What kind of indication are my practice test results?

[ZarbK]

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I've been studying hard for the MCAT for a long time now, but really kicked into overdrive once school got out in mid-May.

This last week I took 2 practice exams from the AAMC site, and did pretty good.

Practice Test #3, got 40 overall, 11 PS, 15 VR, 14 BS, and did good on the essays (doing other studying for that, EK books for main topics)

Practice Test #4, got 41 overall, 12 PS, 14 VR, 15 BS, again good on the essays.

Needless to say I'm very happy that I have some kind of marker to judge my studying performance off of, but how is this going to relate to my score on the real MCAT? (I take it august 14th, late I know, but I got my reasons :\)

I'm of course shooting for the best score I can get, and a 40+ would make me incredibly happy and hopefully able to get into the best schools possible, but I'm still struggling to learn some of the more advanced physics topics (always hated physics, but took Biophysics last semester which has been helping alot) and I'm concerned that from what I've heard about the tests this summer, the practice tests have been WAY easier than the real thing.

So, should I be happy, or worried (dont want to go in there and get a 23 or something...)? 😛

Other thing is on these tests the correct answers I get tend to be 99% solid me-knowing-the-answer, but I do have very good abilities to extract the relevant data out of a passage etc, and that helps tremendously on VR and some really messed up PS and BS passages that I might not understand so well otherwise.

 

[axp107]

Nice job, you're fine. 👍 Don't go in there thinking you'll get a 40 for sure though. Getting 40+ is very rare.. you definitely have a chance though. Every test administration only a few get 40+. But then again, you've got Verbal down.. which will help a ton. So expect 36+ for sure. Guaranteed. There really isn't much of a difference between a 36 and a 40. You realize that getting 3 questions right/wrong could potentially give you a 36 or a 39 right? Normally people get + or - 2-3 points from their practice test scores.

How do you attack Verbal btw?

 

[drizzt3117]

Not to burst your bubble, but I got every single question right on the paper/pencil versions of AAMC tests 3/4, FWIW.

The real test is much harder. Get some of the later Berkeley Review FL tests, or some of the Kaplan/Princeton tests, or even the later AAMC tests for a better comparison to the actual exam. AAMC test 3 is perhaps the easiest test AAMC has ever made, which is why they (at least used to) give it out for free.

Your scores are still good, of course, but the later AAMC exams as well as Kaplan tests will give you a better guide of where you stand. Try to get no more than 5-6 questions wrong on each section, regardless of what the curve says. On the paper/pencil, the guideline was essentially try to get no less than 10 wrong for a ~13 score on BS/PS and you need to do better than that on VR. Since they've cut the questions down, I think 5-7 wrong on each science passage is a good number to shoot for, and VR is still curved more steeply, so you probably need to get almost all the questions right to guarantee a ~13.

 

[ZarbK]

Nice job, you're fine. 👍 Don't go in there thinking you'll get a 40 for sure though. Getting 40+ is very rare.. you definitely have a chance though. Every test administration only a few get 40+. But then again, you've got Verbal down.. which will help a ton. So expect 36+ for sure. Guaranteed. There really isn't much of a difference between a 36 and a 40. You realize that getting 3 questions right/wrong could potentially give you a 36 or a 39 right? Normally people get + or - 2-3 points from their practice test scores.

How do you attack Verbal btw?

Ah aight thats good 🙂

Well I thought I would be weaker at verbal than anything else, but I've been pleasantly surprised (I hate literature and such tbh ^^, can't stand the stuff) at how I've been able to handle it.

Basically the first thing I do is find the part of the passage where the question is asking about (assuming its not a broad topic question) and reread it real fast, then try to imagine I'm the author and what I would logically extrapolate from it, then normally only one answer is viable. *shrug*

 

[NewKidin2block]

try AAMC #8 and tell me about your score

I've been studying hard for the MCAT for a long time now, but really kicked into overdrive once school got out in mid-May.

This last week I took 2 practice exams from the AAMC site, and did pretty good.

Practice Test #3, got 40 overall, 11 PS, 15 VR, 14 BS, and did good on the essays (doing other studying for that, EK books for main topics)

Practice Test #4, got 41 overall, 12 PS, 14 VR, 15 BS, again good on the essays.

Needless to say I'm very happy that I have some kind of marker to judge my studying performance off of, but how is this going to relate to my score on the real MCAT? (I take it august 14th, late I know, but I got my reasons :\)

I'm of course shooting for the best score I can get, and a 40+ would make me incredibly happy and hopefully able to get into the best schools possible, but I'm still struggling to learn some of the more advanced physics topics (always hated physics, but took Biophysics last semester which has been helping alot) and I'm concerned that from what I've heard about the tests this summer, the practice tests have been WAY easier than the real thing.

So, should I be happy, or worried (dont want to go in there and get a 23 or something...)? 😛

Other thing is on these tests the correct answers I get tend to be 99% solid me-knowing-the-answer, but I do have very good abilities to extract the relevant data out of a passage etc, and that helps tremendously on VR and some really messed up PS and BS passages that I might not understand so well otherwise.

 

[ZarbK]

try AAMC #8 and tell me about your score

Just finished taking it, got 41 overall, 13 PS, 14 VR, 14 BS 👍

 

[axp107]

Just finished taking it, got 41 overall, 13 PS, 14 VR, 14 BS 👍

holy mother of god.. you're ready to rape the MCAT 😀

Damn man.. I've never seen anyone so consistent on Verbal

 

[ZarbK]

holy mother of god.. you're ready to rape the MCAT 😀

Damn man.. I've never seen anyone so consistent on Verbal

Yey 😀 Glad all this studying will pay off

 

[werd]

those are good scores man. i took a bunch of practice tests pre-mcat and got 38/39/35/37. my actual was a 35... i was happy but wondered why i tied my lowest practice; i decided that it was the stamina issue - while i took each section honestly i didn't do them all back-to-back like the real test and so i got fatigued on test-day. just a caution: make sure you do a little long-distance practicing or you could get fatigued when you actually take the test. sounds like you're gonna ace it though 🙂. cheers.

 

[ZarbK]

those are good scores man. i took a bunch of practice tests pre-mcat and got 38/39/35/37. my actual was a 35... i was happy but wondered why i tied my lowest practice; i decided that it was the stamina issue - while i took each section honestly i didn't do them all back-to-back like the real test and so i got fatigued on test-day. just a caution: make sure you do a little long-distance practicing or you could get fatigued when you actually take the test. sounds like you're gonna ace it though 🙂. cheers.

🙂 sweet, and yeah I been doing all these tests timed and all-sections-together to build up my stamina / time skills. Really helped out I think.

 

[littlealex]

The real test is much harder then the practice tests, but it is not scored any harsher. In other words, it feels really hard when you're taking it, but your final scores will be similar to the practice.

Don't worry about it, you're fine. Just keep your cool on the day of the test, and you'll get a 39+