I am scheduled to take the mcat on April 23rd. So far I have been scoring 500+ in kaplan and tpr exams. Most recent one being 507 in TPR exam. I am yet to take the aamc practice exam. I have been doing the question bank and scoring around 80-90% . However, once I started the section bank I collapsed. I have been scoring 55-65% worst being the bio. However, bio is my highest score in all the practice exam. My question is how representative are the section banks in terms of difficulty level? Does the real test require the level of data analysis as the AAMC section bank?
Thanks in advance.
Hi
@holdmystethoscope The AAMC question packs are comprised of recycled material from old AAMC practice items from before the 2015 MCAT, chosen because they happen to question science still relevant to the new exam. However, the Section packs are a much better representation of the new questions types and perceived difficulty of the new exam. this is why they came out almost a year after the question packs. Use the section banks as the true gauge of your ability to reason like the AAMC, not the Q packs.
The new MCAT literally has new question types (not really new, but newly emphasized), Skill 3 and Skill 4, that explicitly look for your ability to examine, interpret, and draw conclusions from data presented in many different visual formats. this is what you will be doing
a lot of all throughout medical school and as a physician, trust me. these question will comprise 10% of each (20% total) of the science sections on the new MCAT. no to mention the other skill 1 or skill 2 questions that may require you to possible use a figure/table/graph or equation.
If you need some help, there are several resources you can use, some free, others not, to work on your data interpretation. Easiest is to take a look at some articles in a publication like scientific American to start. it is meant for an educated layman, which is all pre-meds are and what the AAMC can reasonably expect. Always start by examining axes, if there are any. look for trends, outliers. Examine the tables, figures, graphs and see if you can grasp what the meaning or significance of the findings show, in the context of the goal of the experiment or study. Once you get comfortable with those, move on to scientific journals. Most of the figures in peer reviewed journals will be beyond your grasp and beyond the realm of the MCAT, but many of them will fit. I have spoken with AAMC reps and even they recommend this as a way to work on these skills.
If you do not have access to these journals, ask a professor, head to your university library. Find a friend who works in a lab to help you understand the basics if you need it. The
NextStep exams all feature data and graphs taken from peer reviewed journal articles, just like the AAMC. You can get a 1/2 length and full length MCAT for free. Also for free is the Khan Academy site. Many of the passages are not so great and the questions and format do not replicate the real MCAT well, but they do have a ton of useful, MCAT level graphs for you to evaluate. these figures are also at the level of complexity the AAMC expects and they are there for you at no cost. There are mistakes in some of them but you get enough decent ones considering the price.
Hope this helps, good luck!
