Retaking MCAT, needing to improve on CARS and Behavioral Science, how can this be done?

[steelersfan1243]

Hey guys,

So I have a month to revisit CARS and Behavioral Science to get my scores up. I got 30-45% on CARS and 45-60% on Behavioral Science last test. On the AAMC practice test my breakdown was 89% for verbal and 85% for psych so I honestly thought I had the material down.

I used Kaplan for Behavioral Sciences and went through the book multiple times. Looking through the chapters again I feel like I still know everything, is there any other book I can get that does a better job? I plan on using Khan Academy as well big time, but any other useful material?

Also for CARS, I am at a loss of words. I did all the EK 101 passages and my score fluctuated from a 7-11, but I was really hoping I could get at least 70%. I was looking to get the Princeton Review workbook, but I can't find the exact copy online. Can anyone link me directly to the amazon one on which to buy? I was skimming through it and I only found one that was $200, one that was $20, and then would I want the 2015 one? I do not know which one to get. Should I also get LSAT workbook, would that be a great help? I am desperate to raise my score here.

Any help would be appreciated, please and thank you.

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[Jack Westin]

CARS is all about reading comprehension and test-taking ability. If you can improve those two things, you'll not only improve on the CARS section, but the entire exam. Try to read slowly and understand the big ideas of each paragraph of a passage. If you can summarize the big ideas of each paragraph and use process of elimination on the questions, you should be fine. Of course this is very general advice but it is definitely important and the foundations to improving. Whatever you do, don't give up. I believe that if you want something bad enough and you give it your all, you can achieve practically anything in life. This exam and this section can be conquered if you practice daily. I cannot stress that enough. Daily practice is critical to increasing your score.

 

[mcatjelly]

Their verbal workbook is only given out to those who take their course, so the only place you can purchase the verbal is on ebay.

 

[ElectricNoogie]

Before you go rushing into new practice, you need to take a step back an examine how you have been attacking CARS passages until now. As Jack stated so well above, you need to have a clear goal when reading CARS passages. This isn't like the sciences where recognition can get you through semi-familiar science. With CARS you need to read with the AAMC in mind. What are the arguments/ideas being made? Who has them, do they support them? If so, how?

When reviewing your CARS practice, don't just check to see if you got the Q correct. Try to determine why you missed that key statement/piece of info that pointed to the correct answer. Or, can you understand what about your answer makes it wrong? CARS is all about brining your thinking more into the AAMC way of thinking. Simple repetition will not do this. Review the passages you've already seen, determine what you came away with and how that differs from what you should have come away with to answer the Qs effectively. There are a few good CARS dedicated books out there so you can find them. And you would ideally want passages written with the new MCAT in mind, though old VR passages will still do the job, so long as you ignore the Nat Science passages. CARS is what has changed the least compared to the old MCAT.

Good luck!