January 23 Exam, Just took the Practice Exam need some advice.

[Albo]

I been studying for the Pcat exam next week by taking the kaplan online course and everything was going good until i got a wake up call today.

I took my Pearson Practice Exam and i blew Reading and Verbal tests. My exam is in a week and i am thinking about canceling it. I dont know what happen i got ok scores for verbal and good scores for reading during the kaplan exams.

My Practice Scores

Verbal 23-43% range (percent correct 60%)
Biology 76-96%range (Percent correct 83%)
Chemistry 58-78% (percent correct 65%)
Reading 12-32% (Percent correct 60%)
Math 50-70% (Percent correct 63%)

Overall 43-63%

Please i need some advice i got one week left.

PS: Those douches at kaplan have made their practice exams so easy i thought i had it made

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[Mersades8711]

As far as reading just make sure you read the questions first. Because you do not get points for spending alot of time reading the passage. The exam is just like the Pearson. The passages are rather clear, people just run out of time, because they spend too much time reading the passage. As far as verbal jus pray on it because it may be easier than the pearson. However you could go grab a gre book and go over their top vocab the little bit of time you have. I do not think that you should cancel your exam because you never know how you will do... And if your not comfortable with your performance you can go for the no score option. I think youll do fine because it really depends on how everyone else does on the exam that determines your score. Goodluck!!!

 

[docss26]

I believe there are two tests you can purchase on the pearsons website. I paid around 60 bucks for two tests. What helped me a lot was repeatedly taking the test under test like conditions. Also, you will have the option of immediately reviewing the answers. I scored in the range those online practice tests had predicted I would score.

 

[weetzie00]

I studied with Kaplan. The verbal on the PCAT was significantly easier than the practice tests I used. As far as RC... I'm really not one to give advice since I'm one of those people Mercedes mentioned who bombed that section because I read the passages too slowly and too in depth . Apparently I don't understand the concept of skimming... Anyway, if you don't feel that confident, there's nothing wrong with waiting until you are. You only have so many chances since some schools may average your PCAT if you take more than two. If you cancel, the schools will never know.

 

[joh0472]

Verbal ability was my top score (90) and the best advice I can give someone is to recognize relationship in the question. There are usually one or two choices that can be easily discounted and the other two both relate to the question given but one is probably an opposite or has a different relationship than the other. As far as reading comprehesion goes I didn't do well on in the PCAT (72). I did well on the Kaplan and Barron's Tests and even on the offical practice test but the main thing that got me on the actual PCAT was being able to recognize how the paragraphs tied together and the tone of the author. I think the mistake I make is picturing how I would feel if I wrote what the author did instead of remaining an unbiased reader. Good luck with the test. I would take the test, even if you don't do as well as you hope, there is no substitute for practice and there is a learning curve to taking the test.

 

[pharm B]

This thread belongs in the PCAT forum.

 

[MrMeowphers]

You could potentially just ACE the Chem/Bio/Quant sections and let your verbal + RC scores slide. I have some international student buddies that pretty much for 98-99% on the Chem/Bio/Quant sections and pulled off a minimum of 25-30% on the verbal and RC but ended up beating me with a 97%.

I will have to agree with docss26, the Pearson online practice test gave me the range I actually ended up getting on the actual test.

RC AND Verbal are subjects that are developed over time. If you enjoyed reading books or magazines when you were younger, then you naturally are better at these. I developed my RC and Verbal skills in graduate school since you're required to read a dozen primary scientific journal papers every week. I read like 140 scientific papers in various scientific journals in a couple of weeks when writing my Master's Thesis...

Good luck.

 

[weetzie00]

When it came to studying for verbal, I focused more on the root words. That way when I saw words I didn't recognize, but I saw prefixes or suffixes that I knew, I was able to make an educated guess as to what the answer was. I would definitely recommend looking up some latin/greek root words that English derives from. That helped me a lot.

 

[halfempty84]

You could potentially just ACE the Chem/Bio/Quant sections and let your verbal + RC scores slide. I have some international student buddies that pretty much for 98-99% on the Chem/Bio/Quant sections and pulled off a minimum of 25-30% on the verbal and RC but ended up beating me with a 97%.

I will have to agree with docss26, the Pearson online practice test gave me the range I actually ended up getting on the actual test.

RC AND Verbal are subjects that are developed over time. If you enjoyed reading books or magazines when you were younger, then you naturally are better at these. I developed my RC and Verbal skills in graduate school since you're required to read a dozen primary scientific journal papers every week. I read like 140 scientific papers in various scientific journals in a couple of weeks when writing my Master's Thesis...

Good luck.

I know that a lot of people said their Pearson's score range was reflected on their real PCAT score. I am just worried and curious -- did your actual score fall in the middle of the 20% range from the practice? Thanks.

 

[MrMeowphers]

I know that a lot of people said their Pearson's score range was reflected on their real PCAT score. I am just worried and curious -- did your actual score fall in the middle of the 20% range from the practice? Thanks.

Well I can't tell you whether my international friends actually took the practice exams by Pearson.

I can tell you my case though:

On the 2 Pearson Practice Exams, my ranges were:
Bio - 85 - 99%
Chem - 85 - 99%
Quant - 85 - 99%
RC - 80 - 95%
Verbal - 70 - 85 %

On the Actual Oct '09 PCAT, I got:
Bio - 98%
Chem - 91%
Quant - 91%
RC - 85 %
Verbal - 80%

So it is within the range predicted.