66%	Moderate-Difficult
19-Aug-2015	50	Whizlabs	68%	Moderate-Difficult
20-Aug-2015	200	PMStudy	70%	Moderate-Difficult
	1646

*only available if you purchase the Kim Heldman Exam Study Guide.

The confident level started to build up on the 2nd weeks of preparation after going thru almost 1000+ questions.
At that moment, you able to link quite a number of processes and whenever new terms appear it will catch your eye to look for more information about it. once you have started to memorize the formulas and repeatedly use it, you can challenge yourself to memorize more special formula. In actual, the exam will not test how do you memorize the formula, instead how to apply the formula on the situations.

On the exam day, and day before, the feeling is very excited.

I reached the Prometric test center at around 7am and the exam is expected to start at 8am. waited for almost 20mins before the test center is open and started the registration process and check in for the test.

During the test, it is pretty nervous as you will try to read the questions more than 1 time and review the answer several times before moving to the next questions. i set my strategy to skip the long questions if i see difficult questions at the beginning, but during the test, the questions is not so lengthy, and i decided to go thru one by one.

After 2 hours, i managed to complete 110 questions, i decided to take a short break for some water and snacks. I spend roughly 7 mins for the break and continue to the exam room after the break.

I managed to complete all the questions extra 13 mins, i use the remaining time to review the some questions and ensure all the questions are answered. 

When the time fillup the survey form, you will feel the heart beat is increasing tremendously and awaiting for the result.

And finally the result is out!

Yes, i'm pass the exam! and i got all in moderate proficient for all the process group.