Tips for the Verbal Reasoning Section of the MCAT? IN HIGHSCHOOL

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Hey, so I am currently going into grade 12 after this ensuing Summer and I am feeling both brisk and avid! I am pursing my career in medicine and have read the mandatory steps in becoming a physician; however, one thing sparked me with awe and curiosity: The MCAT. I know I should not be worrying about the MCAT at such an early stage of my pursuit, but since there is a section on the MCAT regarding your English reasoning skills called The Verbal Reasoning Section, I wanted to start preparing and enhancing my vocabulary as soon as possible. Can you please give me some advice on how I can start preparing myself for this section; any ways to improve vocabulary/reasoning skills on the Internet for free? I have recently start using Vocabulary.com to aid me in developing a stronger foundation. Would you suggest I continue using this site to help enhance my vocabulary? Also, do you have any free links or websites that I can read articles that will help me? Sorry, english is my worst subject at school. I usually get low 90's... thanks
Update : Also, do you know any good news websites? I was thinking about reading The Economist on a daily basis. Opinions?

 

[Dreamstoo]

Hey, so I am currently going into grade 12 after this ensuing Summer and I am feeling both brisk and avid! I am pursing my career in medicine and have read the mandatory steps in becoming a physician; however, one thing sparked me with awe and curiosity: The MCAT. I know I should not be worrying about the MCAT at such an early stage of my pursuit, but since there is a section on the MCAT regarding your English reasoning skills called The Verbal Reasoning Section, I wanted to start preparing and enhancing my vocabulary as soon as possible. Can you please give me some advice on how I can start preparing myself for this section; any ways to improve vocabulary/reasoning skills on the Internet for free? I have recently start using Vocabulary.com to aid me in developing a stronger foundation. Would you suggest I continue using this site to help enhance my vocabulary? Also, do you have any free links or websites that I can read articles that will help me? Sorry, english is my worst subject at school. I usually get low 90's... thanks
Update : Also, do you know any good news websites? I was thinking about reading The Economist on a daily basis. Opinions?

Get off SDN network and enjoy your last summer before senior year. Enjoy senioritis once you get into college.

 

[Sammy1024]

If you really want to work at it then just start reading newspapers/ books. Verbal isn't about vocabulary because they usually give you the definitions in the passage.

 

[spaceflow7]

If you really want to work at it then just start reading newspapers/ books. Verbal isn't about vocabulary because they usually give you the definitions in the passage.

I have read some articles online from people who have taken the test and they claimed you need to have a strong vocabulary; a big one. Do you think this is a little misleading? I know verbal isn't about vocabulary, but I've heard it makes it a lot easier to comprehend the passages.

 

[Sammy1024]

Personally I don't have an extensive vocabulary, and when I do passages, i've only wondered about a word maybe a handful of times. Most of the time they're...

Ex: There were a plethora of plants in the area, so many that you could barely see the horizon.

Knowing that plethora basically means a lot you could have deduced that from the rest of the sentence.

Some thing I did have trouble with, and I would recommend a refresher are political things like socialist, capitalist, etc... Sometimes they call someone a capitalist in the passage and i'm like wait what was that again?

 

[kristinaeatscows]

MCAT verbal is more about your ability to evaluate the arguments and assess the structure of the arguments that are presented in the passages they give you. Most of them are from textbooks in economics, art history, anthropology, etc, and they will be heavily excerpted.

Since you're not in college yet and there's still hope for you, I strongly suggest you take as many electives as you can in non-science disciplines. Upper level history classes, just as an example, will really test your ability to evaluate argument structure in secondary sources similar to the ones you'll see on the MCAT. If you want to take Latin or Greek, take them. Art history. Ancient history. Classical civilizations. Anthropology. Sociology. Whatever you're interested in that's a humanities type discipline, THAT is where you're going to learn how to think and evaluate. This is also where you're going to do a lot of writing, and that's going to benefit you when it's time to write admissions essays, interview, etc. If you want to, you could even take your prereqs as electives (the chemistries, biologies, biochems, calculus, and physics with the labs that are required for admission to med school) and get your bachelor's degree in a non-science discipline. There's no rule that says you need a degree in microbiology to get into med school (but you should take microbiology, just because it's cool and you'll learn a LOT about bacteria). So pick something you think you'll like, whether it's art history or Chinese poetry in translation, and go for it. Enjoy it. It will make you a better doctor to immerse yourself in the human condition.

I also suggest you take a prep course the semester before you take the MCAT. Not just the SDN self-study program, but an actual course taught by actual teachers for which you'll have to pay actual tuition. Your university will probably have a deal with Princeton Review or Kaplan to provide courses via the university. If they don't, sign up for one right from TPR or Kaplan. Take advantage of the opportunity to have teachers accessible who know the MCAT forwards and backwards and who can teach you to strategize, which is just as important as your content knowledge.

 

[Sammy1024]

I completely agree with the user above!

 

[spaceflow7]

Personally I don't have an extensive vocabulary, and when I do passages, i've only wondered about a word maybe a handful of times. Most of the time they're...

Ex: There were a plethora of plants in the area, so many that you could barely see the horizon.

Knowing that plethora basically means a lot you could have deduced that from the rest of the sentence.

Some thing I did have trouble with, and I would recommend a refresher are political things like socialist, capitalist, etc... Sometimes they call someone a capitalist in the passage and i'm like wait what was that again?

Thanks for the advice, I also get mixed up with those political terms haha

MCAT verbal is more about your ability to evaluate the arguments and assess the structure of the arguments that are presented in the passages they give you. Most of them are from textbooks in economics, art history, anthropology, etc, and they will be heavily excerpted.

Since you're not in college yet and there's still hope for you, I strongly suggest you take as many electives as you can in non-science disciplines. Upper level history classes, just as an example, will really test your ability to evaluate argument structure in secondary sources similar to the ones you'll see on the MCAT. If you want to take Latin or Greek, take them. Art history. Ancient history. Classical civilizations. Anthropology. Sociology. Whatever you're interested in that's a humanities type discipline, THAT is where you're going to learn how to think and evaluate. This is also where you're going to do a lot of writing, and that's going to benefit you when it's time to write admissions essays, interview, etc. If you want to, you could even take your prereqs as electives (the chemistries, biologies, biochems, calculus, and physics with the labs that are required for admission to med school) and get your bachelor's degree in a non-science discipline. There's no rule that says you need a degree in microbiology to get into med school (but you should take microbiology, just because it's cool and you'll learn a LOT about bacteria). So pick something you think you'll like, whether it's art history or Chinese poetry in translation, and go for it. Enjoy it. It will make you a better doctor to immerse yourself in the human condition.

I also suggest you take a prep course the semester before you take the MCAT. Not just the SDN self-study program, but an actual course taught by actual teachers for which you'll have to pay actual tuition. Your university will probably have a deal with Princeton Review or Kaplan to provide courses via the university. If they don't, sign up for one right from TPR or Kaplan. Take advantage of the opportunity to have teachers accessible who know the MCAT forwards and backwards and who can teach you to strategize, which is just as important as your content knowledge.

Thanks for the advice and writing such a descriptive response. I will mostly likely plan to take economics and/or history then because those subjects interest me; however, do you have any tips on what I can be doing on a daily basis? Like would you recommend reading various articles about the news and stuff. I am not really a news person as I only read the major events happening in the world briefly. Do you know any good websites? I know it depends on my interests and stuff, but like I said in the OP, would "The Economist" be a good website to develop a stronger foundation of knowledge and improve me in one way or another?
Once again, thanks guys for the advice. I always appreciate people using the Internet for more selfless reasons, and helping others from their own personal knowledge and experience.

 

[Sammy1024]

What helped me a little was reading NYTimes. I find those passages to be so boring but forcing myself to read them made reading MCAT passages a little easier, and easier to digest. I have a verbal guru friend who strictly reads books. She didn't even try at verbal because she's been reading books on a regular basis for many years now. Her score was like 13/14.

 

[kenjixshadow]

x

 

[orangetea]

when I was in high school I was worried about winning my next soccer match and eating.. and occasionally pissing my parents off.

 

[Dreamstoo]

when I was in high school I was worried about winning my next soccer match and eating.. and occasionally pissing my parents off.

I fell asleep during my AP literature exam in senior year and answered 3 multiple choice questions and guessed on everything else and talked about Harry Potter in the essays.

 

[orangetea]

I fell asleep during my AP literature exam in senior year and answered 3 multiple choice questions and guessed on everything else and talked about Harry Potter in the essays.

at least you made it.. I missed my AP compsci test AND AP stat.. got 1s in both because I had paid for them.. still made it to a top uni. #lifegoeson

 

[Dreamstoo]

at least you made it.. I missed my AP compsci test AND AP stat.. got 1s in both because I had paid for them.. still made it to a top uni. #lifegoeson

On my AP calc exam I got a negative value for time and burst out laughing then said "sorry" cause I forgot I was taking it near most juniors.

 

[Dr. Doctor]

If your in high school and you want to prepare for verbal here is a link to premedwiki http://www.wikipremed.com/mcat_verbal_reasoning.php. At the bottom of the page there are about a hundred books or so to give you a good idea of good verbal prep literature. There is also some advice and tips on preparing for verbal but take everything you read with a grain of salt--what works for someone else might not work for you.

 

[brood910]

One thing that I regret the most is that I did not prepare for verbal ahead of time as an ESL student.

 

[sps27]

I am hoping that by the time OP takes the test, the powers that be will get some sense and take that damned section off the exam......if a person can read those big long graph-y passages in sciences and get 12's, they have comprehension skills, period!......

 

[theparty]

I am pursing my career in medicine and have read the mandatory steps in becoming a physician

weight wut?

 

[kxc262]

I would the types of subjects you read. Don't stick solely to science reading.

 

[RC4L]

Hey, so I am currently going into grade 12 after this ensuing Summer and I am feeling both brisk and avid! I am pursing my career in medicine and have read the mandatory steps in becoming a physician; however, one thing sparked me with awe and curiosity: The MCAT. I know I should not be worrying about the MCAT at such an early stage of my pursuit, but since there is a section on the MCAT regarding your English reasoning skills called The Verbal Reasoning Section, I wanted to start preparing and enhancing my vocabulary as soon as possible. Can you please give me some advice on how I can start preparing myself for this section; any ways to improve vocabulary/reasoning skills on the Internet for free? I have recently start using Vocabulary.com to aid me in developing a stronger foundation. Would you suggest I continue using this site to help enhance my vocabulary? Also, do you have any free links or websites that I can read articles that will help me? Sorry, english is my worst subject at school. I usually get low 90's... thanks
Update : Also, do you know any good news websites? I was thinking about reading The Economist on a daily basis. Opinions?

I admire your attitude but please do yourself a favor and enjoy your life before you actually have things to worry about! One of the most important and beneficial things you can do as a pre med student or just as a human being really is to take one day at a time. This is the best time of your life and you need to enjoy it to the fullest. Don't think about what you will do in college until you get there. Once you start college you need to know the 4 things needed for med school: 1) grades 2) good extracurricular involvement( hands on volunteer work in the medical field that involves direct patient contact and social leadership) 3) good mcat 4) good application. Right now, none of these should be a concern and once you start college, only 1 and 2 should be a concern until you actually need to decide when to schedule the mcat. If you really want to get a head start on the mcat, be a good student in college. Pay attention in class, take good notes, and commit what you in learn each day in class to memory instead of waiting until exams roll around. At times, cramming may be ok as far as grades are concerned but the knowledge will come and go with each exam and you wont retain nearly as much. Spreading the work out over time will give you a much better understanding/background of the material so when you actually study for the mcat you will grasp the material more quickly and efficiently. It will allow you to avoid a ton of stress and leave you time to enjoy your college experience which you should never sacrifice. I know many students who graduated with 4.0s and great mcats but never had fun and now as medical students, they regret not easing up because they realize how easy it actually was. Don't be that kind of student! I was in a fraternity and was a regular musician at a handful of bars around campus so I was partying more than going to class until my junior and I nearly flunked out because of it. Thankfully I managed to turn things around completely and over the following two years, put in enough work to make up for lost time and managed to get into the med school of my choice after 5 years of undergrad. Although I could have made my life much easier without sacrificing all fun, I have zero regrets and feel far more prepared/equipped as a person to be a medical professional. I apologize for going on a tangent here but in the long run, there is so much more to being a physician than having a good mcat score or having a library-sized volume of textbooks embedded in your brain. More students need to realize this. You need to develop as a friend, listener, leader, and general social human being just as much as you need to develop your understanding of the human body to be a good physician. There is an astounding number of socially illiterate/incapable medical students and doctors who are handicapped in application despite an incredible wealth of knowledge because they lack the ability to receive, interpret, and process information from real patients. Brilliance is worth very little if it is limited to textbook language! Don't sacrifice certain aspects of your evolution as a physician and keep in mind that a significant portion of a great college education can be found outside the classroom.
Anyway, for the verbal portion of the mcat it will certainly help you to be a good reader but reading simply for the sake or reading will not yield much. Verbal requires a task-specific skill and for most people including myself, defeating the verbal section requires you to change particular aspects of how you read(you wont realize how you read until you are forced to answer questions on your reading) which didn't make sense to me at the time considering I had been an avid reader for much of my life. By all means read constantly but I wouldn't worry too much about reading specifically for mcat purposes. You shouldn't need more than 3-4 months to study for the mcat if you do it correctly despite what paranoid and over dramatic testers say. The majority of people who take the exam do not prepare correctly or do not prepare enough. These people will view and broadcast THEIR failures as problems/impossibilities with exam itself which is horse **** and unfortunately, the source of most mcat information. The exam is hard but not at all impossible and so many people give up before realizing this. SDN 30plus forum is the place to go to get good info regarding how to prepare and hopefully it is still a goldmine of knowledge after the new mcat becomes situated. Lastly, don't make the mistake of thinking that the only important thing in medical admissions is having an insanely high mcat score because it is not. Grades test your commitment to learning, what you do outside of class tests your ability as a socially competent /capable human being, and the mcat tests your ability to think. All three of these things are very important as a medical school applicant and having a phenomenal mcat score wont substitute for lack of another. However, having a phenomenal mcat score is also not always necessary and it is important to understand this. SDN is famous for preaching that you at least need a score in the low 30s to be acceptable and this simply isn't true. Unless you are applying to a very competitive school, many US MD schools will consider and interview applicants with mcats over 25-26 if the rest of their application is worthy. Past a certain point with scores, most applicants have a relatively even playing field and the breaking point becomes how well you sell yourself or what you can show that you offer as a potential physician. I've seen many students with mcats between 25-30 get accepted into good medical schools year after year because they have taken the measures to qualify and sell themselves as more than just a number. Unfortunately, the students you hear about the most are the ones who attempt to sell themselves with impressive numbers yet fail to get accepted. These situations tend to create a lot of disillusion and bad advice regarding difficulty of acceptance amongst anxious pre med students. Enjoy your life, take one challenge at a time, educate yourself with reliable info before making big decisions, and don't listen to negative/uninformed pre meds. Your journey will never and shouldn't be the same as those around you in this field. Always stay positive, work as intelligently as you do hard, and have a good time as often as you can. Btw, English was my worst subject throughout my entire life and I eventually got a 14 on the mcat verbal. Go chase girls(or dudes if you're a girl?), play sports, and learn how to drink more than 2 beers! There's much more to be learned from that at this point in your life than getting advice on how to study for a test that hasn't come out yet and which you wont take for 4 years. Best of luck to you.

 

[Gauss44]

Practice reading quickly and actively. Find an AAMC practice VR passage somewhere and just look at the length. You'll probably see about 6 paragraphs per passage. Then your goal is to read that amount of writing in about 3 minutes, and get the author's tone, author's likely purpose, and major points. Just keep practicing that and you'll be well on your way.

Reading material
Most popular = The Economist magazine
My favorite = The New Republic magazine

Don't ignore boring or confusing articles. Unless you have wonderful luck, you will get one on your test.

Also don't get in the habit of mentally correcting bad grammar and bad writing because that can cause distractions on test day.

Some VR passages seem to be concocted by people with bad writing skills. I had to learn to stop correcting them mentally to avoid getting distracted.

 

[golfman7]

My suggestion: take some political science or philosophy courses where you are reading dense and abstract journals and passages. Its difficult to prepare for verbal if you haven't taken those courses before, at least it was for me. Regardless, don't stress about the mcat yet and when you get to college just worry about doing well in your pre med courses. The time will come to stress out about the mcat.