Am I using TBR effectively?

[Oxigen]

Hey all,

First and foremost, I have read numerous threads regarding peoples experience with TBR. I've specifically been researching to see how people use TBR C/P and B/B books when they study but the answers seem to vary between individuals. I decided to go with TBR C/P and B/B books for my content review + passage practice, but am I using them effectively? I seem to be studying for 8+ hours every day without much time to review past chapters or work on CARS...

My daily schedule:
Read one TBR chapter a day, take note as I go along. Review the notes briefly. Complete Phase 1 Questions. For incorrect answers, I open a document and write down the question, my answer, correct answer, content topic, and content explanation where I go back and read that topic and write down a sentence or two about that topic to help me understand the correct answer. For all correct answers, I do the same thing but explain the correct answer in my way of thinking.

I feel like I am solid about how I am strengthening my weak areas by keeping an error log of incorrect answers. Although, am I suppose to be reading each TBR word for word and writing notes (a page or two summary of the whole chapter usually) about that chapter? I have a poor foundation in chemistry which is why I decided to read each chapter because I needed that content review. By doing the passages and keeping an error log, is that more than enough for content review, or should I stick to reading the whole chapter and creating a page or two summary of notes.

Anyways, whats your thoughts? If you used TBR for B/B and/or C/P, what was your daily schedule like? Did you read the whole chapter and take notes? Skim the chapter and do passages and learn from those? I'd appreciate any feedback as I continue studying!

Thank you!

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[PlsLetMeIn21]

I used TBR for C/P and B/B and loved them. But I'll admit that I got overwhelmed on more than one occasion. My advice would be to focus on passages and especially their answer explanations.

I would skim or read, depending on how confident I was with the material, the text part. I did all of the questions embedded in the reading section and took notes on any shortcuts they gave or concepts I didn't know well. I reviewed the notes before doing each phase. I recommend adding more notes as you go through the answer explanations for each phase. The three phases generally felt different, but I found that if I got the key ideas and strategies from Phase 1, I could do Phase 2 faster. Same for Phase 3 following Phase 2.

It took me approximately six weeks to work through the eight TBR books (which if I recall off the top of my head is 38 chapters.) I tried to read one chapter, do the Phase 1 for that chapter, do Phase 2 for another chapter, and then Phase 3 for an early chapter in one day. Sometimes I could do all that in six hours, but it usually was 7 to 8 hours. I gave myself one day of break from TBR each week as needed. Once you get on a roll, it gets better. The later chapters went smoother than the early ones for me.

In looking back on my MCAT experience I owe all my success in C/P and B/B to TBR. I hated them at times but looking back feel like nothing was better at preparing me than TBR passages.