MCAT Materials Confusion

[detroitstudent]

Hi all,

I'm getting my materials together for the MCAT I will be taking this spring, and I am confused on a couple different things in the materials department. The general consensus is that TBR is the best, but I've also heard that their new books have hardly any changes and that most of the books weren't even updated yet. If that is the case, is TBR still the best resource for the new MCAT. I am also worried about how detailed TBR seems to be. Are the books detailed to the point it's a waste of time, or is it a good balance? I already have the new EK set, and I'm debating if I should buy the TBR or TPR set next. I haven't heard that much about TPR, but I've heard good things about TBR so I wanted to address my concerns before I buy one of the two. Also for people who used two sets to study, did you guys read both sets, or did you use one for review and passages and the other for just passages. I'm a little confused as to how that works. Thank you all for your time.

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[Doctor Dream]

I haven't heard much about TBR's MCAT 2015 material, so I can't really comment on that. I also didn't use TPR, but I've heard good things about their books. I used mainly EK for my content review and felt it was just fine. If you feel you already have some sort of grasp on the MCAT content, then I would just stick with EK. They don't go into much detail, but they do a really good job of distilling things down to their essence. If I felt EK didn't have enough info on the topic, I just supplemented it with Khan academy videos (which are free).

I bought both the EK set and NS set of content review books, but only used EK and wish I hadn't bought both. I simply didn't have enough time to go through both, and felt I had adequate content review from EK and Khan. Everyone's learning style is different, but I'd look at how confident you are in the MCAT content right now and base your decision off that. If you feel you already have some sort of understanding of most topics, you're probably fine with EK and Khan. If you want more detailed info, TPR (or maybe TBR, don't know about them at all) might be the way to go.

 

[BerkReviewTeach]

Hi all,

I'm getting my materials together for the MCAT I will be taking this spring, and I am confused on a couple different things in the materials department. The general consensus is that TBR is the best, but I've also heard that their new books have hardly any changes and that most of the books weren't even updated yet. If that is the case, is TBR still the best resource for the new MCAT. I am also worried about how detailed TBR seems to be. Are the books detailed to the point it's a waste of time, or is it a good balance? I already have the new EK set, and I'm debating if I should buy the TBR or TPR set next. I haven't heard that much about TPR, but I've heard good things about TBR so I wanted to address my concerns before I buy one of the two. Also for people who used two sets to study, did you guys read both sets, or did you use one for review and passages and the other for just passages. I'm a little confused as to how that works. Thank you all for your time.

As far as BR books go, organic chemistry Book 1 got some minor changes (some questions got swapped in and out and the text got some editing) while Book 2 got a significant update (it's basically a biochemistry book as much as an organic chemistry book now). If you read through posts from people who actually used it (not the hearsay posts), then you'll see that people love the changes in that book. The Biology books got a gradual update over the past three to four years, and although the changes from print to print don't always jump out, those books are absolutely perfect for what is a biology-heavy MCAT these days.

I'll be very interested how well received the general chemistry book is next month. I like what they did with the homework and the shorter chapters (although more of them now) will work better.

 

[detroitstudent]

As far as BR books go, organic chemistry Book 1 got some minor changes (some questions got swapped in and out and the text got some editing) while Book 2 got a significant update (it's basically a biochemistry book as much as an organic chemistry book now). If you read through posts from people who actually used it (not the hearsay posts), then you'll see that people love the changes in that book. The Biology books got a gradual update over the past three to four years, and although the changes from print to print don't always jump out, those books are absolutely perfect for what is a biology-heavy MCAT these days.

I'll be very interested how well received the general chemistry book is next month. I like what they did with the homework and the shorter chapters (although more of them now) will work better.

Thanks for the response. So would it be better to hold off buying the whole set until the new chemistry books are released? Would that be too long if I plan on starting this January?