Very unbalanced mcat..need help

[PKA<0]

I just got my scores back and need advice. 12/5/11 was my score for ps/v/bs. I followed sn2ed schedule and felt very confident going in. I am going to retake, but I don't really have a plan of attack for that. I want to retake June 21 and still apply this cycle. I am very good with physical sciences and biology ( I tutor organic chemistry and physics) but I have done every problem in my berkley review books so I'm worried I won't really be able to gauge the not knowing aspect of passages. Also I don't know where to begin for verbal. I thought my score was a joke. I honestly thought I did good in it which scares me. Advice please

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[Awesome Sauceome]

I just got my scores back and need advice. 12/5/11 was my score for ps/v/bs. I followed sn2ed schedule and felt very confident going in. I am going to retake, but I don't really have a plan of attack for that. I want to retake June 21 and still apply this cycle. I am very good with physical sciences and biology ( I tutor organic chemistry and physics) but I have done every problem in my berkley review books so I'm worried I won't really be able to gauge the not knowing aspect of passages. Also I don't know where to begin for verbal. I thought my score was a joke. I honestly thought I did good in it which scares me. Advice please

So for verbal did you use Exam krackers 101 series? What kind of verbal practice did you do? What were your practice verbal scores (on your AAMC tests)?

 

[chizledfrmstone]

That VR is such a pain in the rear so I understand your situation. My VR was 3 points below my PS/BS so it wasn't too unbalanced.

Honestly EK 1001 and TPR workbook are good but nothing replaces doing AAMC practice passages.

 

[PKA<0]

I used EK 101 for verbal my aamc scores ranged from 8-12 with 9 being my average.

 

[WesternRedCedar]

Any reason why you did so much below average? Were you doing VR passages timed? Real conditions?

 

[PKA<0]

I would say I didn't work as hard for verbal. I allowed it to be up to luck instead of really understanding. I never had a firm strategy. Some days I would get 12 and some days an 8 but never in my life did I get a 5

 

[WesternRedCedar]

Odd, i am the same way, i always get 10/11 on AAMC verbal sections of practice exams. I quickly read through the logic for questions i get wrong, but other than that I dont do anything. I have practiced timing and such, but never really look at reasoning for non-aamc sources. Logic used by EK and tpr are not the same as AAMC.

 

[Awesome Sauceome]

I would say I didn't work as hard for verbal. I allowed it to be up to luck instead of really understanding. I never had a firm strategy. Some days I would get 12 and some days an 8 but never in my life did I get a 5

yea timing and a good gut instinct is all that you need. From your practice scores it sounds like this is just a freak thing that happened on the real deal. Study for a few more weeks and hit it hard again. I have faith you will do better. You get a 7+ in verbal and keep around your scores for the other sections and you are golden my friend.

 

[PKA<0]

Will my old study material be good enough to do just as well as I did in bio and phys? And is a month enough time to improve verbal?

 

[Awesome Sauceome]

I mean it sounds like you were at a good score already, it seems like it was random that you did so poor (in comparison to your averages). So like you need to find some new material to test yourself and make sure you maintain solid averages. But it sounds like you don't need a massive amount of time. Your scores are there, you just need to solidify it.

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[Goro]

Retake, but not until you fix your deficits. Are you ESL?

I just got my scores back and need advice. 12/5/11 was my score for ps/v/bs. I followed sn2ed schedule and felt very confident going in. I am going to retake, but I don't really have a plan of attack for that. I want to retake June 21 and still apply this cycle. I am very good with physical sciences and biology ( I tutor organic chemistry and physics) but I have done every problem in my berkley review books so I'm worried I won't really be able to gauge the not knowing aspect of passages. Also I don't know where to begin for verbal. I thought my score was a joke. I honestly thought I did good in it which scares me. Advice please

 

[Lost Vagus]

Obviously you know your stuff when it comes to PS and BS. You could probably get in to a DO school even with that 5 in verbal but if you retake and score a 7 or above on your verbal, you could have a shot at getting into a MD school if you have a decent gpa.

The way I raised my score from a 7 to an 11 is by doing as many verbal passages and complete verbal practice tests as I possibly could. I had access to a ton because I paid for the Kaplan course, but you can find a ton of practice tests online by either purchasing them or downloading them. Hit verbal hard for a month, brush up on your other stuff a little bit and go into the test with no worries and kick its butt. I'm assuming you either got bogged down by a hard passage and ran out of time or you got unlucky with your passages. Could have been a total fluke.

 

[Awesome Sauceome]

Obviously you know your stuff when it comes to PS and BS. You could probably get in to a DO school even with that 5 in verbal but if you retake and score a 7 or above on your verbal, you could have a shot at getting into a MD school if you have a decent gpa.

The way I raised my score from a 7 to an 11 is by doing as many verbal passages and complete verbal practice tests as I possibly could. I had access to a ton because I paid for the Kaplan course, but you can find a ton of practice tests online by either purchasing them or downloading them. Hit verbal hard for a month, brush up on your other stuff a little bit and go into the test with no worries and kick its butt. I'm assuming you either got bogged down by a hard passage and ran out of time or you got unlucky with your passages. Could have been a total fluke.

This is how I feel too.
1+

 

[PKA<0]

Thank you everyone for the advice. Unfortunately I am born and raised American so I have no excuse as far as that is concerned. I'm focusing on D.O. Because my gpa is borderline as well and I like Kcumb an nova I have 3.4/3.6 cgpa/sgpa. I have better than average ECs I'll post all of this when I get my next mcat into what are my chances
My plan of attack is this:

I have subscribed to scientific American and I will try to read at least an hour a day. I am purchasing Princeton review hyper learning from a friend and I am buying gold standard online tests. I've done all but 2 aamcs so I will do those. I am going to do content review sciences for two weeks (rereading all chapters/notes/notecards from Berkeley review) starting Friday I will be doing my Princeton review for verbal during this time, then I will dive into gold standard+ 2 aamcs after that. Luckily finals are over on Friday so it will be pure MCAT for 5ish weeks.

Wish me luck