3 weeks left, any advice?

[tj123]

I take my exam on April 22. I just finished all of the section banks and now I'm beginning question packs. I took AAMC FL1 a few weeks ago and scored a 496 (before completing section banks). I was surprised by this score because I've been scoring 495-500 on Kaplan and TPR FLs, which are thought to be more difficult. I expected to score at least 505 on the AAMC FL. Would it be more beneficial for me to use only AAMC material and complete the qpacks, official guide, section bank again, or should I start just doing a lot of full-lengths? I feel like I understand the content but it's not transferring to the questions. Looking for any advice/personal experience stories.

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[dnm93]

How many full lengths have you taken in total?

 

[tj123]

How many full lengths have you taken in total?

10

 

[dnm93]

10

And you haven't scored above a 500 on any of these, if I'm understanding your original post correctly. If understanding the content is not your issue, then you have to figure out what is. Are you running out of time? Are you not reading the passages the way they should be read? If you can figure that out before your test date and correct it, awesome. If not, I would postpone until you can figure out why you are scoring so low.

 

[tj123]

And you haven't scored above a 500 on any of these, if I'm understanding your original post correctly. If understanding the content is not your issue, then you have to figure out what is. Are you running out of time? Are you not reading the passages the way they should be read? If you can figure that out before your test date and correct it, awesome. If not, I would postpone until you can figure out why you are scoring so low.

I'm running out of time on almost all of the sections. Some of the biology passages I'm not reading correctly I'm just not sure how to fix this.

 

[pms_testosterone]

What was the score breakdown on the AAMC practice test you took?

Like the above poster said, if you're not getting above 500 on the AAMC sample & practice tests you should probably postpone...

 

[dnm93]

I'm running out of time on almost all of the sections. Some of the biology passages I'm not reading correctly I'm just not sure how to fix this.

I would say more practice would allow you to gauge time better so you know how to pace yourself, but you've taken 10 practice tests so I'm not sure what other advice to give in terms of that. Did you take a course or use any prep books to learn strategy?


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[DoctorCrush]

Other than AAMC materials, Kaplan and TPR, what else have you done?

In regards to SB, what's your breakdown like? For example, you get a table at the end where it gives you results like 37/59 questions correct for scientific reasoning based on research design etc. which one or more are your weakest section? For example, for me, it's the "scientific knowledge" questions that tends to kill me but I do well on the research based questions and statistical reasoning.

When you get a question wrong on AAMC or whatever material, do you know why you got them wrong? Was it lack of knowledge on the topic, misunderstood, able to eliminate down to the two between the correct answer and wrong answer? And the AAMC FL that you took, was that the sample test or the actual FL scored one?

 

[tj123]

Other than AAMC materials, Kaplan and TPR, what else have you done?

In regards to SB, what's your breakdown like? For example, you get a table at the end where it gives you results like 37/59 questions correct for scientific reasoning based on research design etc. which one or more are your weakest section? For example, for me, it's the "scientific knowledge" questions that tends to kill me but I do well on the research based questions and statistical reasoning.

When you get a question wrong on AAMC or whatever material, do you know why you got them wrong? Was it lack of knowledge on the topic, misunderstood, able to eliminate down to the two between the correct answer and wrong answer? And the AAMC FL that you took, was that the sample test or the actual FL scored one?

My SB scores are the following:
B/B=68% Knowledge of scientific concepts: 21/35, Scientific reasoning: 17/35, Reasoning about research design: 13/17, Data-based reasoning: 17/22
P/S=64% Knowledge of scientific concepts: 29/48, Scientific reasoning: 23/33, Reasoning about research design: 6/11, Data-based reasoning: 6/8
C/P=63% Knowledge of scientific concepts: 18/21, Scientific reasoning: 22/32, Reasoning about research design: 11/24, Data-based reasoning: 12/23

The AAMC i took was FL1. I found that for C/P I actually knew all of the content but had a hard time interpreting the data. I also ran out of time. For Biology I had a hard time interpreting the passages and I needed to memorize a few things (molecule structure). For P/S there were just a lot of new terms I hadn't seen before. I'm not going to move my test (will be out of the country doing medical work until august) so I'm mostly looking for advice on how to maximize my last bit of studying.

 

[DoctorCrush]

My SB scores are the following:
B/B=68% Knowledge of scientific concepts: 21/35, Scientific reasoning: 17/35, Reasoning about research design: 13/17, Data-based reasoning: 17/22
P/S=64% Knowledge of scientific concepts: 29/48, Scientific reasoning: 23/33, Reasoning about research design: 6/11, Data-based reasoning: 6/8
C/P=63% Knowledge of scientific concepts: 18/21, Scientific reasoning: 22/32, Reasoning about research design: 11/24, Data-based reasoning: 12/23

The AAMC i took was FL1. I found that for C/P I actually knew all of the content but had a hard time interpreting the data. I also ran out of time. For Biology I had a hard time interpreting the passages and I needed to memorize a few things (molecule structure). For P/S there were just a lot of new terms I hadn't seen before. I'm not going to move my test (will be out of the country doing medical work until august) so I'm mostly looking for advice on how to maximize my last bit of studying.

Those SB scores are actually pretty good. It sounds like you answered your own question. If I were you, I would tackle your weak points like data interpretation, timing, structures, look for the 300 page P/S that's floating around reddit somewhere and do a **** ton of practice at this point

 

[tj123]

Those SB scores are actually pretty good. It sounds like you answered your own question. If I were you, I would tackle your weak points like data interpretation, timing, structures, look for the 300 page P/S that's floating around reddit somewhere and do a **** ton of practice at this point

Besides AAMC stuff, do you know of any good practice problems?

 

[DoctorCrush]

Besides AAMC stuff, do you know of any good practice problems?

I'm basically using the same stuff you're using. Besides that I'm using Khan passages and I just started EK 101 passages of biology I biochem book and I found the questions to be disgustingly difficult but along the line of what I saw on the actual mcat because this is a retake for me. I highly doubt we will be seeing 230 questions of SB or EK style questions on the actual exam, but I found that using those two has helped me increased dramatically from one practice FL to the next.

 

[CoffeeintheMorning]

Which companies have you been using for the FLs?