Vocab on PCAT???

[firstgeneration]

Advertisement - Members don't see this ad

Okay...I am so confused...I have been trying my hardest to study for the vocab part on the PCAT but seems to not go any where...I am currently taking the PCAT Kaplan course, but with the lesson books it is easier than the quizzes..I am not getting a good score on the quizzes...the lesson is understandable and I understand it...Please help..any one have any suggestions....this is especially true for sentence completion on 1 blanks or 2 blanks...anything would be helpful????😕

 

[omnione]

Though test-prep companies like to scare you into thinking that the words in the Verbal section of the PCAT will be words you've never seen, you really will see words that you have encountered during high school and undergrad. Of course, about 10-20% of the words will be more difficult ones but its still manageable unless you really haven't read anything at all.

For sentence completions, you need to view each question as a mini-story. You want to put in an answer that has the story making sense. The common wrong ansnwers for sentence completions involve words that contradict the message of the story. This is more common for two-word completions where the second word creates a sentence that contradicts or distorts the first sentence.

For practice, I recommend finding an official SAT study guide from College Board. However, you need to get the version that came out before the SAT eliminated the PCAT verbal-like questions in their new version. I would offer you mine, but I let a friend borrow it for her PCAT prep.🙂

 

[silverhalo]

I did very well on the vocab section the first time I took the PCAT, so I'll help as best as I can.

1. When you get your quiz score back, do you get to see an explanation for all the answers you got wrong? If so, go back & read the explanations very carefully, reason to yourself WHY they're right.

2. The people at Kaplan probably already told you this, but get use to looking for key words in the sentence (mainly conjunctions) that tell you the LOGIC of the sentence. Words like "but," "therefore," "and," "despite," are really common... they practically tell you the relationship of the blank words.

"Even though Klara was extremely confident before exam due to her ______ studying, her test score was surprisingly ______."

KEY WORDS are "even though" (the "surprisingly" just reinforces it). What is the inherent logic saying in that sentence? Think about it BEFORE you even look at the answer choices... you need a synonym for "rigorous" for the first blank, and a synonym for "poor" for the second blank.

3. Also, never give up on a question b/c you don't know the meaning of a word... you can almost always get it right based on elimination & logic. This is particularly true when there are 2 blanks!

4. Finally, MEMORIZE VOCAB. There are a lot of obscure GRE words on this exam. I recommend the Kaplan GRE Verbal Workbook for all of your verbal studying (check on Amazon.com).


GOOD LUCK! =)

 

[azPharmD2B]

For practice, I recommend finding an official SAT study guide from College Board. However, you need to get the version that came out before the SAT eliminated the PCAT verbal-like questions in their new version. I would offer you mine, but I let a friend borrow it for her PCAT prep.🙂

++ To this suggestion. Check out half.com or amazon.com to find used copies people are trying to get rid of. Or hit up your local used book store.

I've posted this in another thread, but here's a list of the 1000 most common words found in the SAT. It'll take a few seconds to load, but it's a great resource for improving your vocabulary. If you're a flashcard kind of person, they sell this as a set of flashcards at Barnes and Noble.

http://www.sparknotes.com/testprep/books/sat/chapter7section6.rhtml