Kaplan PCAT Biology & QA

[calisoca]

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I realize there is a PCAT specific forum, but here goes:

I have heard various statements saying the Kaplan book goes into too much detail in the biology section; however, it lacks pertinent microbiology information. Does anybody who has studied from this source and taken the test agree? Is this sufficient review of biology? In addition to this I'm hearing that Kaplan is weak weak weak in its prep for the Quant. Ability portion of the test. Can anyone back this up and if so, what sort of material do/have you guys found more useful?

Thanks for your input and sorry if this has been addressed ad nauseam in the past.

 

[jmoini]

mods and OP: this should really be in the PCAT forum

yeah, i've heard a lot of people say kaplan bio was good prep. i think it was great except for microbio stuff, i'm not really sure what to recommend to make up for that.

kaplan is also extremely weak on QA. it's kinda like they put stuff together and decided to sell it, and never update it or correct the mistakes. i felt confident enough in my QA abilities to not worry about it too much.

 

[fenixtnlfan]

Moved to PCAT forum because of topic. Yeah, if you know where the thread is supposed to go post it there. It's just going to get moved anyways. Though it does give me something to do when I would rather not study Immunology.

Really only the Bio section is good in the Kaplan book, and I would say it's all you need for Bio. I used old notes and books for the other stuff. This question has been discussed a lot, so do some searching. I can't remember any of the recommendations that I have seen.

 

[sashagrl259]

Kaplan's detailed Biology section is a plus. I felt really prepared after learning everything in that section from Kaplan. Since is does lack in the microbiology section, and I haven't take that class I bought Schaum's outlines Microbology and learned that book as well.

For math the only questions that I thought were equally comparable to the real test was the Harcourt practice exam. I used many books to prepare (Kaplan, Barron's (new and old), Cliff's, REA flashcards), but everything seemed easier than the actual exam.

 

[nonzerosum]

I actually heard the opposite, I have a friend who took it in June and said that the Kaplan bio section was way off, missing lots of info.

Can anyone give some insight into this? Would just memorizing all that is in the kaplan bio be enough?

 

[diastole]

I actually heard the opposite, I have a friend who took it in June and said that the Kaplan bio section was way off, missing lots of info.

Can anyone give some insight into this? Would just memorizing all that is in the kaplan bio be enough?

I rocked the bio section and there were things that I vaguely remembered from my classes years ago that weren't covered in Kaplans. I also had to supplement the microbiology with my textbook. Kaplan's alone is not good enough to get a 99 but I suspect that it is good enough to get a decent score. I would do more than just memorize Kaplan's though. If you are learning about muscles, for example, and you don't really understand what is happening, go to your text to get the hows and whys. That will help you remember it on the PCAT and also reason out answers that are asked in a different format than what you were expecting. Go for understanding rather than rote memorization.