Verbal - Reading Materials

[The Law]

Besides the economist, anybody have other good suggestions on stuff that might help you? I was wondering if anyone knew of any anthologies or any other collections of obscure, verbal style articles that might be useful! Maybe I can try reading them on my way to the lab in the morning!

[ChexMix]

The New Yorker!

 

some articles are way longer than economist, but the language seems very similar to verbal (even more so than economist)

[The Law]

Thanks - http://www.wie.org <--for more artsy, contemporary philosophy type of articles.

[nemesis]

It seems like a lot of MCAT takers seem preoccupied with reading materials like The Economist to help them with the VR section of the exam.

 

In my experience, the best way to prepare for the VR section is to practice full-length VR passages under similarly timed conditions.

 

I don't know how useful it is to try and find reading materal that mimics the type of prose used in the VR section, and read them under non-standardized conditions (i.e. no time limit and no associated multiple-choice questions).

[md-equation]

well reading material that may resemble the real thing could help. It could work in two ways. One it could improve your vocabulary and/or it prehaps might understand different writing styles which prehaps might be useful for you when you write your writing sample. Forget the MCAT for a min, but reading will help you in your undergrad essays. Improvement there could result in better writing skills for the MCAT. You never really know. To practice for the real thing the best bet would to be to stimulate that enviroment. So my point is reading whatever is going to help you regardless.

[cnb88]

If I have to write the MCAT again (which I REALLY REALLY REALLY hope I don't), I would study for the VR section slightly differently than I did before.

I would still use the EK 101 Passages book. But I would also get used to reading on a computer for hours at a time. I found that during the VR section of the real MCAT, it was getting harder and harder to focus on the words on the screen. I ended up having to go back more times than normal through the passage, which resulted in me having less time for the last passage. So to prevent this from happening as bad, I would definitly spend time just reading stuff online for a few hours at a time.

I don't know if that would help you at all, but by the sounds of it, your paper tests are really good, so maybe it's just the difference bettween reading the passages on paper vs. on the computer?

[The Law]

well reading material that may resemble the real thing could help. It could work in two ways. One it could improve your vocabulary and/or it prehaps might understand different writing styles which prehaps might be useful for you when you write your writing sample. Forget the MCAT for a min, but reading will help you in your undergrad essays. Improvement there could result in better writing skills for the MCAT. You never really know. To practice for the real thing the best bet would to be to stimulate that enviroment. So my point is reading whatever is going to help you regardless.

 

Yeah, I'm just trying to boost my comfort level with alternate forms of writing. All I ever read normally are political works, opinion pieces, and general events. I want to get used to artsy writing and social sci type stuff. Of course this is not a substitute for full-lengths, but rather, a supplement.

[Pantaloons]

Two possibilities:

 

http://givemesomethingtoread.com/

Pro: good variety. Innnnneresting stuff.

Con: mostly the same reading level

 

http://twitter.com/Longreads

Pro: it's aight.

Con: lotta politics (and you mentioned you were looking for variety).

[The Law]

Thanks Panta... those look great.

[Renin]

I read biographies and travel stories ...