How much time?

[Hemorrage]

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When you guys do your passages how much time do you allocate per passage? I've been trying 7 minutes but its quite difficult for me to finish in under 7 on long VR passages

 

[gettheleadout]

I run a stopwatch but don't actually stop until I'm done with the passage and its questions. I record the times along with my answers. I keep the stopwatch up while doing passages and I shoot for under 7 minutes, usually coming in under time and sometimes much under. Occasionally I'll go over and there have been a couple times I've been way over. I think being able to look back at what sections' passages not only were harder for me but took longer will be useful.

 

[Hemorrage]

I run a stopwatch but don't actually stop until I'm done with the passage and its questions. I record the times along with my answers. I keep the stopwatch up while doing passages and I shoot for under 7 minutes, usually coming in under time and sometimes much under. Occasionally I'll go over and there have been a couple times I've been way over. I think being able to look back at what sections' passages not only were harder for me but took longer will be useful.

hmm thats an interesting approach. I'm going to try that. What are the official lengths/times for the actual MCAT sections?

 

[HotHamH2O]

TBR says around 1:20-1:25 a question but SN2ed says to shoot for under 7 minutes.

 

[Hemorrage]

TBR says around 1:20-1:25 a question but SN2ed says to shoot for under 7 minutes.

Yeah, i've been following the SN2ED advice and doing 7 minutes however i find i can usually never finish on time for verbal.. some of these TBR verbal passages are SO dense i'm sitting there wondering what they are even discussing. There was one i did recently regarding the theories about how the moon was created... absolutely terrible

 

[HotHamH2O]

Yeah, i've been following the SN2ED advice and doing 7 minutes however i find i can usually never finish on time for verbal.. some of these TBR verbal passages are SO dense i'm sitting there wondering what they are even discussing. There was one i did recently regarding the theories about how the moon was created... absolutely terrible

Yeah, right now I am either way under time or way over. Sometimes I zone out and lose track of the main idea and that's the one's I am slower on. From what everyone says, the speed comes in time. You learn how to run through these things quicker knowing the kinds of questions they are going to ask. I am not really worrying so much about time now, just making sure to keep track of the passages that took me longer. Good news is, I'm scoring very well in verbal so I just need to speed it up and I should be OK.

 

[Hemorrage]

Yeah, right now I am either way under time or way over. Sometimes I zone out and lose track of the main idea and that's the one's I am slower on. From what everyone says, the speed comes in time. You learn how to run through these things quicker knowing the kinds of questions they are going to ask. I am not really worrying so much about time now, just making sure to keep track of the passages that took me longer. Good news is, I'm scoring very well in verbal so I just need to speed it up and I should be OK.

Well out of the 14 passages i've done in TBR verbal so far i've scored 5-7 on 12/14 of them, however 2/14 i did abysmal (like 3/7 ... moon one was one of them) but these were all in +/- 15 seconds of the 7 minute marker.. so hopefully things get better. The reason why i didn't want to allot myself extra time is just because i figured all training should be kept as realistic as possible but i do agree with you i know on some passages i just zone out because i just get bored as hell reading it. Whats sad about verbal passages is that they always seem to pick some random non-sense rather than writing of some literary merit. For example the TBR passage i did today was about Berkeley California's legislation on nudity in public.. like wtf?

 

[gettheleadout]

hmm thats an interesting approach. I'm going to try that. What are the official lengths/times for the actual MCAT sections?

BS and PS are each 70 minutes at 52 questions each. Out of those 52, there are 7 passages with 4-7 corresponding problems each. The remaining 13 questions are discretes. Shooting for SN2ed's goal time of 6-7 minutes per passage and 30 sec. to 1 minute for each discrete puts you at just under 56 minutes on average. This leaves 14 minutes remaining as buffer time bank or review time.

VR is 60 minutes at 40 questions. All 40 questions are associated with a total of 7 passages. Shooting for SN2ed's goal time of 6-7 minutes per passage puts you at just under 46 minutes on average, again leaving 14 minutes remaining as buffer time bank or review time.

 

[Hemorrage]

BS and PS are each 70 minutes at 52 questions each. Out of those 52, there are 7 passages with 4-7 corresponding problems each. The remaining 13 questions are discretes. Shooting for SN2ed's goal time of 6-7 minutes per passage and 30 sec. to 1 minute for each discrete puts you at just under 56 minutes on average. This leaves 14 minutes remaining as buffer time bank or review time.

VR is 60 minutes at 40 questions. All 40 questions are associated with a total of 7 passages. Shooting for SN2ed's goal time of 6-7 minutes per passage puts you at just under 46 minutes on average, again leaving 14 minutes remaining as buffer time bank or review time.

Well explained 👍

 

[xGeorgettex]

I recommend taking a full length verbal test (40 questions/7 passages) from EK or TPRH to see what your finish time is. Keep a clock running and try to stick around 7 minutes per passage, but remember that is an average. Finishing a full length within the allotted time will probably help soothe your nerves, if nothing else. Otherwise, give yourself, say, 21 minutes to do your three practice passages of the day back to back and see how that averages out.

I scored an overall 11 and finished with 10 minutes to spare on the real thing. I discovered that shooting for the 7 minute mark was useful when practicing, but it's not set in stone. Some passages were easier and took less time, while others were more time consuming. I prefer to take an average. If I take 10 minutes on one passage, but 6 on the next three for example, that works out just fine. Maybe try that out and see what happens.

 

[HotHamH2O]

I recommend taking a full length verbal test (40 questions/7 passages) from EK or TPRH to see what your finish time is. Keep a clock running and try to stick around 7 minutes per passage, but remember that is an average. Finishing a full length within the allotted time will probably help soothe your nerves, if nothing else. Otherwise, give yourself, say, 21 minutes to do your three practice passages of the day back to back and see how that averages out.

I scored an overall 11 and finished with 10 minutes to spare on the real thing. I discovered that shooting for the 7 minute mark was useful when practicing, but it's not set in stone. Some passages were easier and took less time, while others were more time consuming. I prefer to take an average. If I take 10 minutes on one passage, but 6 on the next three for example, that works out just fine. Maybe try that out and see what happens.

Good advice. I did this today and got 18/21 and under 21 minutes 🙂