CARS stress issues a week before MCAT

[Exoduso]

Posted this in the Jan. Thread, but... with just over a week to go, my CARS scores seem to be dropping by around 10 questions lately... I've always had trouble with it but practiced TONS in the last few months and managed to start getting a pretty good hang of it. Lately, however, it seems to be dropping considerably. Whether I'm psyching myself out, not reading properly, not analyzing properly, or just running into very tough exams (Gold Standard seems to be kicking my ass..), I'm starting to worry.

Just took the scored AAMC exam and got a 510, 129/125/128/128. And while I know that I can raise the psych section considerably, and had a pretty rough run overall with Bio, I don't know how to improve my CARS at this point when the exam is next Saturday.

Any bright ideas guys? Or rather, how to not stress myself out with it? I allow myself 10 minutes per passage, but it seems like once I pass the 10 minute mark on a single passage I start stressing out and look at the clock way too much for the remainder of the exam, and I'm sure it hurts my analysis for any passage afterwards... so not really sure how to handle it.

On the other AAMC practice I got 48/53, but it seemed a bit easy. Been scoring mid-low 40s/53 on NS and did pretty terrible on EK3.

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[Jack Westin]

@Exoduso I think you know how to solve your own problem. You want to average 10 mins per passage but that doesn't mean you have to only spend 10 mins on a given passage. Some passages are harder to read than others. Give each passage the amount of time it deserves. Sometimes, you only need 9 mins. Other times you may need 11. But most importantly: stop looking at the timer. It's obviously making you more nervous which means it is lowering your scoring potential.

I think you should spend the last week focusing on just the AAMC CARS questions packs volumes 1 and 2. Those are the only passages that are similar to the real thing. The fact that you got 48/53 correct on the AAMC Sample Test means you are capable of scoring high on the real exam. And just because you didn't do well on AAMC Practice Test 1 does not mean you will not perform well. Change your habits and try to understand what you are reading. You will mess up if you think about anything other than what the passage is saying (including the time). Good luck!

 

[WorkDawg]

It's not you, it's the exams. Seriously. You mention doing poorly on EK 3 CARS...however the score spreadsheet at r/mcat shows multiple yes multiple people scoring in the low 60s on that particular exam scored 132 on the CARS portion of the real exam. Similarly, the scored FL seems to be more difficult than the sample, and many people are posting lower scores. My point is not too worry, you haven't gotten worse - you've just faced particularly difficult exams lately.

 

[Exoduso]

So I worked through the CARS volume 1 pack from AAMC; did the first 60 questions yesterday and the other 60 just now.
I got 95/120 overall, but from the 60 I went over tonight, only 6 were wrong. The former 60 questions are riddled with mistakes though, not sure why until I go over them tomorrow morning.

I did try to not look at the timer as frequently today though, so I guess that did help a bit as I noticed I was actually moving faster than I have in the initial 60 questions yesterday. Whether it's because those were harder and the last ones easier, I'm not sure. But I guess I'll try to do as much verbal as I can until next Saturday's test until I'm comfortable enough with the timing so that the timer itself doesn't stress me as much as it seems to be during the last few FLs I've taken.

 

[CHoge25]

CARS pack 1 is really hard... that is a good score!