Demoralized at my practice exam scores; send help please

[deleted988172]

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Thank you guys in advance ❤

 

[BerkReviewTeach]

No need for sugar coating and no need to be mean. The plain and simple issue is a mistake that many people make when preparing. There is this illusion (delusion?) that once you complete content review, all is perfect and the 515s and 520s should come rolling in. It just doesn't work that way. Content review is a small, and often overrated part of the preparation process. Good scores don'y happen until you master the test taking skills needed to do well.

You are right where you need to be. Now is when the real improvement starts. Stop studying content and concepts and instead analyze how to apply that content and connect those concepts quickly. You will learn more reviewing your exam after the fact than you will ever learning passively reading content. Acknowledge that you are ten to fifteen percent done with your preparation pathway and that the most rewarding (in terms of score improvement) lies ahead.

Have you done the AAMC materials yet? Not the FLs, but the Q packs and the section banks. Go through those next and be cognoscente of how they write their questions and answer choices. Become a student of the test and learn to look at it like a test writer looks at it.

You will get better, you just need to stay on course.

I'm sure NextStepTutor will have more specific things to add about their exam and the goals you should have going through them, but generically speaking, you're fine as long as you don't let this temporary discouragement slow you down.

 

[Blueprint MCAT Tutor]

@BerkReviewTeach has hit everything spot on and has given some great advice! Content review is necessary, but it doesn't provide you with the test taking skills you will need to truly get a high score on the MCAT. Those skills will come from doing as many problems as possible and then reviewing them thoroughly. I know it can feel demoralizing to not reach your goal score after working hard, but this is part of the journey and not the end, and you can definitely improve from here if you keep working on your weaknesses!

Review means not just memorizing the correct answer, but making sure you understand how the correct answer was derived from the passage. You need to think about the connections that were made that would lead you to the correct information in the passage and then how that information was used to select the right answer choice.

In addition to that, you need to see what concepts you don't know well enough as far as the content is concerned. It's possible you're missing questions in a passage about the kidney, because you simply don't know enough about the kidney in your content knowledge. Be honest with yourself on these content weaknesses and make sure to review them. It's difficult to attack our weaknesses sometimes, but doing so will definitely lead to higher scores in the end.

The one thing I like about our Next Step exams is that each answer explanation is in depth and then it also includes a few paragraphs of background information that'll help solidify your content knowledge. So make sure to thoroughly review whatever mistakes you made and that'll help you get those questions correct the next time you see that concept.

I know it can be discouraging, but this is all a part of the process. You have done very well to get this far and I commend you for taking your test taking process seriously. But you still have some work left to do! I am here to help with any questions you have and keep up the good work! If you need anything else at all, please don't hesitate to reach out!

 

[deleted988172]

Thank you guys so much for your help and input.

No need for sugar coating and no need to be mean. The plain and simple issue is a mistake that many people make when preparing. There is this illusion (delusion?) that once you complete content review, all is perfect and the 515s and 520s should come rolling in. It just doesn't work that way. Content review is a small, and often overrated part of the preparation process. Good scores don'y happen until you master the test taking skills needed to do well.

You are right where you need to be. Now is when the real improvement starts. Stop studying content and concepts and instead analyze how to apply that content and connect those concepts quickly. You will learn more reviewing your exam after the fact than you will ever learning passively reading content. Acknowledge that you are ten to fifteen percent done with your preparation pathway and that the most rewarding (in terms of score improvement) lies ahead.

Have you done the AAMC materials yet? Not the FLs, but the Q packs and the section banks. Go through those next and be cognoscente of how they write their questions and answer choices. Become a student of the test and learn to look at it like a test writer looks at it.

You will get better, you just need to stay on course.

I'm sure NextStepTutor will have more specific things to add about their exam and the goals you should have going through them, but generically speaking, you're fine as long as you don't let this temporary discouragement slow you down.

thank you so much for your input. this was SO encouraging when you said: "you are where you need to be". I am starting AAMC practice tomorrow (as per my schedule) but i had sneak peak of a bio passage and chem passage and realized they were far less harsh lol but I guess that's a good thing if I train hard, I won't ever regret it but if I under train, I'll always be upset that I didn't take that extra step to get to where I need to be. you hit the sot and exactly outlined my weakness of not being able to properly analyze the root of questions and that's going to come with practice so I just need to dwell into practice more. for Chem Phys, the questions I get wrong, they're actually the calculation questions which I end up messing up at exactly a step before my final answer so I need to practice with more discrete to control my testing and anxiety and pick up pace: for for C/P specifically, I just started doing discrete calculation of TBR bc I found them to really help me nail down calculation in each subtopic.

 

[deleted988172]

@BerkReviewTeach has hit everything spot on and has given some great advice! Content review is necessary, but it doesn't provide you with the test taking skills you will need to truly get a high score on the MCAT. Those skills will come from doing as many problems as possible and then reviewing them thoroughly. I know it can feel demoralizing to not reach your goal score after working hard, but this is part of the journey and not the end, and you can definitely improve from here if you keep working on your weaknesses!

Review means not just memorizing the correct answer, but making sure you understand how the correct answer was derived from the passage. You need to think about the connections that were made that would lead you to the correct information in the passage and then how that information was used to select the right answer choice.

In addition to that, you need to see what concepts you don't know well enough as far as the content is concerned. It's possible you're missing questions in a passage about the kidney, because you simply don't know enough about the kidney in your content knowledge. Be honest with yourself on these content weaknesses and make sure to review them. It's difficult to attack our weaknesses sometimes, but doing so will definitely lead to higher scores in the end.

The one thing I like about our Next Step exams is that each answer explanation is in depth and then it also includes a few paragraphs of background information that'll help solidify your content knowledge. So make sure to thoroughly review whatever mistakes you made and that'll help you get those questions correct the next time you see that concept.

I know it can be discouraging, but this is all a part of the process. You have done very well to get this far and I commend you for taking your test taking process seriously. But you still have some work left to do! I am here to help with any questions you have and keep up the good work! If you need anything else at all, please don't hesitate to reach out!

Thank you. I actually 100% appreciate the answer explanations in FL and even in other practice questions. I am in the NS course but I don't attend the classes often BECAUSE I feel that explanations are SO wonderfully written that I KNOW EXACTLY where I mess up. For that reason, I think the NS qbank for bio/biochem and psyc is absolutely phenomenal bc they help me point out a big area where I may need to brush my concepts. I actually can't memorize scientific concepts bc I love teaching and have been a tutor for a year for subjects like hematology/molec bio and immunology so when I analyze why I got something wrong, I write in my lesson journal as if I am teaching to 4 years old but you're absolutely right. There are places where I realized my knowledge on mcat level wasn't strongest or things I didn't think are "important enough" and kinda moved quickly from them and saw a big passage on it and I was like wow lol. I am going to be honest with myself and my weaknesses and work through them. Do you think this is also how I'll get better at timing? bc that really worries me.

 

[Blueprint MCAT Tutor]

I think knowing the material inside and out will definitely help with timing to some extent, but the major progress in improvement on timing will come from just doing as many passages as you can and refining your strategy.

Keep up the good work! Please reach out if you have any other questions!