I agree.
My story:
I took the August 2006 MCAT and I employed a similar strategy. I think my first practice test I scored like a 7 on PS. (Sounds worse than it was, but I'll explain). I think I took around 8 or 9 practice tests total (5 princeton, 3 or 4 on my own) and changed my strategy somewhere in between. I was reading the entire passage but skimming through them nonetheless. My scores were consistently around 8's or 9's. I read somewhere, probably here, to avoid reading the passages at all and answer the questions free standing. I thought that it was ridiculous but I tried it on my next Princeton practice test and I got an 11. Then a 12, then a ... you get the point.
The trick: kThere are a great deal of PS questionst hat you can answer 100% without the passage. These are the free standing questions. I would be willing to estimate more than half are like this. By answering these first (and sometimes you can knock out 6 out of 7 in a passage) you have saved loads of valuable time. Once you are done answering questions like "What is the lowest energy orbital? A.
s B.
p" then you can look to the passages for the other questions.
The main reason that this saves you time: You can routinely knock out two or three passages on the test without reading at all. Sure you might only answer 22 out of 24 questions for those three, but those two you save for later are not important in the big scheme of things, especially with the large curve for PS.
There
are many questions in PS which require the passage to answer.
However, the reason why this method works is that IMO unlike the other sections, the Physical Sciences passages will never contradict anything you already know. They might add to it, but they will never contradict. Gravity is gravity, light is light. The laws of physical science do not change, and there is not going to be any passage which reveals that the lowest energy orbital is in fact
p. Thus you can answer these questions efficiently and effectively while saving time for the other questions which require referencing from the passage.
Disclaimer: I know this is not new information. Actually its probably been around as long as the MCAT has. But I didn't understand why it worked before and now I do.
P.S. I scored higher than a 12 and lower than a 14 on the August MCAT PS.