FunkyPants Posted February 8, 2007 Report Share Posted February 8, 2007 Hello! I am planning to rewrite the MCAT this June (third time!). The first time around I took the kaplan course and scored 8, 9, 10 O. The second time around I studied on my own, and worked full time and scored 9, 8, 11, Q. I would love some advice as to how I can really work on improving my scores, especially from people who have rewritten a few times and finally nailed it! Physics is definitely my weak point, and I think I have underestimated the VR section in the past and need to work on that too. Thanks in advance for your help! FP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cary_fan Posted February 8, 2007 Report Share Posted February 8, 2007 Well, I didn't do extremely well (11/10/10/P), but from your scores and your own admission, your weak points are the physical sciences and verbal sections. Your writing sample improved by quite a bit as well the second time around. And I am assuming that the last score is your bio score, which seems to be just fine. From where I'm standing, you could easily increase your physical sciences score by doing more practice. Know your formulas, and do enough practice problems so that you can determine which formula to use (this goes for both chem and physics). The verbal section is the most challenging to improve. If you have been consistently scoring in the same range (<10), a change of strategy could be your best bet. What kinds of strategies did Kaplan suggest? I took a prep course through Princeton Review, and one strategy they had was to spend most of the time on 8 of 9 passages and completely guess on the last one. Personally, I found that no matter how long I spent on a passage, I would always get the same number of questions right/wrong. For me, the trick was to make sure I got through every passage. Do you often run out of time on the VR section and just guess the last questions, or do you finish early and simply not do well on the questions you have answered? The VR section is often regarded as the best predictor of critical analysis, and is usually the difference in making MCAT cutoffs. Do lots of practice and try different strategies until you find one that works for you. Unlike physical or biological sciences, where you can just study harder and see the benefits, the VR section will always be challenging unless you can find a strategy that works for you. Here are some more random things for you to try, although I wrote the paper test and have no idea how the CBT will affect this: - highlighting key words (eg. except, not, increase, decrease) - annotating concepts - paying attention to the author's tone (approving, disapproving, neutral) - more/less time reading the passage vs answering the questions - concentrating on more/fewer passages If you don't read very much outside of school textbooks, there are lists of "good" reading material that will help to increase your reading level and expand your vocabulary. Different things will work for different people. Perhaps someone else can offer different ideas, or will disagree with things I have said here, but the bottom line is for you to figure out what YOU need to do to improve your verbal score. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kuantum Posted February 8, 2007 Report Share Posted February 8, 2007 Hello! I am planning to rewrite the MCAT this June (third time!). The first time around I took the kaplan course and scored 8, 9, 10 O. The second time around I studied on my own, and worked full time and scored 9, 8, 11, Q. I would love some advice as to how I can really work on improving my scores, especially from people who have rewritten a few times and finally nailed it! Physics is definitely my weak point, and I think I have underestimated the VR section in the past and need to work on that too. Thanks in advance for your help! FP You may not be doing enough practice in the PS. Make sure you understand the FUNDAMENTALS of all concepts and can apply them to a wide variety of situations. For example, the doppler effect is important in sound, astronomy, waves, and probably other things I don't know. Try to get your hands on all the AAMC practice material and just chug it out. For VR, pick up EK101, work through that and you should be good. For BS, practice like crazy. For WS, check out the Kaplan formula for writing essays, use big words, write as much as possible, and you should be good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jochi1543 Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 This may be obvious, but analyze wrong answers and also answers that you got right, but wasn't 100% sure about. It helps to read the explanations on why some answers are wrong and others are right. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madz25 Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Practice, practice, practice!!! See where you've gone wrong, fix it, learn it, and practice some more! I would suggest you take some time off (if possible) and just really focus on the MCAT for a few weeks. It's better to work really hard on it now and do well than to balance many activities and have to write it again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lost__in__space Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 go into this MCAT thinking that it'll be your last and you wont be doing it over again, so it's do or die and focus focus focus! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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