BR physics study passages

[aspalaceburns]

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When I go through the content portion of the books everything makes sense, but I start to stumble when I go through the practice passages. I will usually only miss 2-3 questions per passage, but there have been topics where I have missed more. My question is whether people felt that they learned much more about the concepts by completing practice passages and reviewing their mistakes or if I need alot more content review?

 

[tima]

The purpose of doing questions is to expose your strengths and weaknesses. So, it's wise to do as many passages as you can.

After that, you can go over the concepts that you are weak in. You can use the same book or a different one. For example, I used TBR for content/passages, and EK to reinforce weak concepts.

 

[BerkReviewTeach]

When I go through the content portion of the books everything makes sense, but I start to stumble when I go through the practice passages. I will usually only miss 2-3 questions per passage, but there have been topics where I have missed more. My question is whether people felt that they learned much more about the concepts by completing practice passages and reviewing their mistakes or if I need alot more content review?

Tima is absolutely right about passages exposing your strengths and weaknesses within the material. They can also expose your strength and weaknesses in terms of testing skills.

Many of the questions in the BR science books have questions that are intentionally ambiguous (questions that could be interpreted multiple ways) where you need to consult the answer choices to know what the question wants. If you are missing these types, don't worry so much, because the answer explanations address test taking strategies (usually POE). The design of the books is such that you are meant to learn strategies and techniques from the answer explanations. It's a basic philosophy of the BR books, which is why the answer explanations in BR materials are so much longer than ones in other materials. You learn best from reviewing questions you get wrong.

If you're missing 2-3 questions per passage on average, that's right where you're suppose to be if your goal is a 10-11 on that section. I know it's really hard to not pay attention to the scores, but try to not put so much credence in them. It's about learning and reviewing at this point, and scores don't matter yet.

 

[411309]

If you're missing 2-3 questions per passage on average, that's right where you're suppose to be if your goal is a 10-11 on that section. I know it's really hard to not pay attention to the scores, but try to not put so much credence in them. It's about learning and reviewing at this point, and scores don't matter yet.

Stupid question, but if i average 2 or less questions missed per passage im in pretty good shape? Doesnt that seem kinda high? Is tbr really that much harder then the real mcat in your opinion?

Just wanted to see what your thoughts are.

 

[Temperature101]

Missing 2-3 questions per passage is like getting 60%, which corresponds to an 8-9 on the TBR scale. This can translate into an 10-11 (hard for me to believe). If this is true, I should stop beating on myself then. This exactly where I am at and my goal is a 10+ in PS.

 

[Temperature101]

Tima is absolutely right about passages exposing your strengths and weaknesses within the material. They can also expose your strength and weaknesses in terms of testing skills.

Many of the questions in the BR science books have questions that are intentionally ambiguous (questions that could be interpreted multiple ways) where you need to consult the answer choices to know what the question wants. If you are missing these types, don't worry so much, because the answer explanations address test taking strategies (usually POE). The design of the books is such that you are meant to learn strategies and techniques from the answer explanations. It's a basic philosophy of the BR books, which is why the answer explanations in BR materials are so much longer than ones in other materials. You learn best from reviewing questions you get wrong.

If you're missing 2-3 questions per passage on average, that's right where you're suppose to be if your goal is a 10-11 on that section. I know it's really hard to not pay attention to the scores, but try to not put so much credence in them. It's about learning and reviewing at this point, and scores don't matter yet.

Missing 2-3 questions per passage is like getting 60%, which corresponds to an 8-9 on the TBR scale. This can translate into an 10-11 (hard for me to believe). If this is true, I should stop beating on myself then. This exactly where I am at and my goal is to get a 10+ in PS.

 

[UTsksk]

It's a slight relief knowing that the potential to get a 10+ is there if you're getting 9's on TBR, but still have to keep trying for that 15.

 

[BerkReviewTeach]

I think one of the healthiest threads to read if you're freaking out on BR passages is the ongoing one about BR scores. It should reassure you to see three years worth of anxious people who went on to get some pretty good scores. An average of 2-3 wrong per 7 question-passage lands in the 10 region on most scales in the books and most people in that thread said they got about their average BR score to a point higher on their actual MCAT.

And to answer ColeSmalls question, I'm not sure if the hardest BR question is harder than the hardest actual MCAT question, but it seems like the percentage of difficult questions in a typical BR homework set is greater than the MCAT (certainly the AAMC exams). I believe that's where the opinion that BR passages are difficult stems from. As long as you keep in mind that it's homework and the goal is to get better by doing questions and reviewing the answer explanations, then you'll progress in a good way.