For those who got above 10 on Physical Sciences

[lastbastion]

Physics seems to be a steady strong suit for me, however, I've just started my chemistry review and am realizing that the subject is my weakest. For those of you who did well of this April's physical sciences section, I was hoping you could shed light on this subject.

I'm using EK Chem. and EK 1001 ?'s in Chem right now. Since it is a weak subject, should I do it everyday? Thanks.

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[lastbastion]

Also, how should I go about the chemistry review? What topics are most important? How should test-taking strategy be shaped for this section?

Thanks.

 

[wetlightning]

Physics seems to be a steady strong suit for me, however, I've just started my chemistry review and am realizing that the subject is my weakest. For those of you who did well of this April's physical sciences section, I was hoping you could shed light on this subject.

I'm using EK Chem. and EK 1001 ?'s in Chem right now. Since it is a weak subject, should I do it everyday? Thanks.

hi!

i got an 11 PS w/only half a sem of physics, so hopefully my advice will be useful

i really really focused on all of the latter half of physics, since i hadn't even had the the full 2 semesters when i took the mcat. also, the gen.chem at my undergrad was not particularly strong. for me, the best guides were kaplan's big book and the high-yield problem-solving guide. also, i read around the questions (meaning: if i was missing acid/base consistently, i reviewed that...electrochem, etc.). so start taking practice questions and see what specific areas you're weak in. that ought to help!

need any more advice? feel free to PM me

 

[QofQuimica]

Two things: First, try to figure out specifically which sub-topics in general chemistry are giving you trouble, and concentrate on studying those. Second, check out our new General Chemistry Q & A thread in the MCAT Q & A subforum: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=206940 You can post your own questions here, and they will be answered by chemists and chemistry grad students. You can also read answers to other people's chemistry questions. to you.

 

[aamartin81]

I was in the same boat. I completed the 10 week schedule about 4 weeks before the test and ended up going through two thirds of the questions in EK Chem 1001. I went through once doing every third problem for each section (jumping sections, not in order), then went back and did every third question again (obviously starting on a new question). I made sure that the order was different each time. This really helped me.

One thing to consider, however, is that when time was called for the PS section in the morning, I considered voiding my exam. The first 35-40 or so questions were easy and I was ahead of time, but the next thing I knew, I looked at my watch and I had 15 minutes for 20 or so questions. I have no idea what happened, I was regularly finishing practice exams with time to spare, scoring from 11-14. I answered all the stand alone questions remaining and did my best to skim the remaining two passages while spending the most time reading their question stems. I thought this was going to be my worst section but it ended up being my best (seems like that happens to quite a few people). My score was inside my practice range, so I am happy.

I think the best thing you can do is complete as many problems from the EK sections you struggle with on the online AAMC reports. For me, these sections were ones I thought I was strong in, but the online reports don't lie. Use the two in conjuction and you'll be well prepared!

My best piece of advice: The AAMC practice tests were an accurate reflection of my actual score, but not of the difficulty or knowledge depth required by the real exam. Don't let it get in your head early!

Good luck,

Adam

 

[ChuckRock]

I was getting steady PS 8's on my practice tests with 10-11 BS&VR untill I got a PS 12 on the real deal. For me Gen Chem was my worst, I found out by going through my practice tests and identifying the question types I got wrong (about twice as many chem wrong than physics). It started to realy worry me so I devoted the last 4 weeks of prep to ONLY Gen Chem and only the topics I did poorly on. For me it was redox, electro, and rates.

I think my biggest mistake during my MCAT prep was trying to study everything. I can't tell you how many hours I wasted studing the parts of a freaking cell just becuase I wanted to tell myself I reviewed the ENTIRE book. Just focus on your weak areas and you'll get the most out of your study time.

 

[WayChanger]

The PS section has the potential for being very surprising...I thought the PS section on the April 2005 exam was excruciatingly difficult, to the extent that I thought it possible I would get an 8 or 9...instead I managed a 15 somehow. (Considering how lucky I was at guessing, apparently, I should have gone to Vegas the same day) I was scoring around 12-13 at best on practice exams beforehand, so don't give up hope, wherever you are in the studying process! Studying everyday is overdoing it, IMO. It's better to focus on your weak areas rather than trying to "go hardcore" on all of Physics and GChem. After doing practice problems, make of note of what you got wrong - I had a Word document listing my mistakes and the correct answers. Make such a list and spend some time studying these points. If you did pretty well in general chemistry and/or physics in college, you might want to try tutoring if you have time this semester. It is pretty good review. I tutored general chemistry for three semesters before the MCAT and it basically saved me a whole lot of review time. Best of luck!

 

[RayhanS1282]

I took the MCAT in April and the break-up was even between physics and chemistry (with the chem side being slightly favored). The PS section in my opinion really difficult and I am still scratching my head as to my score on this section. I used the EK chem book along with the TPR chem book supplemented with TBR chem books. The EK books were too brief IMO on acids & bases, equilibrium and solubility. And since, I took g-chem about 4 years ago, I needed to review from the beginning. The TPR book was much better in explaining the stuff while keeping the stuff concise. TBR was too in depth and was more like a text-book but the solubility stuff was very helpful and so were the practice problems. The EK 1001 IMO, is good but is not MCAT like, no passages and all discreets. You can tell, I went on overkill with the chemistry books but it helped.

 

[gluon999]

I got a 11 in PS. Like some one mentioned earlier, I too focused more on the latter half of Physics (modern Physics). You can pretty much expect a passage on Voltage/Current/Resistors and their role in circuits. Also, every now and then there is a question on optics but I didn't focus too much on that because those questions take way too long to answer and it is much better to take 10 seconds to make an educated guess rather than spend 2 minutes to figure out the correct answer.

The best way to prepare for PS is to make sure you understand the concepts. You can test your depth of understanding by tackling non passage questions. If you do allright, then go ahead and do lots of passages in PS.

Same principle applies to Chemistry. You can always expect passages on solubilities, ksp, moles, molarity, stoich, so make sure you got the basics down. Then go on and do tons of passages.

 

[MochaMD]

I went from a 9 in PS in the August 2004 exam to a 12 in PS in the April 2005 Exam. One thing that I changed was that I made sure that I did my discretes in the first 15 minutes and then used the rest of the time to do all the passage questions. Also, just practice alot of problems so you become quicker when doing the calculations (you'll learn alot of shortcuts this way). Even though the Kaplan topicals were hard, I practiced them anyways and try to do the subjects test from Kaplan if you can (if you have access to them). On top of this, I also used the Examkracker material and did the 30 minute-mini tests in the back. My main point: JUST DO ALOT OF PRACTICE PROBLEMS!!!!!!

 

[JayQuah]

12 in PS. I would say spend a lot of time on the general chemsitry part, beacuse the things you see in the practice tests are gonna be fairly similar to the stuff on the real thing: i.e. what is the electric potential of this cell, or the valence electrons for Cs. for mechanics and physics, study more of the concepts, because the real thing can test on anything. Like Tarzan. That was crazy. Anyway.So practice, practice practice for Gen Chem problems, and know the formulas inside and out for mechanics, work, energy, momentum, etc. Hope this helps.