The Official November 7, 2014 MCAT Thread

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M.D.orbust

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Hey all! I am signed up for this date. 8:00 a.m. Yikes!!! I am aiming hard to make 40+ my reality so hence me making this thread so early. A former lab- mate and current medical student had a ton of MCAT prep stuff she gave to me. So I have the Examcrackers set, Hyperlearning set, regular Princeton Review, audio osmosis, and practice MCAT tests from a variety of sources I also do the MCAT questions a day through email and on my phone (to help with super quick recall). I am officially studying legitimately now. Currently starting with Examcrackers. I'd love to hear from you all doing the same. Let's do this!!!
 
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athlete1003 said:
thank's for the encouragment 🙂 I've been getting 9's and 10's too.



You know, to be honest, I'm not sure. USUALLY for me it's just understanding the passages...Sometimes I'll be short on time, but that hasn't been the case lately. I know you're not supposed to look at the clock, but if I'm not understanding the passage, I could spend like 10+ minutes on one lol. So I look at the clock to try and not spend more than 8 minutes on a passage. If I'm having a tough time on a passage, I just choose my best guess and move on to the next question. I got 9's on AAMCs 3 and 4. 10s on AAMC 5,7,8,9. Now I take AAMC 10 and get an 8?

On AAMC 10, I was actually relieved because the passages were easy to understand or read. However, with 10, I definitely felt like the answer choices were much tougher to narrow down than they were on the other AAMCs. Idk. Even though I just took it, it's all a blur now. 🙁
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oh man i thought AAMC 10 VR passages were horrrrrrrible besides i think 2 that were pretty science-y.
 
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Man aamc 11 was tough but thank you aamc for that verbal curve lol (10PS/8VR/10BS) It literally happens every test where I reason the correct answer in either BS or PS and I choose the wrong answer because I am trying to go fast as I can. I usually dont have much time to check my answers at the end. Hoping my mind will be super duper sharp and catch these errors on Friday.


Home stretch everyone!
 
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One tip someone gave me in the summer when I was studying PS was when you're stuck work with units. Units are your BEST FRIENDS and knowing how to manipulate them is very important. The only place where units are not so easy is electrostatics and magnetism but otherwise I love them!
 
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TheEngineeringNerd said:
One tip someone gave me in the summer when I was studying PS was when you're stuck work with units. Units are your BEST FRIENDS and knowing how to manipulate them is very important. The only place where units are not so easy is electrostatics and magnetism but otherwise I love them!
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+1000 I cannot stress this enough myself.
 
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Taking AAMC 11 tomorrow morning and then reviewing it a few hours afterwards. This is it guys we are so close!! 😱 😱

Time to wiggle off our worries haha ::wiggle wiggle::

giphy.gif
 
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lazyindy said:
Taking AAMC 11 tomorrow morning and then reviewing it a few hours afterwards. This is it guys we are so close!! 😱 😱

Time to wiggle off our worries haha ::wiggle wiggle::

giphy.gif
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That my friend, is an awesome jif.

Right now I am so excited to go to the mall first time this semester and eat at the cheesecake factory as celebration on Monday I feel like doing this dance haha!
dancing-spiderman.gif
 
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Well guys, I just did the 2015 "bio" section, and if you want to practice experimental passages, I would definitely recommend it. They are all experimental, most of them disease/physio based with a molecular bio/genetics experimental undertone. Edit: even though at the surface they seemed challenging, they were kinda fun to dissect!! Got 52/59 correct.
 
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I've taken it waaaay easy compared to the last few months this past week so I wouldn't be burned out by the time of my test. I just hope it doesn't come back to haunt me! Sometimes, I get so worried about forgetting stuff, but here's hoping it all pans out.
 
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anon5759 said:
Well guys, I just did the 2015 "bio" section, and if you want to practice experimental passages, I would definitely recommend it. They are all experimental, most of them disease/physio based with a molecular bio/genetics experimental undertone. Edit: even though at the surface they seemed challenging, they were kinda fun to dissect!! Got 52/59 correct.
Click to expand...
Is this the new 2015 practice exam or the guide you are talking about?
 
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lmao..... another 28 in the books. i guess that's my favorite number


AAMC FL 11
10/8/10

definitely ran short for time on VR which i have never done in any of my tests.

a record breaking 22% on orgo questions lol :shrug:
guess it balanced out with a record breaking 88% on bio questions

history of FL scores:
24 (real deal this June)
27 (FL 3)
27 (FL 4)
25 (FL 5)
28 (FL 9)
28 (FL 10)
28 (FL 11)


Averages from AAMC material (not including real deal or self assessments): 27.2 composite, 9.67 PS, 8.00 VR, 9.50 BS

annnnnddddd because I'm a excel nerd... METRICS!
Composite:
2cgmsd1.png


PS:
2e0iy3p.png


VR:
14uufj9.png


BS:
9kus5c.png


the most noticeable trend i can see is composite and bio questions in BS. everything else looks incredibly sporadic lol
 
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@baxt1412 did you take the AAMC practice FL's prior to taking your first MCAT this june? That is a respectable increase but I was just wondering if you would be happy with around a 28?
 
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lazyindy said:
@baxt1412 did you take the AAMC practice FL's prior to taking your first MCAT this june? That is a respectable increase but I was just wondering if you would be happy with around a 28?
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first time with these FLs. also, got a 24 on my first real deal MCAT in june. i'm pretty happy with a 4 point increase. it's not perfect, but it's what i've got.


i did some paper versions that were available in my bio dept at school, idk what they were exactly... i'm guessing non-AAMC. i'm applying primarily DO and a 28 would seal a lot of acceptances provided the spots are still open. ideally i would want a 30 like most others, but for my #1, they won't take an MCAT past nov 7 so i didn't want to push back to dec or jan.
 
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ciestar said:
Im starting to question if i should take aamc 11 at all. Im so tired right now.
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Please don't burn out so far into the game. Everybody on this forum deserves to succeed for the work they put in, including you!

My thinking is that one practice test won't benefit you a whole ton. You honestly don't learn a huge amount from taking practice tests. They are absolutely essential in the beginning after content review, to figure out your weak points and build stamina. If you think you are too tired and can make do without it, take it easy man.
 
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I'm only reviewing my concepts and formulas for the next two days. I don't get how you guys are still doing tests. Then again, I ran out of tests already.
 
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When you guys encounter a problem that has a lot of calculations to do (i.e. balance equation, then find limiting reagent, moles to gram conversion, etc.) is it better to take the proper time to solve it or just come back to it later if you have time. I feel like sometimes I get stuck right in between and end up wasting precious time.
 
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I was mad about that 11 on my VR on AAMC 11 so I took just the verbal from 8 today and got a 15. I would love if I could do that on the actual test!

I'll be taking 10 tomorrow.
 
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Janus_Kinase said:
When you guys encounter a problem that has a lot of calculations to do (i.e. balance equation, then find limiting reagent, moles to gram conversion, etc.) is it better to take the proper time to solve it or just come back to it later if you have time. I feel like sometimes I get stuck right in between and end up wasting precious time.
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I'd just do it and if I feel like I'm spending too much time I'll choose a random answer, mark it, and come back
 
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Janus_Kinase said:
When you guys encounter a problem that has a lot of calculations to do (i.e. balance equation, then find limiting reagent, moles to gram conversion, etc.) is it better to take the proper time to solve it or just come back to it later if you have time. I feel like sometimes I get stuck right in between and end up wasting precious time.
Click to expand...

If you can figure out it's going be calculation heavy in under 5 secs, I would pick an answer and mark it to come back to at the end. I say this because you usually see these problems in the PS section. This sections tends to be time more crunchy because of calculations. If you tend to be under a time crunch in this section and triage it, you can get 2 or 3 easy questions out the way instead of this one long question which is worth the same as an easy question. Another thing is that you can probably get this done in 45 secs to 1 minute if you only have that much time. I notice that I can push myself to finish a passage in PS in 6-7 mins if that's all I have and still do pretty good.

As a side note, remember that all the hard concepts melt down to a/several simple concept and it's your job as a standardized test taker to figure out what the simple concepts are and how to apply it to the situation given. That is what the smartest idiot, in @lazyindy's words, does when taking this test.
 
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TheEngineeringNerd said:
Please don't burn out so far into the game. Everybody on this forum deserves to succeed for the work they put in, including you!

My thinking is that one practice test won't benefit you a whole ton. You honestly don't learn a huge amount from taking practice tests. They are absolutely essential in the beginning after content review, to figure out your weak points and build stamina. If you think you are too tired and can make do without it, take it easy man.
Click to expand...

That's what I'm afraid of. I feel like i need it really to basically "test run" before Friday.
I just feel like I'm on a disaster course. I feel like I'd be better off really going over stuff I'm weakest at for the next few days and watching some more of Chad's videos to try and nail things down, or do some SWB passages rather than an entire exam. My fiancé doesn't seem to think so, though, continually tells me over preparing is better than under preparing. Basically doesn't believe in burnout.

Im also terrified i'll do poorly and that'll blow whatever confidence i have.
 
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Looking back, at least i'm consistent.
I just wish i could trust my AAMC 10 score, but I don't. It should be much higher than it is. I took it under very poor conditions with distractions galore.

my nerves are starting to get to me.
 
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Wow. Going through my AAMC 9, i always miss the "easy" questions. I need to fix that and not over think things so much.
 
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Decided against taking AAMC 11. I hope i don't regret this.
But I feel like i have major burnout ensuing and I don't want to push it.
 
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What formulas/equations is everyone memorizing and writing down on their scratch paper as soon as they sit down?

F=ma

KE= 1/2mv'2

D=M/V

Lambda*nu= C

M1V1=M2V2

Pv=nrt

....
 
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MajorUnderDog, isn't that a bad idea? Why don't you wait until you see a question that needs an equation? You might waste time writing equations that you wont be using. And from recent tests, the physical science portion have been non-mathematical.
 
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Okay, little sister is finally taking FL AAMC exams, and boy oh boy, what a wild ride.
Scoring between 11-13 on PS, 12-15 on BS, and a mere 7 on VR, but just got a 9 on her last one.
Still has FL AAMC on 10 and 11 to go. This is a huge unbalanced score, but not much we can do about it now.
Her 9 finally came when she just went through it and didn't give a crap anymore. Most curious outcome for that strategy. Probably just overthinking it, but who knows. Verbal is just plain unexplainable to anyone else.

Best wishes to her and you all on Friday.
 
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Great White Buffalo said:
Okay, little sister is finally taking FL AAMC exams, and boy oh boy, what a wild ride.
Scoring between 11-13 on PS, 12-15 on BS, and a mere 7 on VR, but just got a 9 on her last one.
Still has FL AAMC on 10 and 11 to go. This is a huge unbalanced score, but not much we can do about it now.
Her 9 finally came when she just went through it and didn't give a crap anymore. Most curious outcome for that strategy. Probably just overthinking it, but who knows. Verbal is just plain unexplainable to anyone else.

Best wishes to her and you all on Friday.
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unbalanced isn't so big of a deal if verbal is the one that is lowest IMO. everybody knows verbal is really tough, so even getting an 8 is fine as long as you can make up for it in the PS and BS to get your desired score. it's when VR gets under 8 that you start running into issues, if i had to guess. now obviously if you get a 12/11/8 or something similar then they may not want to take the chance, but i'd say if any of your scores were a few points lower than the others, you'd want it to be VR.


Doctor W said:
MajorUnderDog, isn't that a bad idea? Why don't you wait until you see a question that needs an equation? You might waste time writing equations that you wont be using. And from recent tests, the physical science portion have been non-mathematical.
Click to expand...


i don't think writing down a few equations that are the hardest for you to memorize is a bad idea.

but if you're at this point and you can't remember f=ma, etc then you might want to postpone... again, not trying to be rude but more realistic. that should be second nature to you as a scientist, but especially as someone who is taking the MCAT in LESS THAN 48 HOURS AHHHHH lol.
 
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Doctor W said:
MajorUnderDog, isn't that a bad idea? Why don't you wait until you see a question that needs an equation? You might waste time writing equations that you wont be using. And from recent tests, the physical science portion have been non-mathematical.
Click to expand...

Because you write them down during the tutorial and thus waste no time at all. Lol
 
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MajorUnderDog said:
What formulas/equations is everyone memorizing and writing down on their scratch paper as soon as they sit down?

F=ma

KE= 1/2mv'2

D=M/V

Lambda*nu= C

M1V1=M2V2

Pv=nrt

....
Click to expand...

Are these equations youre having issues memorizing?

Im going to be working on a few of the sound ones (fundamental frequency), the electrostatics ones, and probably Nernsts. No idea what i have to memorize, but even so...
Maybe kinematics too. Idk yet
 
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not that i've been scoring 15s on the PS, but I don't really think I've had to use the kinematics very much and i took AAMC 3, 4, 5, 9, 10, 11. and i certainly don't know them by heart, but it wouldn't hurt i suppose. i'm going to try and commit a few more equations to memory but also have a list of maybe 5 that i'll write down.
 
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ciestar said:
Are these equations youre having issues memorizing?

Im going to be working on a few of the sound ones (fundamental frequency), the electrostatics ones, and probably Nernsts. No idea what i have to memorize, but even so...
Maybe kinematics too. Idk yet
Click to expand...


No no. I was just throwing out some common examples of one's that seemed to be the most common throughout the AAMC FLs that popped up in my mind.

I was just curious what everyone else had in their mind.
 
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baxt1412 said:
unbalanced isn't so big of a deal if verbal is the one that is lowest IMO. everybody knows verbal is really tough, so even getting an 8 is fine as long as you can make up for it in the PS and BS to get your desired score. it's when VR gets under 8 that you start running into issues, if i had to guess. now obviously if you get a 12/11/8 or something similar then they may not want to take the chance, but i'd say if any of your scores were a few points lower than the others, you'd want it to be VR.





i don't think writing down a few equations that are the hardest for you to memorize is a bad idea.

but if you're at this point and you can't remember f=ma, etc then you might want to postpone... again, not trying to be rude but more realistic. that should be second nature to you as a scientist, but especially as someone who is taking the MCAT in LESS THAN 48 HOURS AHHHHH lol.
Click to expand...

Believe it or not but medical schools actually pay most attention to verbal which sucks so much! In Canada they have started only paying attention to the verbal score which I think is unrepresentative of a competitive medical school applicant. I wish I was strong on that subject but I'm not and I guess I can't do anything about it at this point.

I'll take another FL when I get home and call it a day...
 
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MajorUnderDog said:
No no. I was just throwing out some common examples of one's that seemed to be the most common throughout the AAMC FLs that popped up in my mind.

I was just curious what everyone else had in their mind.
Click to expand...

Im basically basing it on what equations i had issues recalling during my full lengths. So, a lot of electrostatics because i cant seem to remember any of them very well except for F=kq1q2/r^2
 
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Do you guys know during which tutorial in the beginning of the real MCAT are we allowed to jot down equations for the PS section? Because I heard there are two or three 10 minute sections?
 
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adr2be said:
Do you guys know during which tutorial in the beginning of the real MCAT are we allowed to jot down equations for the PS section? Because I heard there are two or three 10 minute sections?
Click to expand...

i think you can use either. the AAMC doesn't have any rules on this as far as I am aware.
 
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update: AAMC 11 14 PS 14 VR 15 BS : 43!!

Wow this PS definitely was not like the other AAMC's, very calculation oriented and relatively few manipulations of concepts. I usually finish PS with 10 mins remaining but this one I only had around 3 mins left.

VR was alright and BS was just as time consuming as PS. That ebola passage almost took me 10 minutes to do but the rest weren't too bad. I definitely felt a little more pressed for time on this FL than I have on the previous ones. I am both excited and nervous simultaneously for AAMC 12 🙂p) on friday haha. Well lets hope its similar to the practice exams and nothing too ridiculously demoralizing. A little over a day left guys!! lets do this!!

:clap:
 
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