Guest snowpea Posted January 21, 2002 Report Share Posted January 21, 2002 Ugh! Help! I'm planning to take my MCATs this August, and I'm trying to plan out what I need for studying. I'm totally overwhelmed! Here's a list of what I know I need: 1) MCAT prep books: how many? any recommendations? 2)AAMC test booklets: What is AAMC V, AAMC III? Are they just different test sets? Should I buy all of them? 3)Globe and Mail: I just subscribed in hopes of preparing myself for the VR. Anything else I should read to prepare? 4)a LSAT prep book: also to prep for VR Is there anything else I need? Another question, what can I do to prepare myself for the essay part? Normally, I am just an OK writer, but under pressure and a time crunch, I freeze and I write (mind the language) like crap. I even do stupid things like mix up tenses! Any advice on that? OK, thank you for all advice, and thank you for putting up with my nonsense babbling. :\ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest cheech10 Posted January 21, 2002 Report Share Posted January 21, 2002 Just try to relax. It's still early on and the real worrying shouldn't start until at least July. Here are my tips (and some older threads probably have more info too): 1. I tried the Flowers and Silver book but I found it very basic and I didn't like it at all. Later on I bought the Kaplan book, which I liked a lot more. Go to Chapters, leaf through the whole set of prep books, and choose the one you like most and suits your style best. They all do a great job of covering the main part of the material, although some have slightly different emphasis on different subjects. 2. AAMC tests are official practice MCATs (I think some of the were actual MCATs too). The higher numbered tests are more recent and better approximations of the real MCAT. You probably want to buy at least one (whichever is more recent), but you should buy as many as you need. If you learn best by practicing old tests, then you should buy more. I ended up only doing the ones that came with the books I bought, and ended up doing alright. On a related note, don't be discouraged if you don't do well on the early diagnostics. They're supposed to make you think you need a prep course. Just study hard, practice, and you'll do alright. 3 and 4. I didn't try any of these approaches for VR prep. Honestly, almost everyone finds it to be the hardest part of the exam. The LSAT book looks like it might be a good choice (wish I'd have thought of it). I'd say do A LOT of old passages in verbal. That's probably the best advice. And the Kaplan and TPR passages don't do a very good job of mimicking the actual test on VR (according to people I've talked to and my own experience). Try to start without a time limit to get into the "VR state of mind," then add in the time constraint. You'll get used to the questioning style first and can work on the speed later. Don't forget you're marked on a percentile scale, so even if you feel you did very well or poorly, wou may be surprised with your final result. 5. The MCAT essay is pretty formulaic. I really liked the Kaplan method of answering the essay, and it worked quite well for me. Also, the MCAT announcement on the AAMC web site has a list of possible topics for the essays. Try practicing those, first without a strict time limit (though you shouldn't go overboard) and then with a time limit. Keep in mind the three tasks set out in the essay and you'll do fine. I guess that's the limit of my advice on this topic. Feel free to ask if you have any more questions. Oh, and one more: I found that speed played a key role in the test. The time limit, especially in VR, is a real pain. Get your speed up quickly. Practice as much as possible and get your speed up so that you have time to spare. Also, try not to jump around questions too much on VR; it really slows you down if you have to skim through the passage again because you forgot some information. Good luck on the MCAT! As long as you study hard and practice, things will go ok. And it's not as important a factor here in Canada as it is in the States. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest BCgirl Posted January 21, 2002 Report Share Posted January 21, 2002 snowpea, A lot of this might be the same thing at cheech10 said, but I thought I would add a bit of what I did for preparing for the MCAT. I wrote the August MCAT last year... my summer wasn't the greatest because I worked full time, studied for the MCAT, and volunteered a bit. But, I think a couple of crappy months is worth getting a good score so then you'll never have to think about writing the MCAT again. It's bad enough once I think that the best way to prepare for the MCAT is to do practice problems and practice tests under timed conditions so you get used to the time constraints that you have on the test. I think I took about 6 full length tests (AAMC I, III, IV, V and a couple Kaplan ones) and a bunch of section tests. By the time that the actual exam came around, I was used to the time limits. I finished verbal with only a couple minutes to spare, but I had plenty of time left in the science sections. So, make sure you get used to the time limits so that you can finish with time left to double check your answers, bubbling, etc. I bought some Princeton Review materials off of ebay and worked through Science Workbook (which has a ton of practice problems) after going through the Science Review. For verbal, I just worked through passages and tests from PR and the Kaplan Workbook (from Chapters). PR also has a verbal reasoning and writing review book that might help you with the verbal and the essay. The only time I wrote essays was during my practice tests, but since there was no one to grade them I don't know how much that helped. Just make sure you follow the way that they want the essay written and hopefully you should do fine. There are 5 AAMC tests. AAMC I is the oldest and V is the newest. I definitely think you should buy III, IV, and V. They were almost exact predictors of how I did on the actual test. You should be able to buy those off of ebay or you can get them straight from the AAMC (they're reall expensive, though) or you can also check your university's book store. There was a good thread on the Student Doctor Network for verbal: www.studentdoctor.net/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=000681 I never had a strategy for verbal, but maybe reading that thread might help you out a bit. And I've also heard that reading the Economist can be good for verbal prep. This is getting pretty long, and it's probably all stuff that you've heard before. Good luck!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest JD Posted January 21, 2002 Report Share Posted January 21, 2002 I heard (don't know if it's true) that there will be a new AAMC practice test (#6) released next month. If it does come out, it's probably worth checking out because the newest ones are the most representative of the MCAT you'll see this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ian Wong Posted January 22, 2002 Report Share Posted January 22, 2002 Man, you guys rock! Thanks for chipping in all your advice; there's nothing really that I could add to it, and you all are more familiar with how the MCAT is now, compared to when I wrote it in 1999. Ian UBC, Med 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rb1234 Posted January 22, 2002 Report Share Posted January 22, 2002 I found the Berkley Review set to be very helpful. They provide tests at the end of each section and a stack of mock MCATs that are very much like the AAMC tests. I timed myself for all of the little section tests so that by the time I was ready for the mock tests and AAMC tests, time wasn't much of an issue. I also had some books from Chapters, but I did not find them to be as useful. I would suggest going through as many full length tests as you can to get used to the concentrating for hours on end. I still have all of my stuff so if you are in the area (Vancouver), you can always check it out. Good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest not rex morgan Posted January 25, 2002 Report Share Posted January 25, 2002 Wow Ian. You wrote the MCAT in 99? I wrote it in 97. I'm in first year. I feel kind of old right now. Anyways folks. Good imput. I saw the shear volume and didn't read it. If nobody mentioned it, I heard reading "The Economist" is helpful for prepping for VR. MCAT is about breadth not depth. Layer your clothes...seriously, I was so happy to rip off my pants after the second section as I almost dried up and fell on the floor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Kirsteen Posted January 25, 2002 Report Share Posted January 25, 2002 Re: drying up and falling on the floor, if that's a concern, you may want to consider writing at the Holiday Inn on King (in TO). Not only do they provide comfy seats and more pleasant, diffused lighting (they're used to furnishing meeting rooms for the comfort of conferences I suppose) but also, water and sweeties to keep the liquids and glucose up! Cheers, Kirsteen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest monkey Posted January 25, 2002 Report Share Posted January 25, 2002 Hello... just one more thing about the VR.. I fought with this section a long time. Wrote it three times....just because of this section (my sciences were always 10's and 11's) on the VR first got a 3..then a 5,...then finally an 8..one of the things I felt was helpful with timing was to time myself when reading articles(in magazines)of about the same length as those on the VR. The economist, atlantic monthly and harpers are all great magazines for this. Jot down the key points and see if you understood the author's argument. This makes good practice and gives you a little break from the real practices. When you actually practicing with the real thing..you don't need to do entire VR sections all at once. Each passsage should take about nine minutes..so time yourself for that. That way you can assess what you need to improve on with each passage rather than each entire tests....get more bang for your buck. With each passage go over what you got wrong as well as what you got right and really think hard why. When you get more comfortable with time etc..then go onto doing full VR practices, it'll make you much more calm when you do so. Also, when doing the full practices, different people have different strategies with timing. I like to go straight through until I hit a hard one..then I skip it and continue till the end. That gives me more time to get through easier passages while allowing me to build confidence as I work through the entire section. If I come back to the hard passage and am still stuck...well at least I didn't waste valuable time dwelling on it. Hope these work for you. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest snowpea Posted February 7, 2002 Report Share Posted February 7, 2002 I just wanted to say thank you for everyone's great advice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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