EK CARS Pitfall - need help

[FlyingPancakes]

So I'm planning to take the MCAT in the Spring, and I'm getting alarmed with the sudden decrease in my verbal scores. So far, I've been practicing mainly with ExamKrackers Verbal 101 book, since I heard that CARS is similar to old Verbal.

My scores for the first 10 tests were consistently in the 9-11 range. However, I steadily declined to 9, 8 and 7 on Tests 11 - 13. I'm not sure what went wrong, and I'm getting worried.

I've been using EK 9th edition CARS book as a verbal strategy: basically, reading for the main idea, close reading with a pointer, follow the author's voice etc. So even with the recent tests, I got the main idea down pretty well but mess up with misinterpretations over few details or get tricked by a question etc. The answers don't help much since EK contradicts itself.

I really want to do well on CARS since it's my weakness. I'm saving the AAMC Question Packs, FLs etc until the end since I heard they were the best.

So what do you suggest for me to improve? Any good additional books to practice on verbal? Any tips/advice will also be helpful.

I also should mention that I tend to complete my passages within 8-9 minutes, so I'm trying to compress it down heavily to 7-8 minutes. Any tips for this?

Thanks!

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[TestingSolutions]

@FlyingPancakes - This is actually very common with the EK book. There are a few reasons:

1) The later tests are generally considered to be of a poor quality than the first 10.

2) There are errors in the answer keys where the "quick" answer key that is in the table, doesn't actually correspond for a number of questions to the answers given in long form in the explanations. For tests 10 and beyond in that book, I'd recommend that you grade your exams using the long form explanations and the answers given there and not the quick table of answers. There are probably 8 to 10 such errors in the final tests.​

I think you're smart to save the AAMC Question Packs until "later" but don't make it too late. I'd divide up your studying period into thirds, so for example, if you're studying for three months, take the AAMC materials at the beginning of your third month or after finishing 2/3 of your studying. This allows you to make the "silly" mistakes on lower quality materials and will give you the best chance of getting the most out of the AAMC diagnostic tools for review.

As for timing, use the following:

For a passage with 5 questions | 9 Minutes
For a passage with 6 questions | 10.5 Minutes
For a passage with 7 questions | 12 Minutes
​

Best of luck!

 

[FlyingPancakes]

@FlyingPancakes - This is actually very common with the EK book. There are a few reasons:

1) The later tests are generally considered to be of a poor quality than the first 10.

2) There are errors in the answer keys where the "quick" answer key that is in the table, doesn't actually correspond for a number of questions to the answers given in long form in the explanations. For tests 10 and beyond in that book, I'd recommend that you grade your exams using the long form explanations and the answers given there and not the quick table of answers. There are probably 8 to 10 such errors in the final tests.​

I think you're smart to save the AAMC Question Packs until "later" but don't make it too late. I'd divide up your studying period into thirds, so for example, if you're studying for three months, take the AAMC materials at the beginning of your third month or after finishing 2/3 of your studying. This allows you to make the "silly" mistakes on lower quality materials and will give you the best chance of getting the most out of the AAMC diagnostic tools for review.

As for timing, use the following:

For a passage with 5 questions | 9 Minutes
For a passage with 6 questions | 10.5 Minutes
For a passage with 7 questions | 12 Minutes
​

Best of luck!

Thanks for this really helpful advice! It turns out the later EK tests were too detail heavy, while I was focusing mainly on main idea/inferences (I didn't refer back to the passage at all), so it could explain the decline. I did refer to the long answer key, but I guess it wasn't as good as I hoped.

If my test is 6-9 weeks away, should I start with the question packs now? Just do like 3-4 passages per day with heavy analysis? Or should i simulate it like a practice FL and do 9 passages?

 

[TestingSolutions]

If my test is 6-9 weeks away, should I start with the question packs now? Just do like 3-4 passages per day with heavy analysis? Or should i simulate it like a practice FL and do 9 passages?

@FlyingPancakes - I recommend starting to use the AAMC CARS materials somewhere between 6 to 4 weeks out. This gives you enough time to use the materials for their diagnostic purposes and also familiarizes you to the exact "feel" of a real CARS test, something no test prep company can perfectly recreate (as hard as we try!). It's important to have at least a month of practice with other materials prior to starting the AAMC materials, because if you don't, you'll be making all your silly errors on the highest quality materials and thus not getting the most out of them. Best of luck!