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What are the Kaplan AAMC Practice Items?
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No, they are not.
There are 8 released AAMC tests (1-8!), which you can check out free at the Kaplan center (for center use only) or buy online from AAMC (4-8 only, 3 is free). You should definitely do a couple of these, if not all of 4-8. You need to see non-Kaplan tests.
The "practice items" are much older and not as representative of recent exams. I used them for extra VR practice, and I also thought they were more realistic than the Kaplan PS questions.
There are 8 released AAMC tests (1-8!), which you can check out free at the Kaplan center (for center use only) or buy online from AAMC (4-8 only, 3 is free). You should definitely do a couple of these, if not all of 4-8. You need to see non-Kaplan tests.
The "practice items" are much older and not as representative of recent exams. I used them for extra VR practice, and I also thought they were more realistic than the Kaplan PS questions.
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MeowMix said:
First of all, by "old" the OP meant 3R, 4R, 5R, 6R, 7 and 8 which are on www.e-mcat.com (as the OP referred to). The OP didn't imply AAMC 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 because these non-revised versions aren't available for purchase on www.e-mcat.com
Since Kaplan provides the 3R, 4R, 5R, 6R, 7 and 8 (as well as 1 and/or 2 but that's a different matter), they are the same AAMC exams.
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Sorry I should have phrased my question better. I want to know if Kaplan has AAMC items that you can not buy on e-mcat.com. Thanks.
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remo said:
Yes, they have the aforementioned "AAMC Practice Items," or "Practice Passages" or something like that, which are not full-length tests (these are NOT the same as AAMC 1-8 or 3R-8R or whatever). They are just passages with sets of questions. You cannot buy these online. I guess this was not clear from my earlier post.
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MeowMix said:
They also carry the AAMC exams 2, 3R, 4R, 5R, 6R, 7 and 8. Maybe your center carries AAMC 1 as well. If so, then they carry AAMC 1 and/or 2, which aren't available for purchase online at www.e-mcat.com
However, if you are enrolled in a Kaplan course, it is more economical to just do the AAMC practice exams at the Kaplan center rather than buying them online.
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Ugly Boy said:
neither - the style of a lot of the Kaplan VR is just not very MCAT-like, in my opinion. The Kaplan VR questions tend to either be a lot more cut & dried than the real thing, or just plain weird.
I always recommend to MCAT students that you work through practice items from a variety of sources, especially in VR. At the very least, AAMC plus something else (EK, Kaplan, TPR; skip the bizarre stuff in some of the other books; absolutely no SAT, GRE, LSAT, etc.). You need to see questions written by a bunch of different people, with their varying interpretations of what the MCAT verbal looks like.
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MeowMix said:
I was referring to their PS. I find it a little difficult to complete all the passages with high accuracy. What do you think of their PS?
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Ugly Boy said:
I think their PS are problematic. The passages are very long, take a lot of time to decipher, and are too computationally intensive (i.e. you have to do too much complicated math, takes too long, uses obscure formulas, and the numbers don't work out to nice round numbers like they do on the real thing). On full-length 1, you can pretty much finish the PS. On 2 and some of the other later ones, it's pretty much impossible in the allocated time. (caveat: I did these in 2003, but I don't think they've changed since then)
It's not a bad idea to do the Kaplan PS. In the worst case, you will see something on the MCAT that appears like the Kaplan passages (but they will never take as long or require as much math). The principles they test are generally important (but some are either bizarre or esoteric). Having to finish that quickly makes you learn to guess and move on, an essential strategy. My approach to this problem was to finish the section in the allotted time, and then go back after the test and redo the PS, noting how much extra time it took. I would compare my score before and after that extra time. I found the Kaplan topical tests to be equally problematic; it's a good mental workout, but don't let it discourage you.
It is very important to do PS from other sources, especially AAMC. I also think the Examkrackers PS questions in their "complete study package" books are very good (one of their fluid dynamics questions appeared pretty much verbatim on my MCAT). You need to see PS questions that test concept more than calculation, and you need to get used to the idea that on a real MCAT question, if you understand the concept, the calculation is very simple.
