Write your VR techniques here! (VR Help)

[ymartino]

I've finished every passage in the EK 101 book (except for the last one, test 14), I've reviewed every wrong answer, and I have improved by approximately 3 points (I score about 11 now). But I am VERY inconsistent and not confident in my VR abilities! Some passages I get about 3 wrong, some I get none wrong, and some I get only one correct. I don't understand what I'm doing wrong. ((PLEASE tell me what I should do, the EK tips aren't sufficient for me.))

Here's my method that I use for every passage:

1.) I do all passages in the exact order they are in.

2.) I read the entire passage as thoroughly as I can with the following in mind: what is this author trying to tell me? What does he/she believe? Are there any contradictions/discrepancies? If there are comparisons made in the passage, what are the differences? (I spend more time reading the passage, so approx. 5 min on reading)

3.) I begin the questions in the exact order they are in and emphasize not looking back at the psg unless absolutely necessary (ie. "which one of the following is not elaborated on with an example?"). I've noticed that the answers for most questions tend to be variations of whatever the main idea is. So I won't look back at a psg just because the question happened to refer to lines X-Z (because going to those lines is sometimes not helpful and wastes precious time).

4.) About 80% of the time I can narrow down the choices to 2 answers and I pick the one that is most relevant to the thesis.

5.) If I happen to have an extra minute or 30 sec, I will go over a question I was unsure of and will return to the psg for textual support.


My Problems:

1.) Some passages are dense, boring, or simply have so much circumlocution that I can't figure out the thesis! After reading I will think "Okay, I think this passage was about China's government... but maybe it was about their government's economic spending plan, or maybe about political insecurity, oh my god, I don't know!" And BOOM, I get 2 correct out of 6 questions, and those 2 were lucky guesses. What should I do!?

2.) The worst of the worst. These are the passages I successfully fool myself into thinking I understand, but I don't. They're the sucker punches to my morale and I don't feel it until after I check the answer key (after which I find my whopping one or zero correct and consider a career change). Perhaps I focused too much on one paragraph that threw off my perception of the passage as a whole?

3.) Questions such as "What is implicit to this passage?", "What assumptions can be made"? I often get these wrong since the answers usually aren't textual references.

4.) Questions such as "Which of the following would the author be most discrepant with? Or the author would disagree with all of the following EXCEPT..?"

Please offer any insight as to what you do because I'm taking this monster of a test on August 21st so I need to become more consistent.

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[theyellowking]

My advice for you would be the following:

1) Develop a faster pace of reading. 5 minutes per passage is way too long, giving yourself less time for the questions, thus making you feel more pressured, thus leading you to make silly mistakes. Whether you read the New York Times or something along that line, "speed read" at least 30 minutes each day to the point where you grasp the information in a short amount of time (2-3 minutes is ideal).
2) I've read this on another thread somewhere here, but the advice is to focus on the first and last sentences of each paragraph. This will zone you in on the paragraphs and each of their main ideas. Also, be active, and maybe draw boxes that correlate to the number of paragraphs in the passage, and briefly write the main ideas in each box (5 words max). These will take you out of the "bored" state and make you more active.
3) Everything is textually based. What I found was that for the assumption and implicit based questions, you can more or less find the answer within a paragraph. For instance, if the question asks, "What assumption can be made about China's economy in relations to Turkey?," I would go to the paragraph about this subject, briefly skim through, and make assumptions there. If it's a main idea assumption, then look at the first and last paragraphs, and get a general feel for what the author is saying. Another thing: never bring outside bias. This will usually confuse you with these types of questions, as your mind will sometimes wander out, trying to grasp whatever knowledge you have of the subject. Remember that for the most part (90%), the questions have answers directly from the passage.
4) Again, this a tone-based question. Always ask yourself, "Does the author like this? Dislike it? Indifferent about it (Never this, usually)? Why or why not? If you're having difficulties with "EXCEPT" questions, always go through each choice and cross out the ones that ARE true for that question.

I apologize for the long answer, but I've summed it up for you below:
1) Develop a quicker reading pace, and you can do this by reading NYT's, Economist, etc.
2) Focus on first and last sentences per paragraph. Be active by jotting down the main ideas of each paragraph.
3) Always refer and find the evidence within the passage, whether it's in a specific paragraph, or the main idea of the passage (refer to the first and last paragraphs for the main idea).
4) Try to think in your mind about the author's opinion and attitude about the subject.

Good luck!

 

[IslandStyle808]

I am actually still developing my technique, but I will tell you what I do. I did an analysis of most AAMCs and verbal self-assessments to try and figure out ways to do better on the AAMC passages. However, you will find out there are no real tricks to do radically better on the verbal. You can still improve, but you pretty much have to be good at the whole "main message," author's opinion," etc.

1) I try to understand what I am read to the best of my ability (you won't understand everything, but the verbal is formatted in a way which there are some parts that can be understood by the normal person). I try not to over analyze what I am reading because it can lead one to miss vital details or get burned out before reaching the questions.
2) I try to read each paragraph and get the main idea of each one. When I mean main idea, I mean a general understanding of what is being said. So I stop and think for a couple of seconds about it. (I also think about how it ties into the pervious paragraph, similar to the PanRoast method if you have read his thread)
3) I try to find ways to keep my focus such as visualizing what I am seeing, even if it is very abstract. The reason why some passages are hard to understand is NOT because they are boring, but because they are extremely abstract/not very tangential (it easier to understand the word politician than political because you can visualize a politician, but you cannot visualize the word political).
4) Once I am done reading I develop a general idea, think of the authors opinion/tone and then continue to the questions
5) Try not to look back after reading the question and answer choices, if you are almost 100% sure of the answer. You would be surprise how much time is wasted looking back excessively. After looking through the AAMCs, EK and TPR are very off the mark with those look back at the passage type questions. The AAMC can take a question and make you look at 2 paragraph (I mean very far apart) to answer the question. I am not saying never look back, but I am say to keep it to a minimum. If you understand what you are reading, you will remember most of what you have read or have it subconsciously mapped (this increases your lookback speed). I don't even need to jolt stuff down on a paper.
6) Deduction of the answer is far more important here (vs. the sciences) than knowing the right answer. There are "times" when the right answer is extremely obscure and not understandable. However, a good chuck of the time the wrong choices are actually more understandable than the right, and so you should just eliminate them first to see if the obscure answer is the right one.

I can't really give much tips here since I am just developing my technique. A big flaw of it is that I take 3 and 1/2 - 4 minutes to read a passage. I am trying to read faster to cut this time down. However, I am still finding that the longer I read the better if there is a very abstract passage. I am not saying that you should take a longer time to read, but, if in the mist of an exam, I would read longer if I am having trouble understanding a passage. Understanding a hard passage >>>> returning back to a hard passage.

Well, hope this help.

 

[sunshine02]

Say if there are a couple of really long and obscure verbal passages that you spent more time on during the test, and then when you reach the last passage, you realize you only have like 4 min left. What would you recommend--try to read the passage through very quickly and then answer the questions, or read the questions and then try to find the answer in the passage?

 

[ymartino]

Thanks a lot, theyellowking, that was really helpful! I'll start practicing speeding up my reading process and hopefully that will help.

 

[ymartino]

Say if there are a couple of really long and obscure verbal passages that you spent more time on during the test, and then when you reach the last passage, you realize you only have like 4 min left. What would you recommend--try to read the passage through very quickly and then answer the questions, or read the questions and then try to find the answer in the passage?

I would recommend reading and focusing on the first and last paragraph carefully (maybe even skimming the body paragraphs just to get the gist), and then taking educated guesses on the questions. But if you're constantly running out of time, I would suggest you make a time table so you know by what time you should be on what passage. I aim to spend 8 minutes on every passage. If I see an easy passage, I may finish it in 6 minutes, leaving me 2 extra min to work on harder passages. So before you begin your exam, you should plan it out so that by passage 3, you should have approximately 36 minutes left. If you have much less than that, you need to rush on the following passages to finish on time. (Or just glance after every passage to check you've taken 8 min +/- 1 min. But if it's a difficult passage, obviously spend more time on it.) Hope that's helpful.

 

[ymartino]

1) I try to understand what I am read to the best of my ability (you won't understand everything, but the verbal is formatted in a way which there are some parts that can be understood by the normal person). I try not to over analyze what I am reading because it can lead one to miss vital details or get burned out before reaching the questions.
2) I try to read each paragraph and get the main idea of each one. When I mean main idea, I mean a general understanding of what is being said. So I stop and think for a couple of seconds about it. (I also think about how it ties into the pervious paragraph, similar to the PanRoast method if you have read his thread)
3) I try to find ways to keep my focus such as visualizing what I am seeing, even if it is very abstract. The reason why some passages are hard to understand is NOT because they are boring, but because they are extremely abstract/not very tangential (it easier to understand the word politician than political because you can visualize a politician, but you cannot visualize the word political).
4) Once I am done reading I develop a general idea, think of the authors opinion/tone and then continue to the questions
5) Try not to look back after reading the question and answer choices, if you are almost 100% sure of the answer. You would be surprise how much time is wasted looking back excessively. After looking through the AAMCs, EK and TPR are very off the mark with those look back at the passage type questions. The AAMC can take a question and make you look at 2 paragraph (I mean very far apart) to answer the question. I am not saying never look back, but I am say to keep it to a minimum. If you understand what you are reading, you will remember most of what you have read or have it subconsciously mapped (this increases your loopback speed). I don't even need to jolt stuff down on a paper.
6) Deduction of the answer is far more important here (vs. the sciences) than knowing the right answer. There are "times" when the right answer is extremely obscure and not understandable. However, a good chuck of the time the wrong choices are actually more understandable than the right, and so you should just eliminate them first to see if the obscure answer is the right one.

I can't really give much tips here since I am just developing my technique. A big flaw of it is that I take 3 and 1/2 - 4 minutes to read a passage. I am trying to read faster to cut this time down. However, I am still finding that the longer I read the better if there is a very abstract passage. I am not saying that you should take a longer time to read, but, if in the mist of an exam, I would read longer if I am having trouble understanding a passage. Understanding a hard passage >>>> returning back to a hard passage.

Well, hope this help.

Thank you for this! You're absolutely right about the abstract topics. I'm going to try reading faster and spending more time on the questions to see if that helps. I take too long to read only because I'm trying to absorb all the information, when I don't actually need to. I never heard of the PanRoast method but I'll have to look it up now.

 

[WordSword]

Thank you for this! You're absolutely right about the abstract topics. I'm going to try reading faster and spending more time on the questions to see if that helps. I take too long to read only because I'm trying to absorb all the information, when I don't actually need to. I never heard of the PanRoast method but I'll have to look it up now.

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/a-vr-strategy-thats-working-really-well-for-me.936176/

 

[IslandStyle808]

Thank you for this! You're absolutely right about the abstract topics. I'm going to try reading faster and spending more time on the questions to see if that helps. I take too long to read only because I'm trying to absorb all the information, when I don't actually need to. I never heard of the PanRoast method but I'll have to look it up now.

Although I am not much of a fan of increasing reading speed (it has not helped me in the past), I can see its importance. I have been reading "Moonwalking with Einstein" by Joshua Foer and have been learning a lot of interesting things about human memory. He states in one part of the book about retention and speed. People usually hit a "okay plateau" when learning or doing something and this is not because you brain has hit its mental limit, but because you brain thinks its good enough.

It can be difficult to break this limit because your brain doesn't want to work any harder than it has to (probably the reason why it is so hard to study longer hours, LOL). The key to overcoming this limit is to make mistakes pushing your brain to do a task. For example, lets say your typing speed is 50wpm and you can never get it higher. This is because your brain thinks it is a good enough speed (the average person types at around 40wpm, but I don't think this will be true for long). The key to overcome this limit is to type faster and actually make grammatical mistakes (all the while trying not to make any). As soon as you do this, your brain will want to become more efficient and then your speed will go up as well as accuracy.

This is why I think that you should try to get your speed up. Your brain can actually read and retain at a faster speed, but it is now at an "okay plateau." I would suggest doing what yellowking has been mentioning and reading articles. Try to summarize what you have read. Then go back and read slower, to see if you have analyzed the articles correctly. You should try to move just fast enough to be making mistakes, but slow enough to know why you are making them. You don't need to give yourself only 2:30 minutes at the start of your training, but try to work your way down from 4:30 minutes (since you have said you take 5 minutes).

 

[ymartino]

Although I am not much of a fan of increasing reading speed (it has not helped me in the past), I can see its importance. I have been reading "Moonwalking with Einstein" by Joshua Foer and have been learning a lot of interesting things about human memory. He states in one part of the book about retention and speed. People usually hit a "okay plateau" when learning or doing something and this is not because you brain has hit its mental limit, but because you brain thinks its good enough.

It can be difficult to break this limit because your brain doesn't want to work any harder than it has to (probably the reason why it is so hard to study longer hours, LOL). The key to overcoming this limit is to make mistakes pushing your brain to do a task. For example, lets say your typing speed is 50wpm and you can never get it higher. This is because your brain thinks it is a good enough speed (the average person types at around 40wpm, but I don't think this will be true for long). The key to overcome this limit is to type faster and actually make grammatical mistakes (all the while trying not to make any). As soon as you do this, your brain will want to become more efficient and then your speed will go up as well as accuracy.

This is why I think that you should try to get your speed up. Your brain can actually read and retain at a faster speed, but it is now at an "okay plateau." I would suggest doing what yellowking has been mentioning and reading articles. Try to summarize what you have read. Then go back and read slower, to see if you have analyzed the articles correctly. You should try to move just fast enough to be making mistakes, but slow enough to know why you are making them. You don't need to give yourself only 2:30 minutes at the start of your training, but try to work your way down from 4:30 minutes (since you have said you take 5 minutes).

Thanks, that was really insightful. I've actually considered that "plateau" before in regards to things such as mathematics and any sort of problem solving thinking. I guess the only way to really read faster is to read faster! I'll try using this technique, but as you said, I'll do it gradually.