Anyone Start With A Score Of 4 Or 6 On Verbal And Improve Tremendously?

[SCUBA GIRL]

Share Your Secrets.... We Can All Use A Little Help

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[iamgoingbananas]

yeah i started at Zero duh. But really though, i started at 4 and i am up to the a seven hope to hit an 11.....it is possible..just focus on the number right. I started in the twenties, i am clearly into the thirties, hopefully will break into the roaring forties....Take it slow, one step at a time...just don't look down because it is scarry..

 

[SCUBA GIRL]

I meant on a real test... someone who went from like a 4 or 6 to a 10 on a real test

 

[psiyung]

I meant on a real test... someone who went from like a 4 or 6 to a 10 on a real test

no one has started that low and ended up with a 10....ever

 

[laya533]

I started with 5. For a long time I kept ketting 6! now I am getting 10. Hope to improve.

 

[SCUBA GIRL]

no one has started that low and ended up with a 10....ever

let's hear from someone who did.... it's better not to be negative

 

[typeB-md]

buy yourself a reading program. there is no other 'trick'

 

[Megalofyia]

Most of it is reading comp. Practice reading and understanding articles in papers that are above your head or are really boring to you.

 

[CuttinEmUp]

Share Your Secrets.... We Can All Use A Little Help

Scuba---

I have never taken the MCAT before..first timer here. Here is a little encouragment.

i am not the smartest guy in the world..by any means...but on my Kaplan diagnostic, i scored a 3 in the Verbal reasoning section. On my first Kaplan Full Length exam, my verbal score was an 8. You can belive that on tommorrows full length, i am going to get a 10 on the Verbal and a 12-13 finally on the real thing!

YOU CAN DO IT...if i (who am NOT a brainiac) can raise my score that much from the diag. to the first full length..then YOU def. can too!

Have faith..many score high..you can too! THINK positive..never get discouraged...your going to be a doctor----> apply yourself and FOCUS!

 

[Lebesgue]

no one has started that low and ended up with a 10....ever

Ha! 5 on Kaplan Diagnostic, 11 on August 2002 MCAT. Of course you'll have to take my word, but what the heck do I have to gain by posting this late on a Friday night.

I actually posted some MCAT tips in the non traditional thread. As far as verbal goes, I can tell you what I think works (for me). I found the Kaplan course tips to be worthless. I couldn't score better than 7 or 8 with their method. They teach that you should skim the passages first to determine which are "easiest" for you, number them, then go back and read them. But you're not reading them in detail, only skimming them (whatever that means), then go answer the questions. Another method was to read the questions before reading the passages. All this I found to be a total waste of time!!!

What I found worked was starting with the first passage and reading it slow enough to get it ALL into my head, then I would go and answer about 95% of the questions without having to look back at the passage. Then I would go to the second passage, and so on. One by one in order, not skipping around, fast enough to finish, but slow enough to get the passages in my head with some understanding. My rationale was that I will eventually have to read them all anyway, and try hard to get them, even if they were the most obscure or boring passage I could imagine. I found I had to totally get "into" the passage no matter what! If you hate Russian literature and the passage is about that, then you will need to make it your best friend and immerse yourself in that passage. After doing that I was getting 9s and 10s. My MCAT verbal was an 11, so it worked.

The more full lengths you can take, the more verbal practice you'll get. It took me 9 full lenths to get down the speed vs comprehension. The best thing I can tell you is that you need to figure out what works for you, and the only way to do that is to practice. I'm offering my method since it worked for me, and I didn't learn it in any course or recommendations from others. Try it out and see if it works.

Also, don't waste your time reading the Wall Street Journal to get your comprehension down. You are pretty much where you are at, and reading newspapers is not going to help. Doing full length practice tests will.

Anyway, it is possible to more than double your score. So, hang in there and keep working.

Good luck!

 

[manfood.com]

I went from my diag at princeton with a 3 or 4 to a 12.

It can be done. Seriously, I think it takes pure concentration and numerous passages. You think about it, a passage takes roughly 8-9 minutes, in an hour of practice you'll finish say 4-5 and have enough time to go over your mistakes. you gotta practice. I started reading to myself, and that didn't work cuz my brain would just drift away, and then I started to read a little more with my mouth moving and things just started to sink in. I don't know, things work for different people, and practice really really really helped. Read passages, get used to the questions, and bust your arse. 30+ more days.

 

[happyprairiedog]

I agree totally with Lebesgue here. I took the MCAT twice - 11s on verbal both times. I started with the first passage and read it as thoroughly as possible - answered the questions - refered back to the passage if need be - and moved on to the next. I am not a speed reader and I was able to finish the section with around 10 minutes to spare to go back and double check any questions I may have had trouble with. I never understood the skim, rate, and skip philosophy of some of those MCAT courses....it only wastes precious time.

 

[drguy22]

Share Your Secrets.... We Can All Use A Little Help

i started with a 5 on the practice exams and then i went to a 10 on the real thing....my secret.....practice practice practice.

good luck

 

[psiyung]

Ha! 5 on Kaplan Diagnostic, 11 on August 2002 MCAT. Of course you'll have to take my word, but what the heck do I have to gain by posting this late on a Friday night.

I actually posted some MCAT tips in the non traditional thread. As far as verbal goes, I can tell you what I think works (for me). I found the Kaplan course tips to be worthless. I couldn't score better than 7 or 8 with their method. They teach that you should skim the passages first to determine which are "easiest" for you, number them, then go back and read them. But you're not reading them in detail, only skimming them (whatever that means), then go answer the questions. Another method was to read the questions before reading the passages. All this I found to be a total waste of time!!!

What I found worked was starting with the first passage and reading it slow enough to get it ALL into my head, then I would go and answer about 95% of the questions without having to look back at the passage. Then I would go to the second passage, and so on. One by one in order, not skipping around, fast enough to finish, but slow enough to get the passages in my head with some understanding. My rationale was that I will eventually have to read them all anyway, and try hard to get them, even if they were the most obscure or boring passage I could imagine. I found I had to totally get "into" the passage no matter what! If you hate Russian literature and the passage is about that, then you will need to make it your best friend and immerse yourself in that passage. After doing that I was getting 9s and 10s. My MCAT verbal was an 11, so it worked.

The more full lengths you can take, the more verbal practice you'll get. It took me 9 full lenths to get down the speed vs comprehension. The best thing I can tell you is that you need to figure out what works for you, and the only way to do that is to practice. I'm offering my method since it worked for me, and I didn't learn it in any course or recommendations from others. Try it out and see if it works.

Also, don't waste your time reading the Wall Street Journal to get your comprehension down. You are pretty much where you are at, and reading newspapers is not going to help. Doing full length practice tests will.

Anyway, it is possible to more than double your score. So, hang in there and keep working.

Good luck!

I've noticed that a lot of you premeds are lacking the word 'sarcasm' from your vocab

 

[OSUdoc08]

no one has started that low and ended up with a 10....ever

Maybe....maybe not...

I had a 7 on my first real one and got a 10 on the second one.

The trick is not to finish 30 minutes early and take a nap in the middle of the exam.

 

[Medikit]

I think it depends on why you scored so low. If you were accurate but ran out of time before you could finish say the last two passages then you might want to learn how to read faster or try to answer quicker, leaning more on your gut. If you were able to finish the test but your answers were inaccurate you might want to take a lot of practice verbal tests or talk to a professor of some sort to see if you can get some advice. If you read slowly and you are inaccurate, which is probably the case since you are getting a 4 then it's going to be really tough to get your score up to a 10. I don't really know what to tell you, I got my score to go up 2 points but I pretty much found Verbal to be the most difficult to raise of any of the sections.

 

[Medikit]

I've noticed that a lot of you premeds are lacking the word 'sarcasm' from your vocab

If that was sarcasm it wasn't very funny, starting with a 4 and getting a 10 is in fact pretty rare.

 

[LT2]

the real deal

VR August 2003: 6
VR August 2004: 10 (freaking out with a cell phone ringing for the last 5 minutes of the section breaking any concentration i had)

practice practice practice do every practice test you can get your hands on! it is possible...

 

[beponychick]

Ha! 5 on Kaplan Diagnostic, 11 on August 2002 MCAT. Of course you'll have to take my word, but what the heck do I have to gain by posting this late on a Friday night.

I actually posted some MCAT tips in the non traditional thread. As far as verbal goes, I can tell you what I think works (for me). I found the Kaplan course tips to be worthless. I couldn't score better than 7 or 8 with their method. They teach that you should skim the passages first to determine which are "easiest" for you, number them, then go back and read them. But you're not reading them in detail, only skimming them (whatever that means), then go answer the questions. Another method was to read the questions before reading the passages. All this I found to be a total waste of time!!!

What I found worked was starting with the first passage and reading it slow enough to get it ALL into my head, then I would go and answer about 95% of the questions without having to look back at the passage. Then I would go to the second passage, and so on. One by one in order, not skipping around, fast enough to finish, but slow enough to get the passages in my head with some understanding. My rationale was that I will eventually have to read them all anyway, and try hard to get them, even if they were the most obscure or boring passage I could imagine. I found I had to totally get "into" the passage no matter what! If you hate Russian literature and the passage is about that, then you will need to make it your best friend and immerse yourself in that passage. After doing that I was getting 9s and 10s. My MCAT verbal was an 11, so it worked.

The more full lengths you can take, the more verbal practice you'll get. It took me 9 full lenths to get down the speed vs comprehension. The best thing I can tell you is that you need to figure out what works for you, and the only way to do that is to practice. I'm offering my method since it worked for me, and I didn't learn it in any course or recommendations from others. Try it out and see if it works.

Also, don't waste your time reading the Wall Street Journal to get your comprehension down. You are pretty much where you are at, and reading newspapers is not going to help. Doing full length practice tests will.

Anyway, it is possible to more than double your score. So, hang in there and keep working.

Good luck!

Well said. I think this is the best advice. Just read and understand the passage completely. Totally immerse yourself in it and you will improve. The questions are not that difficult if you understand the passage, but impossible if you skim it and have a vague idea of what its saying. Good luck!!

 

[Lebesgue]

I've noticed that a lot of you premeds are lacking the word 'sarcasm' from your vocab

My primary form of communication is sarcasm, but not in this case... I'm actually an MSII getting ready to take Step I of the USMLE, not a premed. I figure people would most likely want high yeild info on how to possibly do better on the MCAT.

I would have liked to have known what I found out over the course of taking those tests so I could have perfected it more. In hindsight, that sort of focus on things you are uninterested in will serve you well in med school. For me histology and embryology couldn't have been more boring.

Getting a good MCAT is certainly important in setting yourself apart from the masses, and I have no problem lending any tips I might have that can help out. I feel fortunate to be here and I'd like to see others succeed as well.

Good luck and keep practicing that focus.