you are not alone, though I sort of have a love/hate relationship with EK in that I love it in terms of making you think that the right answer is the "best" choice even though it sounds like an answer someone created after smoking some .... I find this approach really does help with the mcat and i'm most likely going to end up taking the test this way. so anyway, i also hate it because i sometimes find that certain questions have wrong answers that are so easy to spot like if the question asks what challenges a point in the passage, they will give you three wrong answers that actually supports the point whereas TPR doesn't do this, their wrong answer choices varies (so they sort of slap your hand saying not so fast!). I'm thinking people are saying EK is like the real thing because it tests more of the main idea or rather have alot of implied,conclusion questions which you can't find word for word in the passages (TPR likes to do this); you have to obtain the general direction of the passage and learn to eliminate the wrong answers first (basically, you can't always find the exact answer or the exact main idea with such a short amount of time). Yes, I thank god for the other three choices because imagine a test where you were graded on the accuracy of your summaries of the passages. OMG just shoot me now! But then also, I see some overlapping in strategy between the materials in that by knowing the main idea of the passages, you can eliminate wrong answers by just having that "feel" for what is or is not stated in the passage. That's why I believe people say just practice everything or as much as you can because the basic strategy of improving your verbal is there just that the different practice materials have slightly different styles.
As for explanations to the answers, AAMC does the most horrible job explaining things, their explanations are more horrific than the passages!! so I decided to create my own explanations like "this is not the answer because you didn't pay attention to the key words that the author did not talk about at all you *****!!! argg!" though I find EK's explanations and TPR explanations aren't exactly the greatest either, but are in a language i can understand at least.
I'm just going to do it all damn it and try to understand the basic framework of how these questions and answers came to be. By doing all three types of materials, I am starting to see a pattern and hopefully when i'm taking the aamc and the mcat, I'll have those "ah ha!" moments where I am starting to see how the test writers "think." I don't know, some people on here who destroyed the mcat and then even kicked the mcat while it was laying on the ground seem to say it's important to figure out how the test writers "think."
what is with me? i always seem to write these long paragraphs that no one wants to really read hahaha ... back to my bat cave to study🙂
