Feeling Helpless- Need Advice for MCAT

[RedWolverine]

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yo

 

[minicutcarrots]

First off, don't be discouraged! An A in orgo I and II is nothing to sneeze at, and your GPA's stellar. You've got this.

I started out like you did - tried reading all content plus note-taking (I also used Kaplan) and quickly realized it was not going to work. Bought every single practice test and question bank AAMC had available at the time and just pored through those. I referred to EK for things I needed a refresher on. Ended up scoring with a 514 - this after only a couple of weeks of actual content review.

I agree with your friends - the more practice, the better. I definitely internalized more material/knowledge and honed my test-taking skills by taking practice tests. When concepts escaped me, I'd go to EK, skim through the material and then do the end-of-chapter questions; I found a lot of material came back to me this way.

As for psych/soc, if you've taken a psych/soc class in undergrad, you'll likely be familiar enough with a lot of the concepts and can probably pull off a quick review of terminology.

If you honestly didn't retain any concepts/material from undergrad, then it's better that you discovered that now than later and break out of the habit of 'learning and forgetting'. (We're obviously all guilty of it to some extent, myself included, so don't take this the wrong way.)

 

[RedWolverine]

Thank you for the encouragement, so you would recommend just pouring through as many practice exams and sections as possible and pick up the information as I go with them? Learning from mistakes and honing test taking skills at the same time? Some of these Kaplan passages and questions are VERY specific, I don't see how I will get them right unless I know these minuet details memorized down to a T?

 

[RedWolverine]

First off, don't be discouraged! An A in orgo I and II is nothing to sneeze at, and your GPA's stellar. You've got this.

I started out like you did - tried reading all content plus note-taking (I also used Kaplan) and quickly realized it was not going to work. Bought every single practice test and question bank AAMC had available at the time and just pored through those. I referred to EK for things I needed a refresher on. Ended up scoring with a 514 - this after only a couple of weeks of actual content review.

I agree with your friends - the more practice, the better. I definitely internalized more material/knowledge and honed my test-taking skills by taking practice tests. When concepts escaped me, I'd go to EK, skim through the material and then do the end-of-chapter questions; I found a lot of material came back to me this way.

As for psych/soc, if you've taken a psych/soc class in undergrad, you'll likely be familiar enough with a lot of the concepts and can probably pull off a quick review of terminology.

If you honestly didn't retain any concepts/material from undergrad, then it's better that you discovered that now than later and break out of the habit of 'learning and forgetting'. (We're obviously all guilty of it to some extent, myself included, so don't take this the wrong way.)

Thank you for the encouragement, so you would recommend just pouring through as many practice exams and sections as possible and pick up the information as I go with them? Learning from mistakes and honing test taking skills at the same time? Some of these Kaplan passages and questions are VERY specific, I don't see how I will get them right unless I know these minuet details memorized down to a T?

 

[minicutcarrots]

Yes, I think you've already demonstrated mastery of the material. All that's left is to figure out what you don't know/aren't too familiar with. If you're missing a lot of questions re: amino acids, then you'll know to review them more carefully. Better to pinpoint your weaknesses and focus on improving those areas than to needlessly review material you already know on top of it.

Thank you for the encouragement, so you would recommend just pouring through as many practice exams and sections as possible and pick up the information as I go with them?