MCAT without having university physics: how did you find PS?

[lovestruck]

I'm currently in that boat. I've taken high school physics but not university level physics as its not required in my program and I hate the subject and wouldn't want it to lower my GPA. I'm doing the MCAT in August, most likely not taking any Kaplan, etc courses, just studying from books. I plan on getting a physics tutor as well. I have textbooks and lots of studying materials for physics and I'm a good independant learner and can motivate myself to do the studying if I need to.

 

Has anyone else done this? Should I just suck it up and take the university physics or a Kaplan course or can I get a reasonable score with my plan (I'm aiming for a 10-11 on PS). What were your scores in PS if this was your situation?

 

I thought of posting this in the MCAT thread but I figured most people on there haven't taken the MCAT yet so I might be better off posting it here.

[onamountain]

Totally doable. Like you I dreaded physics, and while I definitely had to put the most work into this section, after doing a lot of practice problems I found that MCAT physics really isn't all that bad. PS ended up being my highest section, ironically.

[kawalac]

I was in the same boat last year, didn't take a Kaplan course, just used the Kaplan book. I found it pretty difficult, mostly because if an example from the Kaplan book was confusing, I didn't use another source to gain more information. Pretty stupid of me, but I've learned my lesson. I would definitely suggest having an actual physics textbook to provide more in-depth discussion about some particular topics that are unclear to you after reading the Kaplan book. Good luck!

[Haruka]

I was facing the exact same situation last summer. I took physics in high school, but had IB transfer credit so I joyfully avoided university physics, so it had been about 3 years since I had learned the material. It definitely took a lot more effort to refresh my understanding of it. I would recommend working on lots of practice questions in tandem with your general review of physics, because I found it a bit tricky to figure out how to fit the concepts with the information in the passages. I ended up getting a 10 in PS.

 

 

Hope this helps a bit, good luck!

[supafield]

No university physics or chem... about 4 and 6 years removed from high school science when I wrote...

 

I was able to get 11 and 12 on the PS on two tries...... That said, I had to study my butt off to learn the material from scratch and had to put in a lot more time studying than someone else who already took those courses.

 

If you have the time though, it's doable. MCAT science is very conceptual.

[Nobodycirclesthewagons]

I didn't take university physics, but I took it in Grade 11 and 12. I studied physics from the EK book and also supplemented it with some google searches of concepts that EK didn't cover to my liking. Overall, MCAT physics is a lot easier than school physics. Your plan sounds more than adequate, especially with the tutor, so you should be fine. Good luck.

[Prothrombin]

Remember that theres no calculators for the MCAT, and thus they won't be expecting you to derive the speed of a 350kg rock circling the earth or something like that. It's all about understanding the concepts and being able to apply them into equations with simple numbers.