Verbal Reasoning, Please Help

[TheAnonymous]

Yet another VR thread - my apologies !

I'm still struggling with VR and I was wondering if I can get some advice from verbal reasoning gods.

I keep hearing/reading that you should look for the main idea of the passage, or gist of each paragraph, or think about the argument/claim the author is making and see if you can find weaknesses/strengths, etc... what I DON'T understand is that everytime I do a verbal passage and look at the answers I notice that almost all of the questions (except the few that ask for "main purpose" or "tone") are based on ONE or TWO SENTENCES mentioned somewhere in the passage. I have tried Kaplan, EK, and Princeton. For example, in one of the paragraphs, the author is saying FDA tested some experiments and this was not something they usually would do... and this single sentence is the answer to one of the questions...... HOW can someone read a passage for the main tone and overall gist and still answer these questions? To me every verbal passage states 20 things and they test 5-7 of these, and it all depends on whether or not you REMEMBER those specific parts of the passage or not... so over time my strategy became reading quickly, remembering everything, and referring back to the passage almost everytime because there is no way in hell that I can remember everything...

Can someone please help? How can I read for the over idea of the passage and authors main idea while answering these questions? Any advice?

Thanks guys

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[Uafl112]

ok well you can try out this tip that my friends gave me and see how it works for you. They told me that those specific parts are support that add up to make the bigger picture. Perhaps you could try to find the relation between all these supporting details and how they relate to the overall main idea. This way you could still internalize the details while also getting the bigger picture, therefore covering all ground. You prob wont remember the details verbatim, but it will give you an idea of where they were in the passage in case you need to reference them.

Also, my personal advice would be to read comfortably while not focusing too much on time, but just being mindful of it. I personally would not read too fast or else you might not internalize anything

Just my 2 cents. Hopefully it gives you some sort of help so I dont sound like an idiot

 

[R35]

Listen man. Stop worrying about strategies and different methods of cracking the VR. There's only one thing that will help you: reading. Take a break and slow down. Take a breath. When you get to a passage, throw out any notion you have of "main ideas" or "action words" and just read.

Start at the beginning, and just read the passage. I know it sounds obvious ("read"? really? What do you think I've been doing?") Go slow. Don't worry about strategies and just let the words sink in.

Then go to the questions, and read them carefully. Often a few words are placed to trick you. Just read slowly.

Your greatest weapon is your reading speed - the more time you spend reading and save by not worrying about "strategies", the more time you'll have to go back if necessary.

This is how I've been practicing for my VR, and I've been crushing it. Good luck mate.

 

[orangetea]

Have you tried mapping? And no not the kaplan long way but a word or two by each paragraph? highlighting? you are absolutely right.. you cannot remember EVERYTHING that is why you need find was to do that.. I circle nouns MCAT LOVES those.. I highlight transitions.. "the FDA did this experiments blah blah blah HOWEVER.." I connect sentences and words using arrows.. If there are multiple ideas, I make a quick list.. True it is important to read but you need to read smart and find ways to remember main points. Try it without timing yourself and then answer questions and see how you do THEN worry about the time. My scores went up from 7-11/10 consistent by just making small adjustments like those

 

[Alex Schmidt]

Listen man. Stop worrying about strategies and different methods of cracking the VR. There's only one thing that will help you: reading. Take a break and slow down. Take a breath. When you get to a passage, throw out any notion you have of "main ideas" or "action words" and just read.

Start at the beginning, and just read the passage. I know it sounds obvious ("read"? really? What do you think I've been doing?") Go slow. Don't worry about strategies and just let the words sink in.

Then go to the questions, and read them carefully. Often a few words are placed to trick you. Just read slowly.

Your greatest weapon is your reading speed - the more time you spend reading and save by not worrying about "strategies", the more time you'll have to go back if necessary.

This is how I've been practicing for my VR, and I've been crushing it. Good luck mate.

This is good advice. You are right OP, many of the questions can be answered from one or two sentences in the passage. I know some prep companies teach you to never go back and re-read, but I often felt I had to do this, and thus would focus on reading briskly but attentively the first time through to make time for glancing back.

I found that consciously making myself interested in the article really helped. This would cause me to instinctively read slower, but I had to fight that urge and keep reading briskly but very engaged.

 

[TheAnonymous]

^ manyyy thanks everyonee hugee help .. thanks a lot !!

ok well you can try out this tip that my friends gave me and see how it works for you. They told me that those specific parts are support that add up to make the bigger picture. Perhaps you could try to find the relation between all these supporting details and how they relate to the overall main idea. This way you could still internalize the details while also getting the bigger picture, therefore covering all ground. You prob wont remember the details verbatim, but it will give you an idea of where they were in the passage in case you need to reference them.

Also, my personal advice would be to read comfortably while not focusing too much on time, but just being mindful of it. I personally would not read too fast or else you might not internalize anything

Just my 2 cents. Hopefully it gives you some sort of help so I dont sound like an idiot

this is a great advice, I try to do this but then sometimes get caught up too much and waste valuable time .. my other problem is having problem sometimes finding the idea of a paragraph... like for example I read the paragraph but dunno how it relates to other paragraphs ( like i usually say ok this is another point author is making and not seeing how its related )

Listen man. Stop worrying about strategies and different methods of cracking the VR. There's only one thing that will help you: reading. Take a break and slow down. Take a breath. When you get to a passage, throw out any notion you have of "main ideas" or "action words" and just read.

Start at the beginning, and just read the passage. I know it sounds obvious ("read"? really? What do you think I've been doing?") Go slow. Don't worry about strategies and just let the words sink in.

Then go to the questions, and read them carefully. Often a few words are placed to trick you. Just read slowly.

Your greatest weapon is your reading speed - the more time you spend reading and save by not worrying about "strategies", the more time you'll have to go back if necessary.

This is how I've been practicing for my VR, and I've been crushing it. Good luck mate.

Thanks man ! I try to do this to be honest but having hard time finding a balance between reading slowly, not running out of time, remembering everything mentioned in the passage, and having time to go back if I have to

Have you tried mapping? And no not the kaplan long way but a word or two by each paragraph? highlighting? you are absolutely right.. you cannot remember EVERYTHING that is why you need find was to do that.. I circle nouns MCAT LOVES those.. I highlight transitions.. "the FDA did this experiments blah blah blah HOWEVER.." I connect sentences and words using arrows.. If there are multiple ideas, I make a quick list.. True it is important to read but you need to read smart and find ways to remember main points. Try it without timing yourself and then answer questions and see how you do THEN worry about the time. My scores went up from 7-11/10 consistent by just making small adjustments like those

this is good advice but part of my problem is not understanding a part of the passage and just losing it from there (im in ESL student) and if I spend too much time figuring out everything, by the time I get to the questions I won't have enough time but im gonna try this.. many thanks

This is good advice. You are right OP, many of the questions can be answered from one or two sentences in the passage. I know some prep companies teach you to never go back and re-read, but I often felt I had to do this, and thus would focus on reading briskly but attentively the first time through to make time for glancing back.

I found that consciously making myself interested in the article really helped. This would cause me to instinctively read slower, but I had to fight that urge and keep reading briskly but very engaged.

Thanks !! this is exactly my point ... I guess I just have to keep practicing to read actively, with the right speed, while mapping mentally, remembering every single point made in the passage, and having some time left at the end to refer back and double check

 

[R35]

If your test is soon this may not be very helpful, but it definitely will help out in the long run:

http://www.spreeder.com/. Use this a bit each day and over time your speed will increase dramatically. Also, if you have an Iphone/Ipad or whatever, check out the app "Acceleread". It's designed to increase speed over time through various exercises. I've used it a bit and it's definitely worth checking out.

Don't hesitate to message me if you have any concerns or questions about anything. Best of luck mate.

 

[Lopweb22]

Hey man I feel your pain, I had those same issues before. I know most people say to read fast and get the main idea, that never worked for me. My strategy ( which worked because i was scoring in the doubles) was to really take my time reading the passage (3 and half mins to up to 4 and a half mins for the hard ones). I would only highlight dates, names, titles, arguments, and words that I had no idea what they meant lol. After i finished I quickly talked to myself in my head pretty much about what the passage was about and the authors tone and main argument (<-- thats important!!). Then here is the main thing,,I trained myself to NOT look back at the passages! (You will no longer have issues with the time too) No matter how uncomfortable that was i didn't do it, and every question i would answer quickly, the ones I didn't know I would mark and take my best educated guess. In order to do well in verbal you have to be comfortable with guessing on some questions (which premeds hate, i know I do). Anyways, I don't know if that helps but I know it helped me, and I was in your same situation. Happy Studying

 

[TheAnonymous]

If your test is soon this may not be very helpful, but it definitely will help out in the long run:

http://www.spreeder.com/. Use this a bit each day and over time your speed will increase dramatically. Also, if you have an Iphone/Ipad or whatever, check out the app "Acceleread". It's designed to increase speed over time through various exercises. I've used it a bit and it's definitely worth checking out.

Don't hesitate to message me if you have any concerns or questions about anything. Best of luck mate.

Thanks man !!

 

[TheAnonymous]

Hey man I feel your pain, I had those same issues before. I know most people say to read fast and get the main idea, that never worked for me. My strategy ( which worked because i was scoring in the doubles) was to really take my time reading the passage (3 and half mins to up to 4 and a half mins for the hard ones). I would only highlight dates, names, titles, arguments, and words that I had no idea what they meant lol. After i finished I quickly talked to myself in my head pretty much about what the passage was about and the authors tone and main argument (<-- thats important!!). Then here is the main thing,,I trained myself to NOT look back at the passages! (You will no longer have issues with the time too) No matter how uncomfortable that was i didn't do it, and every question i would answer quickly, the ones I didn't know I would mark and take my best educated guess. In order to do well in verbal you have to be comfortable with guessing on some questions (which premeds hate, i know I do). Anyways, I don't know if that helps but I know it helped me, and I was in your same situation. Happy Studying

thank you so much bro..... To be honest this method is the only one really working for me but not the problem is that it doesn't work everytime... Can I ask if this worked for you with Kaplan/EK/TPR/AAMC? I agree with taking time to read but not going back really lowers my score in EK.

Also when you say think about the main idea in my head, can you give an example? Is it like the new drug was bad, we shouldn't use it... or is it more like, the drug is bad for this and that reason, the author suggested this, but also brought up an example of a study etc.... how detailed is your mental summary?

many thanks buddy, its a huge help

 

[Lopweb22]

Yea, this worked for me for pretty much every passage i did whether it was Kaplan, EK, or AAMC (I never got the TPR book). When I think about the main idea in my head It would be like "This new drug is bad, author is for it, gave ex." That was really it, it doesn't have to be too detailed, and you have to be careful because if you try to make it too detailed, your head can add little things that might hurt you when answering a question. If you come across a question that you don't know I would read it again, still nothing, then I marked it, finished every question in that passage, then went back to that question, and i would look back at the passage and try to narrow it down (But i wouldn't spend more than a minute on a question). However, usually it was between two and I would guess and move on. You don't want to spend too much time on it because more than likely you might get it wrong, but you got all the other ones right, so it doesn't really matter. I guess practice as much as you can, and try different strats, if you see that this doesn't work then try something else for sure! Don't worry your score will go up with time, because you'll get used to their types of questions, and just their format.

 

[TheAnonymous]

Yea, this worked for me for pretty much every passage i did whether it was Kaplan, EK, or AAMC (I never got the TPR book). When I think about the main idea in my head It would be like "This new drug is bad, author is for it, gave ex." That was really it, it doesn't have to be too detailed, and you have to be careful because if you try to make it too detailed, your head can add little things that might hurt you when answering a question. If you come across a question that you don't know I would read it again, still nothing, then I marked it, finished every question in that passage, then went back to that question, and i would look back at the passage and try to narrow it down (But i wouldn't spend more than a minute on a question). However, usually it was between two and I would guess and move on. You don't want to spend too much time on it because more than likely you might get it wrong, but you got all the other ones right, so it doesn't really matter. I guess practice as much as you can, and try different strats, if you see that this doesn't work then try something else for sure! Don't worry your score will go up with time, because you'll get used to their types of questions, and just their format.

Many thanks man, I will try this method for a while and see if I can bring my score up to a 9-10 and I will be the happiest man thanks dude