MCAT Verbal help!!

[The Brown Knight]

Hi,
I have underlined my main questions for convenience.
1. How do I improve on speed? My accuracy is fine but each passage takes me 11-12 minutes with around 6 mins for reading and 5-6 mins for answering questions. This is why my VR practice test scores have been suffering a bit: I can get most of what I answer right, but end up guessing on 1 or 2 passages. I've done most of the TPR workbook passages and some EK passages, and I've realized my biggest problem is passages heavy with retrieval questions. For example, the question would be asking me about a word or phrase buried deep within a convoluted passage and then ask an except/not/least question; while I can eliminate extremes, out of scopes, and contrary to main idea, I would still need to go back to the passage to pick from the remaining 2 or 3 choices. This ends up taking an inordinate amount of time.

2. Can you guys critique my general reading strategy? My strategy is in each paragraph figure out claims/viewpoints, glide through the evidence/support, and then at the end of the passage recap all the claims to come up with on overall main idea. This allows me to fairly accurately identify the main idea and attitude, but takes a bit too long. Every time I try to push myself to go through it quicker, my accuracy ends up suffering. Also, I know some of you might recommend not spending very long on the passage; however, quite a few members on SDN, especially OCDOCDOCD, have recommended the slow and careful approach. 3. But how in the world do these people read "slowly and carefully" and answer the questions within 8 minutes? Keep in mind, I'm not a slow reader (my humanities coursework in honors program at top 30 has trained me to some extent in reading fairly quickly) and I am able to comprehend most passages at least for the main idea.

I suppose I could do the questions faster with minimal referring back to the passage and try to improve reading speed by using the Economist, which I HAVE used sporadically the past couple months. 4. So for someone who prefers to wrestle a little longer with each passage and spend a little less time on the questions, what do you guys recommend for the timing breakdown? How much time should I spend reading and how much in answering questions (5:3, 4:4, etc.)?

5. Lastly, do you guys recommend doing the first couple tests on EK101 timed but beyond the time limit or should I impose the time limit? I want to use it as well as possible the last month before the exam.
I have about 40 days and am willing to spend a majority of my time on this as my BS and PS are fine.

Thank you very much for your time and input!

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[The Brown Knight]

Anyone?

 

[burntheblobs]

Okay, I have tutored MCAT Verbal a few times using techniques that worked well for me. I am a solid 11/12 scorer on AAMC materials under test conditions. Here goes:

1. How do I improve on speed?
I would generally finish the verbal section with about 10 minutes to spare. There is no excuse for not finishing the passages with at least a minute or two to spare. If you are not finishing on time, there is a 99% chance it is because you are going back into the passage. Stop doing this. Until you start finishing on time, your "going back into the passage" privileges are revoked. If a passage is really difficult, by all means slow down a bit. But dear God, STOP LOOKING BACK WHEN YOU ARE ANSWERING QUESTIONS. Here is your new strategy when you get to any question:

1. If you have a gut feeling/know the answer, answer it quickly and move on, and NEVER look back.
2. If you don't know the answer, but know exactly where it is in the passage, mark it, make a best guess, move on. (You can skip this step only once you have proven you can handle the responsibility of going back into the passage without blowing your timing).
3. If you don't know the answer, and have no idea where it is in the passage, mark it, guess, and move on (probably forever).

Here's the thing with answering questions. You need to move quickly. For reference, I would answer most questions in just a few seconds. This is because MCAT verbal will **** with your head if you don't. To show this, let me break down what goes on during the section. You read a passage of brand new information for 5 minutes. Then for 3 minutes, you answer questions that are purposely designed to throw you off and have "good sounding" answers. See the problem here? The information you read the first time was brand new to your brain. If you stare long enough at wrong answer choices during that 3 minutes of answering, the wrong answer choices BECOME your reality. It's not like the sciences where the basics are ingrained in your head. This is all new, confusing information, and you only get five minutes for your brain to solidify it as truth.

2. Can you guys critique my general reading strategy?
You're reading strategy is fairly solid. You are looking for main ideas and opinions. Stop summarizing and doing other nonsense other than reading straight through. These passages generally have a flow and a "story." By breaking it up, you are screwing up your own innate ability to pick up on the subtleties of what the author is saying.

One last point I would like to make is that MCAT writers sometimes purposefully pick ****ty authors for the tests. Sometimes I would literally find myself thinking "What are you trying to say to me??" or "Holy ****, this guy is a bad writer." DO this. It keeps your confidence high, and if you are thinking it, it's probably truth. If you are having a lot of trouble following the author, flip it on it's head and make him the dumb one, instead of you. I found that just by thinking "Get to the point, buddy!", I was able to pick up on a lot more than I otherwise would have during difficult passages.

There are lots of other finer points and tips for Verbal Reasoning, but these seem to answer your main points. Good luck!

 

[moisne]

1. More practice - like thousands of these.
2. Ask for extended time, apply for accommodations... Get special help from your school to find some way to do this.

I personally did not score well on VR but it wouldn't have matter if they gave me 10 hours. I am suggesting this because I had similar issues with math when I was younger, accurate but slow. After several hundreds or possible thousands, it became second nature.

 

[avivace]

I found it helpful to highlight what seemed to be key points or details as I read the passage. The act of highlighting helped me process what I was reading, and having important points highlighted helped me find information much more quickly when I needed to glance back at the passage. It might be worth a try.

I agree with burntheblobs that summarizing each paragraph is likely a waste of time. These aren't your basic essays, with one point per paragraph and a neat topic sentence. The paragraphs often flow together to make the overall points the author is aiming for.

 

[DocBella]

When to assume and when to look for evidence....? (on the VR section)

I'm confused about when a question wants you to make a choice based on an assumption derived from the information in the passage and when it wants you to make your choice based on direct information/evidence mentioned in the passage.

It seems that it's so inconsistent or maybe it's just me who's confused. Whenever I choose an answer based on an assumption, it explains that "nowhere in the passage was......mentioned" and when I chose something that was mentioned in the passage, it says "while it is true that.... it can be inferred from the passage that....." I'm so frustrated!

Any ideas on how to strategically differentiate between these two types of questions?

Hopefully I didn't confuse everyone and it's making some sense.... =/

(p.s: This is not about the questions that says "according to the passage it can be inferred.... " I'm talking about the less obvious ones that we have to identify)

Any input will be helpful! Thanks guys

 

[burntheblobs]

Docbella, are you referring to AAMC materials or third party (EK, TPR)? The latter tend to give weird, inconsistent, frustrating answers sometimes, while the former only does so on rare occasions.

 

[DocBella]

Docbella, are you referring to AAMC materials or third party (EK, TPR)? The latter tend to give weird, inconsistent, frustrating answers sometimes, while the former only does so on rare occasions.

It has happened on both, but mostly Kaplan

 

[DocBella]

Does going over the verbal problems really help? Because unlike the PS and BS, every passage is different, and knowing a passage, which I will never see again might not help as much as constantly doing new passages and trying to do problems........ what do u guys think? (I just realized as I was typing this, that it might help in noticing the trends in the way the information is presented) But I've yet to apply anything that I've learned from the previous verbals sections that I've reviewed so far....bc it hasn't happened yet!

 

[The Brown Knight]

Does going over the verbal problems really help? Because unlike the PS and BS, every passage is different, and knowing a passage, which I will never see again might not help as much as constantly doing new passages and trying to do problems........ what do u guys think? (I just realized as I was typing this, that it might help in noticing the trends in the way the information is presented) But I've yet to apply anything that I've learned from the previous verbals sections that I've reviewed so far....bc it hasn't happened yet!

Just a disclaimer: I'm hardly an expert on VR as my original post suggests!

But I think it's important to review your practice passages because while the passage content is useless, analyzing the flaws in your strategy/pacing is very crucial. Try the following suggestions that I try to employ in my practice:
1. If it takes too long to review every passage you do, try this: as you are working through the passage, mark/underline questions that you have ANY discomfort with (i.e. if you can't eliminate the third choice); then review those you get wrong and have underlined, and then if you have enough time you can verify whether your reasoning is correct for the ones you were confident with.
2. And yes, you should notice the trends in the way the information is presented, but by reviewing you should also notice the trends in the TYPES of questions you get wrong. While I find TPR's verbal strategy in their Verbal Review Book is overall a huge time sink, I think their chapters on question types and answer traps is very useful in pinpointing the patterns in your mistakes. This categorization strategy makes you aware of the obvious answer traps (extremes and out of scopes) as well as the more subtle ones.
3. Lastly, another thing I try to do in terms of reviewing passages is write down on a blank piece of paper a couple of bullet points as recommendations to myself for avoiding the mistakes you committed in reading/pacing/answering the previous passage; when you do the next passage, consciously try your best to apply those recommendations. For example, I often find my pacing suffers because I take too long on answering questions, so I tell myself to pick an answer and move on. This has also helped me see that I pick extremes/out of scopes because I choose an answer without completely reading it and so on and so forth...
Good luck!

 

[Aerus]

Does going over the verbal problems really help? Because unlike the PS and BS, every passage is different, and knowing a passage, which I will never see again might not help as much as constantly doing new passages and trying to do problems........ what do u guys think? (I just realized as I was typing this, that it might help in noticing the trends in the way the information is presented) But I've yet to apply anything that I've learned from the previous verbals sections that I've reviewed so far....bc it hasn't happened yet!

Yes, doing practice passages definitely does help. It helps you standardize your pacing as well as perfect your strategy for answering these types of questions. There isn't a formulaic one all strategy that will get you the right answer. It's more of an intuition that you must continue to hone and perfect.

 

[DocBella]

Just a disclaimer: I'm hardly an expert on VR as my original post suggests!

But I think it's important to review your practice passages because while the passage content is useless, analyzing the flaws in your strategy/pacing is very crucial. Try the following suggestions that I try to employ in my practice:
1. If it takes too long to review every passage you do, try this: as you are working through the passage, mark/underline questions that you have ANY discomfort with (i.e. if you can't eliminate the third choice); then review those you get wrong and have underlined, and then if you have enough time you can verify whether your reasoning is correct for the ones you were confident with.
2. And yes, you should notice the trends in the way the information is presented, but by reviewing you should also notice the trends in the TYPES of questions you get wrong. While I find TPR's verbal strategy in their Verbal Review Book is overall a huge time sink, I think their chapters on question types and answer traps is very useful in pinpointing the patterns in your mistakes. This categorization strategy makes you aware of the obvious answer traps (extremes and out of scopes) as well as the more subtle ones.
3. Lastly, another thing I try to do in terms of reviewing passages is write down on a blank piece of paper a couple of bullet points as recommendations to myself for avoiding the mistakes you committed in reading/pacing/answering the previous passage; when you do the next passage, consciously try your best to apply those recommendations. For example, I often find my pacing suffers because I take too long on answering questions, so I tell myself to pick an answer and move on. This has also helped me see that I pick extremes/out of scopes because I choose an answer without completely reading it and so on and so forth...
Good luck!

Thanks!! That was so helpful just a quick question.... I'm also having trouble with pointing out the extremes and out of scopes, have you had any improvements? What should I look out for? Extreme works like "always" "never" etc? Idk how else to do that...

 

[DocBella]

Yes, doing practice passages definitely does help. It helps you standardize your pacing as well as perfect your strategy for answering these types of questions. There isn't a formulaic one all strategy that will get you the right answer. It's more of an intuition that you must continue to hone and perfect.

You're right.... I have to force myself to go over the painful passages TWICE each time to develop that intuition lol thanks!

 

[DocBella]

Okay, I have tutored MCAT Verbal a few times using techniques that worked well for me. I am a solid 11/12 scorer on AAMC materials under test conditions. Here goes:

1. How do I improve on speed?
I would generally finish the verbal section with about 10 minutes to spare. There is no excuse for not finishing the passages with at least a minute or two to spare. If you are not finishing on time, there is a 99% chance it is because you are going back into the passage. Stop doing this. Until you start finishing on time, your "going back into the passage" privileges are revoked. If a passage is really difficult, by all means slow down a bit. But dear God, STOP LOOKING BACK WHEN YOU ARE ANSWERING QUESTIONS. Here is your new strategy when you get to any question:

1. If you have a gut feeling/know the answer, answer it quickly and move on, and NEVER look back.
2. If you don't know the answer, but know exactly where it is in the passage, mark it, make a best guess, move on. (You can skip this step only once you have proven you can handle the responsibility of going back into the passage without blowing your timing).
3. If you don't know the answer, and have no idea where it is in the passage, mark it, guess, and move on (probably forever).

Here's the thing with answering questions. You need to move quickly. For reference, I would answer most questions in just a few seconds. This is because MCAT verbal will **** with your head if you don't. To show this, let me break down what goes on during the section. You read a passage of brand new information for 5 minutes. Then for 3 minutes, you answer questions that are purposely designed to throw you off and have "good sounding" answers. See the problem here? The information you read the first time was brand new to your brain. If you stare long enough at wrong answer choices during that 3 minutes of answering, the wrong answer choices BECOME your reality. It's not like the sciences where the basics are ingrained in your head. This is all new, confusing information, and you only get five minutes for your brain to solidify it as truth.

2. Can you guys critique my general reading strategy?
You're reading strategy is fairly solid. You are looking for main ideas and opinions. Stop summarizing and doing other nonsense other than reading straight through. These passages generally have a flow and a "story." By breaking it up, you are screwing up your own innate ability to pick up on the subtleties of what the author is saying.

One last point I would like to make is that MCAT writers sometimes purposefully pick ****ty authors for the tests. Sometimes I would literally find myself thinking "What are you trying to say to me??" or "Holy ****, this guy is a bad writer." DO this. It keeps your confidence high, and if you are thinking it, it's probably truth. If you are having a lot of trouble following the author, flip it on it's head and make him the dumb one, instead of you. I found that just by thinking "Get to the point, buddy!", I was able to pick up on a lot more than I otherwise would have during difficult passages.

There are lots of other finer points and tips for Verbal Reasoning, but these seem to answer your main points. Good luck!

burtheblobs, you've made my day with that response! LMAO @ "What are you trying to say to me?" "Get to the point buddy!" hahaha I tried that today and it totally worked! loll

 

[MudpuppyLake]

I am no VR expert, but I disagree about finishing early with lots of time to spare. People who choose ACCURATE answers based upon "gut feelings" have had lots and lots of practice. Someone who is unsure of their current strategy or aren't in the position to use this kind of technique could end up choosing answers that have selected words here and there from the text but are not true. This is what I would advise for someone still building up their score:
1) When unsure of an answer, eliminate answer choices one by one by using focus and correct reasoning (even if you have to refer back to the passage). Once an answer choice is eliminated, have the confidence to not go back and re-check your reasoning. Whichever one is left should be right. And if it's wrong, you'll go back and check your answers and learn more about how YOU learn and reason, which will help you on Test Day.
2) Identify which types of passages you do well on (literature, history, technology, nature, etc) and leave the passage type that you are terrible at for the end. Start confidently.
3) Give yourself a time limit for each passage (~8 min). Do not exceed this because you may start to ruminate about answer choices and refer back to the passage multiple times. Once the time for a passage starts to end, answer all the questions for that passage. You are more likely to choose the correct answer at that moment, than to come back later toward the end when your head is spinning with everything you've read and try to choose an answer. Part of doing well on VR means focusing on the passage for the time being, and forgetting it when you are done so that you can focus on the next passage!
4) MOVE ON. Wrong answers becoming truth in a moment of twisted reasoning is not someone you want to weigh you down for each question who approach!

 

[The Brown Knight]

Thanks!! That was so helpful just a quick question.... I'm also having trouble with pointing out the extremes and out of scopes, have you had any improvements? What should I look out for? Extreme works like "always" "never" etc? Idk how else to do that...

Again I'm no expert and I do sometimes miss these, but extremes IMO are anything that's too absolute, one-sided, etc. - so in addition to "always" and "never" I would also be wary of "any, all, every, etc." Keep in mind also that these words have to be in the right CONTEXT to be considered extreme. I feel a better way to evaluate these is to read the choice closely, and if it definitely encompasses an entire category (or is too general) when the passage deals with a specific thing within that category, then you should have a red flag immediately.

 

[The Brown Knight]

I am no VR expert, but I disagree about finishing early with lots of time to spare. People who choose ACCURATE answers based upon "gut feelings" have had lots and lots of practice. Someone who is unsure of their current strategy or aren't in the position to use this kind of technique could end up choosing answers that have selected words here and there from the text but are not true. This is what I would advise for someone still building up their score:
1) When unsure of an answer, eliminate answer choices one by one by using focus and correct reasoning (even if you have to refer back to the passage). Once an answer choice is eliminated, have the confidence to not go back and re-check your reasoning. Whichever one is left should be right. And if it's wrong, you'll go back and check your answers and learn more about how YOU learn and reason, which will help you on Test Day.
2) Identify which types of passages you do well on (literature, history, technology, nature, etc) and leave the passage type that you are terrible at for the end. Start confidently.
3) Give yourself a time limit for each passage (~8 min). Do not exceed this because you may start to ruminate about answer choices and refer back to the passage multiple times. Once the time for a passage starts to end, answer all the questions for that passage. You are more likely to choose the correct answer at that moment, than to come back later toward the end when your head is spinning with everything you've read and try to choose an answer. Part of doing well on VR means focusing on the passage for the time being, and forgetting it when you are done so that you can focus on the next passage!
4) MOVE ON. Wrong answers becoming truth in a moment of twisted reasoning is not someone you want to weigh you down for each question who approach!

How much time is good to spend on reading and how much on questions? I currently take 4-6 mins to read, which means I can't give myself much more than 4 mins for answering passages. I have highlighted my reading strategy in the first post; do you have tips for speeding it up? Thanks for your input!

 

[Aerus]

I take 40-50 seconds to pre-read the questions, spend 3-4 minutes actively reading the passage, and 2-4 minutes answering questions.


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[DocBella]

Again I'm no expert and I do sometimes miss these, but extremes IMO are anything that's too absolute, one-sided, etc. - so in addition to "always" and "never" I would also be wary of "any, all, every, etc." Keep in mind also that these words have to be in the right CONTEXT to be considered extreme. I feel a better way to evaluate these is to read the choice closely, and if it definitely encompasses an entire category (or is too general) when the passage deals with a specific thing within that category, then you should have a red flag immediately.

That's great advice, thanks so much! It's taking me more than 6 hours to review the practice test after I've take it, is this a normal amount of time or am I moving too slow?

 

[The Brown Knight]

In terms of practice tests, I feel fine with my PS and BS, so I would make a list of questions I have ANY discomfort with and then go through that list and whatever I get wrong; for most errors I try to google the concept so I understand it well for next time and if I recognize multiple errors corresponding to a single topic I try to go through the corresponding TBR chapter (EK for Bio) and do problems specifically on it. For verbal, I often find my errors to be localized within two or sometimes 3 passages; I would redo those and just go through answers/explanations for the rest.

 

[DocBella]

But does it take you this long to go over a test?

 

[The Brown Knight]

For PS and BS on TPR practice tests, I've been generally missing 2-6 per section, so that doesn't take too much time; for those I felt uncomfortable about I would just verify my reasoning. If I missed too many in a specific topic, I would then dive into TBR for refreshment/practice on non-FL days.
It's better to go through them as thoroughly as you currently do, but if it takes way too long maybe review one section a day for an hour each. I've noticed I take way too long to finish something if I stay on the same thing too long, so try mixing it up.

 

[DocBella]

For PS and BS on TPR practice tests, I've been generally missing 2-6 per section, so that doesn't take too much time; for those I felt uncomfortable about I would just verify my reasoning. If I missed too many in a specific topic, I would then dive into TBR for refreshment/practice on non-FL days.
It's better to go through them as thoroughly as you currently do, but if it takes way too long maybe review one section a day for an hour each. I've noticed I take way too long to finish something if I stay on the same thing too long, so try mixing it up.

Ahhh, that's very true... thanks for making me realize that!! Good luck on your studies!! May the force be with you loll (When are you scheduled to take yours? I'll be writing on the 27th!)

 

[user12]

im not an expert in verbal. I think it is the hardest thing ever and is solely responsible for some people not getting accepted to med school. I also think there is no "strategy." obviously, if there was, everyone who is smart would use it and succeed. to do well in verbal, you have to be good at reading, understanding, thinking, and answering questions. i would agree that it is always best if you can answer a question without looking back. that's always pretty sweet. but let's face it... there is going to be AT LEAST 1 passage on the real thing that is long and difficult that you wont totally understand and will require you to go back several times. do you know what will happen if you try to plow through all the questions on a passage WITHOUT looking back? you'll probably get 4/5 or 4/6 wrong, so it wont matter if you finish the test on time or not, you're still looking at a lousy score. what i think you should do is this... make damn sure you take the time to answer at least 4 questions per passage with reasonably good confidence... then if you cant get the last question on the passage, say **** it and move on. at least you'll probably have 4 in the bag. it's better to make a sacrificial guess on one question in favor of having time to read another passage... vs. spending forever on 1 question because you KNOW you can get it if you just search harder and then going into the last passage with 4 minutes left (which is basically the same as going in with 1 minute left). i don't know how the hell ANYONE can finish verbal with 10 minutes to spare, are you kidding me? even 1-2 minutes is a stretch. and what are those two minutes going to do for you anyway? the best thing they can do is help you check over the questions from the last passage you do... because more than likely youll forget the important stuff from the passages you already did

 

[L. Beethoven]

OP, I had a few quick thoughts on Verbal when reading over your post. VR was my best section throughout my preparation, and I ended up scoring a 12.

To speed up reading on practice passages, I would put my finger under the sentence and move along as I read. It's basically how you teach three-year-olds to read, but your eyes really can move a lot faster if they're following your hand across the page. Doing this on the computer is a little more challenging, so I'd recommend using your mouse arrow to follow each line of text. As you go along, highlight any really key phrases like "contrary to Smith..." or "in further support of Theory A is the fact that..."

For EK101, I would take two passages at a time, set a timer for 16 minutes (8 for each passage) and then see how fast I could finish. With the above strategy I always finished early, and I'm not a particularly fast reader.

 

[Zelda840]

Verbal was the only section I didn't study for, and it ended up being my highest scoring section (11) and I had plenty of time leftover. I don't know if my strategy would work for anyone else, but I was not spending much time AT ALL on the initial reading of the passage. I was speed reading to get the gist, then spending the majority of the time analyzing what the question was actually asking and going back to the passage for clues.

I honestly don't know that what works for one person will necessarily work for another, though. You say you are fine on PS, and that seemed a thousand times more difficult than verbal for me.

 

[DocBella]

I think you're all right in that every person is different and different strategies work for different people. For example, moving the cursor actually slows me down but it helps some other people. I find it risky to keep moving the cursor because with the test center's old computers, it may freeze and malfunction which is something I really can't deal with in the middle of the test! What helps me keep up my speed is actually not fully pronouncing every word and kinda just say it under my breath with minimum lip movement and barely moving my tongue. Enough for my brain to understand what I've read but not actually waste time in fully saying the word. Almost like reading with your eyes and slightly whispering. Also, not moving my head helps my comprehension. If I'm sitting still, it keeps me calm. Not only does it keep my nerves under control but it also keeps me focused if I only move my eyes when I'm reading. Using minimum brain power for motor movement leaves more for comprehension. This applies to all body movements. Save your brain power to focus on the passage instead of motor movement. Stop jittering and moving your legs, stop moving your entire head with each word and sentence. Just move with your eyes and after each paragraph, think about the author's opinion thus far.

I find that if I read too fast through a passage, I will miss key points and miss the gist of the passage. When I've tried reading too fast, I've been more inclined to go for the opposite answers because the wording would sound right and familiar but it would actually state the opposite of what the point of the passage would be.

I've found that verbal is something that can ONLY be improved with more practice. Just keep doing it until you master it. That's the only way. No strategy or trick will work. Our brains are very plastic and it will automatically adjust as needed. I've just been practicing and my brain has finally learned to process the wording and information and be able to apply it. It seems to have helped in improving my reading speed, comprehension and application. I still end up with having 6 minutes for the last passage but I try to get at least 2 or 3 out of that passage right and that usually gets me by ok.

 

[Holmwood]

Just start summarizing notes on the piece of paper they give you. It may not help you, but it has helped me immensely when reading dense medical literature.

I wish I did it with my own mcat . . .