Hit a Wall with verbal please help!

[Cells4life]

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Hi, So i dont have my MCAT for another approx. 2months so I still have time but i feel like I've hit a wall with verbal and can't seem to do any better.

In a nutshell: My first ever verbal practice was really low like 4-5 but I went in and did the passages again untimed and ended up getting my score within the 6-7 range. I assumed the first score was a fluke due to nerves, anxiety, too much reading the passage twice, etc.
However, I did another practice test and scored a 6 and then did another practice test and scored 4! Leaving me completely demoralized, I started mapping out the passage and it seems to work for me as long as I get the main idea right. But I wanted to know if anyone has gone through anything similar and what they did to combat this? And after how long did they started seeing consistent improvement ( I am doing some sort of post game analysis but right now can't seem to find a pattern). If anyone can share their techniques that would be great! ANY advice or imput....I don't want to "waste" or use up any resources too fast or unwisely so if anyone has any other books to supplement, etc. that you would be great also
btw I'm using ek verbal 101
thanks!

 

[DeFused]

The one thing I've learned about verbal reasoning is that it really takes time to get better. You're not going to get better every time you take a practice exam. Also the gains that you will see in verbal reasoning are going to be extremely slow and probably won't even really realize it until the end. You still have 2 month left, I would say just make sure you're doing the correct post question analysis - take every question that you get wrong seriously and try to understand why you got it wrong.

I would focus on 2-3 passages at a time to get the timing down and that way the passages will be more fresh in your mind when you analyze the questions you got wrong (Btw, I'm not saying you should only do two passages a day - just two at a time). If you go through a practice exam with 9 passages and then go back to review you might not be able to remember the thought process you were going through as well.

In terms of post game analysis, I used found some advice here that I don't remember where I read but it really helped me. Most of the time if you're scoring around the 6-8 range you're probably struggling comprehending the more difficult passages - at least that's what it was for me. What I did was I marked all the questions that I got wrong but DONT put the right answer down. Go back to the questions that you marked wrong and try to find the right answer in the passage. This will probably require you to reread the passage and try to understand it. It'll help in your reading comprehension in the long term.

You will also probably need more material and I would recommend tprh verbal workbook and aamcs practice exams for verbal reasoning. The key to verbal reasoning is practice and post question analysis.

 

[Cells4life]

Hi there! thanks for the reply...you mentioned you found some useful advice? can you elaborate on the techqinues..thanks!