Question for January MCAT takers !

[GoldenSword]

The old MCAT had 9 passages for verbal (85 minutes)
The time is reduced to 60 minutes now, how many passages are there ?

Also on each of the science sections, there were about 11 passages and 15 stand alone questions, totalling to 77 questions.
How are the 52 questions divided ? how many passages and how many stand alones?

Are AAMC 9R and 10R practice exams formatted similarly ?

Thanks

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[wutwinb]

The old MCAT had 9 passages for verbal (85 minutes)
The time is reduced to 60 minutes now, how many passages are there ?

Also on each of the science sections, there were about 11 passages and 15 stand alone questions, totalling to 77 questions.
How are the 52 questions divided ? how many passages and how many stand alones?

Are AAMC 9R and 10R practice exams formatted similarly ?

Thanks

Verbal: 7 passages in 60 minutes.
Sciences: 7 passages + 13 discretes in 70 minutes.


however, a few days before my January test, Kaplan sent me an e-mail that there will eventually be different versions of the Physical and Biological Sciences. A version might have 7, 8 or 9 passages. but they will always have 13 discretes.


hope that helps

 

[GoldenSword]

thanks. So this means 8 minutes something per passage, compared to 9 minutes something in the longer test that's about how long it takes me to just answer the questions, I don't know how I can manage to read the passage itself in such short time. any suggestions any1 ?

 

[RAD11]

thanks. So this means 8 minutes something per passage, compared to 9 minutes something in the longer test that's about how long it takes me to just answer the questions, I don't know how I can manage to read the passage itself in such short time. any suggestions any1 ?

Practice

 

[wutwinb]

thanks. So this means 8 minutes something per passage, compared to 9 minutes something in the longer test that's about how long it takes me to just answer the questions, I don't know how I can manage to read the passage itself in such short time. any suggestions any1 ?

most of the passages in the biological and physical sciences don't take more than 3-4 minutes to read if you are focusing on content and not detail. also, i found that many of the AAMC questions are not strictly based on the passage and can be answered with outside information. just get enough of the passage to know what it is about and what they might ask, then put as much time as you can into answering the questions.
.....he's right though, it does come down to practicing a lot....

 

[GoldenSword]

most of the passages in the biological and physical sciences don't take more than 3-4 minutes to read if you are focusing on content and not detail. also, i found that many of the AAMC questions are not strictly based on the passage and can be answered with outside information. just get enough of the passage to know what it is about and what they might ask, then put as much time as you can into answering the questions.
.....he's right though, it does come down to practicing a lot....

You're right, I have noticed that many questions in the Science sections can be answered without reading/correlating the passage info. In fact, I'm doing ok on the science sections as far as timing.
but my main concern/problem is the verbal reasoning since English is not my native language and I'm a slow reader. I can read quickly and not understand the ideas, but I'm sure that would not be a method any1 would want to use to approch VR passages.