Deciding to take mcat next year, but just bought practice materials

[tatabox80]

Hi there,
I just recently decided to retake the mcat next april. I just bought my examkrackers stuff though. Should I just hide them away for now? Also I'm thinking of retaking kaplan for the extra study materials. It's $500 to retake next spring...what do you think?

 

[missbonnie]

don't even think about it now. enjoy your summer. I started studying feb for the april mcat.

 

[Doctora Foxy]

study lightly for now if you feel you need it, and then study hardcore in January I guess....I know if I decided to retake, I would have had to change my ways from last time, which would mean more study time and time devoted just to mcat prep and not school work.

sorry if this post makes no sense--im really sleepy...

 

[tatabox80]

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by Doctora Foxy:
<strong>study lightly for now if you feel you need it, and then study hardcore in January I guess....I know if I decided to retake, I would have had to change my ways from last time, which would mean more study time and time devoted just to mcat prep and not school work.

sorry if this post makes no sense--im really sleepy...</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Nope it makes total sense! I kinda made that mistake last spring!

 

[hsieh]

Hey,

I decide to take next year as well. I am not a typical pre-med student so I need time to prepare for the MCAT and build up my resume.

I kind of use the Kaplan material and I am thinking to buy EK1001 as well. Do you guys think that really help? Please let me know, thanks.

 

[The Mysterious Stranger]

I had both Kaplan and Columbia review materials. I am not familiar with EK. What's nice about Columbia review is that you don't have to buy all the subject books. You can purchase just physics if you want just physics. I hate promoting one company over the other b/c people always assume you work for the company. I don't, and I honestly thought CR was very beneficial, although all the companies are very good. Some of the practice problems on the physics practice exams were very similar to the actual questions asked on the MCAT. To state it bluntly out of all the materials I had (remember I did not have TPR or EK so I can't compare), the most useful for me were CR's physics and Orgo books, Kaplan's verbal video tape sessions (on the video tape of the verbal class the instructor spoke out loud what your brain should be processing silently while attacking each passage and showed how often one should pause to summarize--after several trials of trying to emulate the process I improved greatly...this worked best for me, but I don't doubt other people succeeded by different means), and AAMC's practice tests 4,5,6 (I had questions on the AAMC exams that showed up on my MCAT in slightly different form--the key is to go through all the solutions to the questions on the AAMC, even the ones you answered correctly. I hope this might help. Perhaps other people can write what they found beneficial about the other programs. If someone has a weakness in a particular subject then they can use these responses as a guide to choosing an appropriate program.

 

[The Mysterious Stranger]