ek 1001 vs actual mcat?

[vargant]

I'm going through the examkrackers material and their 1001 questions, and i'm not doing as good as I would like. I'm just wondering, how is the 1001 questions compared to the actual aamc MCAT overall, and compared individually to the bio., chem., o-chem., physics, and verbal 1001 sections as well?

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[RoadRunner17]

You should do a forum search when you have a question; there have been a lot of great posts in the past regarding the 1001 Question series that I've used to find information on in the past. But anyway..

Of the 1001 Question series, only 101 Passages in VR actually mimics the MCAT. That's the only book I would recommend across the board to everyone who is studying for the MCAT.

The others are questionable. The best of the rest I would say is 1001 Questions in Biology, as the questions do come in a passage-based format and is useful for learning Biology (by doing them, and learning from the answer explanations). The rest are mostly the same format and are primarily used for you to learn the basic sciences rather than to prepare you for the MCAT. They are not in MCAT format, and aren't even in passages.

They're really intended to be used as a supplement to the corresponding ExamKrackers manuals; it can be difficult for you to work through them if you haven't worked through the corresponding EK manual first.

The authors even say that these 1001 Question series books aren't intended to help you specifically for the MCAT but rather to teach you the basic concepts; they are mainly for those who are scoring 8's and below on the exams in the back of the manuals.

 

[ratherberocking]

RoadRunner17,


What would you suggest to properly prepare for the MCAT?

 

[Suaveness]

Yeah I'm interested to know as well, since I'm doing a lot of the EC 1001 problems. They aren't representative, so I'm not sure how to approach this. I guess it's good practice, but some problems are very...well weird.

 

[RoadRunner17]

Don't get me wrong, EK's 1001 series is good practice for brushing up on fundamental concepts that might be preventing you from getting good scores. I used it myself for Organic Chemistry and Biology, and they were good. But they're not exactly the highest yield practice since they are not MCAT format.

TPR's science workbook is very useful for the next step, though. Most of the questions in that workbook are passage-based, but still test specific concepts. One way you could study for the MCAT is to take your diag, determine which subjects you're weak in, review these subjects, find the passages in the workbook corresponding to these subjects (there is a table of contents listing the topics and their corresponding passages) and work them out & read the answer explanations. That's one way to eliminate your weaknesses and turn them into strengths. Do this after every AAMC CBT you take, using the diagnostic report given at the end of each exam.

Berkeley Review's books are probably the next step; they have MCAT-style passages at the end of each section; so each subject set (two books each) has roughly 800-1000 problems total with answer explanations. Those are great and I recommend it all to everyone in my opinion.

EK's 1001 series for Chem/Physics/Organic Chem are useful for learning the basics, but they aren't in MCAT format and within each section, there are repeats of questions (which is why they tell you to do every 3 questions). So to do all of them isn't that efficient unless you identify which sections you're having trouble with in the corresponding EK subject manual. It's all about efficiency; if you have the time to churn through all 1001 questions in these books, then go for it. But not everyone has the time and willpower to do it.

Bottom line, study smart and maximize the time (and attention span?) that you have in limited quantities.