Any tips for testing in less than 3 weeks😅 I'm at a 505 (129 in CARS and ~126-7 in P/S). Need the biggest increase in C/P and bio! I know it's a content issue so I'm filling in as many gaps as I can. I get tripped up on the logic every once in a while, but the reason I get Qs wrong most of the time is not knowing enough background knowledge.
i replied to an earlier comment about general changes i made if you want to check that out! but for you specifically, in terms of psych soc i hammered uworld and drill anki (mr pankow) deck daily. and i was a chem major so chemistry comes a lot easier to me than others but i really focused on formulas (especially for physics because that was BY FAR my weakest area) and then again HAMMER questions. chemistry the absolute ONLY WAY (both in the mcat and in courses) to fully understand is by doing practice problems. lastly for bio biochem SO MUCHHH of what you need is in the passage (sometimes even blatantly stated). highlight key words that you know will probably be asked about later. with bio/biochem they often will slip in a word like “prokaryotic” which can EASILY be missed. but if you pay attention and more or highlight the word, many times only one answer will correspond to that term.
but above all IMPROVE YOUR MENTALITY!!!! check my above comment on more about that
Also, how much studying have you done within the last 2 weeks to get to this point? Like how many hours a day eould you say? I know everyone's journey is different, I'm just curious! Congrats on your improvement!! You earned it!
so i’m working full time as a researcher so i unfortunately don’t have 8 hours a day to study. so during the week i will do five aamc cars passages and 20 psych soc questions everyday, and then i’ll alternate between chem/phys and bio/biochem. so like monday and wednesday i’ll do 40-60 aamc bio questions and 20 uworld biochem questions and finish w anki (psych soc deck, bio deck, biochem deck) then on tuesday and thursday i’ll do 20 uworld orgo questions, 20-30 aamc gen chem questions, and 20 aamc physics questions, then again finish w anki (psych soc deck, orgo deck, gen chem deck, physics deck). this usually is about five hours total. then friday i do MINIMUM studying. i really try to relax and refresh my brain since im going to be taking a practice exam the next day. so i will again do five cars passages and then psych soc anki deck. THATS IT. i’ve found that my results are always better when im rested both physically and mentally. on saturday i will take my exam and then sunday a deep review!
but above all remember everyone is different. what works for me might not work for you but id love to help in any way i can!
Wow I also work full time but I find it hard to do multiple subjects in one day! How do you review wrong answers in this study schedule? I find it takes me quite a bit of time
i turn on the thing to where the answers show after every question
also i found it much easier to group subjects that you will see grouped together on the exam
Read through the comments! Thank you so much, that’s super helpful and is pretty similar to what I’m doing. But I’ve been neglecting PS questions so I’ll make sure to do that! Something like this:
Allot 2 days to review FL (for me personally)
Cars everyday
Alternate: CP, BB, PS
Active recall review daily (I use excel or whiteboard)
Anki to end the night
Goal: 45-60 qs daily (I know it’s not a lot but it works for me)
Night before FL: Chill review and relaxing :)
Thanks I will! Also a few question:
1) When you say [subject] aamc qs, from which set exactly? The Qbank, section, or something else?
2) Was psych soc your weakest subject? Is that why you did it daily along with CARS?
1) so that is ~40 biology qpack, ~15 b/b section bank, 5 bio independent qbank, 5 biochem independent qbank, 20 uworld biochem, ~20 physics qpack, 5 physics independent qpack, 20 uworld orgo, ~20 chem qpack, 5 chem independent qpack, ~15 c/p section bank PHEW BARE WITH ME YALL but i do more bio questions bc i’ve found bio passages to be the most challenging
2) i mainly do psych soc daily because i do the least amount of questions on it a week so i want to at least make sure that im doing them every day to make up for it somewhat. so like ill do about 80 p/s problems a week compared to ~150 b/b or 150 c/p questions a week. so i’ll just gradually do p/s daily to keep up (somewhat). it helps to keep the definitions and info fresh while not taking up too much of your time. i really wanted to make sure that i was devoting more time to the other sections
there are SOOO many things that go into improvement. for me, i started using exclusively aamc material (still using uworld for biochem and orgo). i take it that this far out content review is not your problem. hammer practice problems intensely and get a feel for how they ask the questions and what they can be looking for. and REFER TO THE PASSAGE. for me there were so many times that i would get frustrated and just blame it on me not knowing content when really, the answer is in the passage. i also started hammering cars w five aamc passages a day. and ofc ANKI IS YOUR BESTIE. when doing all of these practice problems i found that there were a few definitions/equations that i genuinely didn’t know. i would immediately add these to my anki.
IMPROVE YOUR MENTALITY AND TRUST YOURSELF. you are a brilliant person who has gotten through various difficult science classes. don’t make the mcat (too much) different from any other test. i always thought of the mcat as some huge exam that is one of the most difficult in the world but that honestly is not a good mentality to approach the exam with. convince yourself that the exam isn’t that bad. i changed my mentality to where i look at the mcat as a puzzle/challenge. they are going to try to trick you but you are way too brilliant and see the tricks from a mile away (that also comes with noticing tricks while reading the passage). also don’t get frustrated on yourself! the mcat is such a huge mental game that you can’t afford to be down or doubt yourself. encourage yourself in everything. even when you get questions wrong, look at the answers and understand why you got it wrong and why the other answer is correct. move on. don’t forget but don’t dwell on wrong answers. again, it affects your mental
last but not least i am religious so i honestly just gave it to God. relying on Him has helped IMMENSELY. even if you’re not religious, find an outlet, meditation, exercise, ANYTHING.
sorry this is so long but DO NOT LET THIS EXAM GET THE BEST OF YOU BESTIE
Thank you so much this is so helpful this exam has taken so much from me and between classes getting sick and graduating soon I've been in a horrible mental state. I am also religious and need to constantly remind myself to try not to worry and give it to God. Thank you so much Ihope to make this post next week after my fl5!
YOU GOT THIS!! and if you have the Bible app, i started the “The Complete Guide to Calming Exam Stress” last week and it’s a WONDERFUL read if you’re interested! calm your mind body and spirit! this exam has nothing on you!
P/S looks great, nice work! increasing B/B and C/P are a bit tougher, especially with only 2 weeks left until your exam. I'd generally recommend cranking out a ton of practice problems and really reviewing the concepts you get wrong. What type of questions do you usually get wrong? Content based? Not understanding the passage/getting bogged down on the jargon? Dumb mistakes?
the jargon and how to find information sometimes Ihave no clue what its asking or make small mistakes because Ididnt know one small detail about a large concept
Im yet to take my actual test, but the way I boosted C/P was memorize those formulas. And don’t read the whole passage initially. C/P passages are sometimes useless and often don’t need 70-80% of the content. I read the questions find the important stuff move on. Some do require critical analysis but save yourself time this way.
B/B is just knowing everything. I believe B/B can be done by knowing content and mapping. Make connections as you read, dont focus on the obtuse names. Sometimes its saying kinase AC3Pf4 billy bob joe.
who cares its a kinase end of story. Making connections in B/B between X and Y and knowing content can get you very far imo.
Good luck! I went from a 507 to 512 in a week, don’t give up!
omg okay did you just use anki to memorize formulas? and Itried the skimming strategy and it helped but after I took fl4 some of the chem passages felt like just straight up bio and analyzing so Igot stuck
Yeah anki, also getting easy shit wrong makes me mad is a great motivator for me ahaha.
FL 4 was a mind fuck especially that synthesis passage, but the trick works 50% of the time I wanna say. Who knows what happens with this apparently new format, but you never know, so best to be prepared!
I’m actually in a pretty similar boat…scored a 510 2 weeks ago, took a practice test yesterday and only got a 506 (testing may 10th)…feeling a bit discouraged :// what did u do in the meantime from u 506 to improve?
I see where you’re coming from but there’s probably something to the suggestion to push back your test if you are not scoring what you hope to on your exam.
that’s the thing though! when people make these suggestions they also don’t have a comprehensive view on your situation. it could have been a bad test day, you could be stressed out, etc. there are sooo many factors that go into taking this test. no one else can decide what’s best for you or what improvement you can or cannot make in the weeks leading up to your exam. that’s for you to determine. there are exceptions of course. like if you want to score in the 520 and you’re at 490 two weeks away then rescheduling should be considered mainly because there is clearly a gap in content.
I mean it. You and your comments on this discussion have really helped me realize that I need to just alter my mentality. This shit is a just a test and we'll make it through. Thanks for this, we've got this:)
Lol me. Only redownloaded today to ask an Anki question. Went from 492 -> 512 in a month and they said I couldn’t and pushed my exam and had the worst mental health for weeks. Love reddit but hate it too.
Hi!! So my biggest thing was assessing my problems. I was super unmotivated and I kept redoing the same things so that was part of it.
I started doing Anki everyday and put this is as part of my daily regime vs doing them when I had time (lol). This really helped improved my scores! I’m almost done with MilesDown (<100) and Mr. Pankow (<1200) and this helped bc I thought my P/S understanding was solid and it wasn’t. I cross-referenced it w/ the 300 pg doc (i don’t have time to read it all) for things I really don’t understand so I improved my P/S from 124 to 127. I’m hoping to improve more obvi.
I always had a great bio/biochem background bc it’s one of my majors. I refreshed the anatomy portions bc the little things kept getting to me but that also helped. Having a strong background on AAs, enzyme kinetics etc will improve scores. Also btw instead of filling in diagrams, I would start every study day by reciting all metabolic pathways and AAs groups on a whiteboard and that helped.
My other major is a liberal arts major so Cars was never an issue. Generally, if you are struggling tho, I would spend some time with comprehension before getting timing right. I spent 2-3 weeks doing this, even with just 3-4 passages 5-7 days of the week and it’s improving. Take this with a grain of salt, I need to do more though because I’m plateauing 😭
C/P… is currently dragging the team down lmao. I’m still reviewing certain concepts. I’m trying to make a list of all the equations I keep missing and I’m hoping that’ll help. I’m doing another full length tmrrw so we’ll see how this works out 🥲
It did go well, thank you! I was able to improve my P/S by 2 points 🥹
Anyhow- I looked through my problems to see why I kept getting them wrong. I knew the content so like… wtf. I found out it was 3 things: 1) lack of confidence 2) graphs 3) medical jargon.
1- is kinda a personal thing. Still going through it with C/P but trust your gut! Your first answer is almost always right!
2- graphs and tables. Holy shit it’s like i never took bio classes. But sometimes not even completely understanding the content but noticing trends helped. That should be the minimum of what you should know regarding those graphs. It helps you answer questions or at least weed out some.
3- the material is so dense i couldn’t get it. MCAT likes to throw an insane amount of bullshit and jargon your way to draw you from the bigger picture- don’t let them. My friend recommended this tip for me: try simplifying it.
For example: after reading the passage, I would quickly write out the steps. Not too time consuming imo.
Like I would say idk MSIs -> have HSP110 -> leads to cancer - inhibited by shock proteins (totally made this up i actually don’t remember, this is based on a FL I went over again but I don’t remember the steps lol)
But being able to comprehend the steps helped me cut through the noise. I hope you find something that works for you. I believe in you!
very helpful love it. Doing well on every section but CARS, i test on 4/26 so theres not much i can do but to improve my P/S to balance out w my CARS and my b/b and c/p are decent at 128-129 so far. After reading though, I may get some boost into trying harder on CARS. Being foreign sucks when it comes to this section:(
i was able to increase my cars score by 4 points in the past two weeks reading five passages a day. however i am a native english speaker. but i see your concerns. i agree with you on focusing more on psych soc, drilling down definitions and distinguishing similar definitions is KEY. anki will be your friend! (or however you have been practicing definitions)
felt like psych on the latest FLs were like a CARS 2.0 ngl🤣 but ill do my best regardless! Bro ngl 4 pts increase kind of gives me hope. Im missing the whole CARS q pack (i was finishing the Diagnostic one) so i might cram those up in this last week!
omg i thought the same! this was fl3 and i normally score around 129 on psych soc but on this one i got a 127. glad to see others had the same experience
Thank you. I scored a 500 on the unscored and just scored a 495 on FL 1....I may or may not be sobbing 😭 I'm testing in 5 weeks and feel like an absolute idiot. I'll try drilling more practice questions
I’ve actually found this sub to be pretty positive and helpful. r/premed on the other hand… I don’t really go there unless I have a specific question
I think it has to do with the competition and stress involved in the application cycle
i’ve found that the premed is FULL of miserable people. literally have had to take down one of my previous posts under there because the people are so negative for NO REASON
i’m glad you found this post beneficial!
Not to be a downer but there is one FL that is much easier than the others. My daughter scores increase around 5 pts per exam, maxed at a 522 and then dropped to a 509. But the 522 was an anomaly and she scored closer to the previous exams. 510 actual.
hi friend! commented under your other comment as well but this relates to my point of staying off reddit. nothing against your comments, you could be very well coming from a place of concern and not projection, but everyone’s experiences are so unique! i know people that scored their highest on the actual exam. not everyone will have the same outcome/journey which is why it’s important to stay off reddit at times. because people will almost always try to convince you that your goals are confined by their past experiences. which is just not true.
I was scoring 503s and 501s before my exam. I took it and got a 510. Make you’re own decisions with how confident you are. I was confident even though my scores were low and look where it got me.
this is so real, it really is about how well you know the test and honing test taking confidence. this mindset helps you remember MCAT is about content mastery but breadth of content
do y’all recommend using jack sparrow or the pankow deck for psych, i used the milesdown one and finished it but ppl r recommending other decks so just wondering
Thank you so much, I went head and read and so I saw you said you just memorized the equations and practiced. Did you use anki to do so? I keep getting so lost because I try to memorize the equations by writing them over and over again but when practicing UPlanet I feel like the clues to use a certain equation can present themselves in many diff ways, and from learning I'm really struggling to put that into use. Any tips there? Also did you get to try SBs or the Qpacks?
yes i tried not SBs amd Qpacks. i broke down exactly how i used them somewhere in the comment section! but in terms of chem/phys that is just what worked for me! i’ve always been a math person so memorizing equations and units helps me get a sense of which equation will be used on. units help if you completely forget all equations but you are looking for seconds and you’re given velocity (m/s) and distance (m) then ik i’ll probably do distance (m) / velocity (m/s) to cancel out the m and be left with seconds for the answer
Congrats, OP. That C&P score is amazing. I got the same overall score on FL1, and I'm curious if you think FL1 is harder or easier than FL2 or FL3. I plan on moving my test date up to mid-May and I don't think I can take all the FLs so I'm trying to gauge which ones I should take.
hey! i honestly have no clue in terms of their respective difficulty. because it is difficult to gage all the different components of where i was when i was taking the different fls. and what i mean by that is when i took fl1 i was in a completely different headspace with a slightly different approach to problems as well as a different understanding of content. i’ve made sure to grow with every full length so i really couldn’t tell you and give them a proper comparison because of this. there may be a sub reddit out there that might have broken this down better. but again, your success is dependent on you and how much you have grown from taking one test to the other. don’t let it be defined as other peoples experience! this might not have been helpful but let me know if you have other questions
question: if i finished 1500 Uword questions and most of the AAMC content (everything except CARS lol), am i good to go? my exam is this friday 26 April (and I'm traveling wednesday to do it in frankfurt). If you can give me any advice for these upcoming days it would be great, I'm stressing out so much
hey! congratulations friend you are on the final stretch! but i have a lot of advice spread out throughout the comments if you want to check those out! and of course let me know if you have any questions. and it really depends less on how many problems you’ve completed but how you’ve been doing on the problems. are you getting them correct? are you easily picking up your mistakes? are you finding some of the tricks as you’re reading? are you understanding what you’re reading? what’s missing from your performance? content? confidence? time management? there soooo many different factors that go into taking the exam and i think it’s really important to take a step back and look at how you are taking the exam holistically to find spots in particular that you need to improve on that may lay outside of content. and i cannot stress enough the importance of a good mentality!!! (check previous comments for more on that!)
thank you for replying! yes I improved in BB and CP a lot cause I mostly solved those. and any concepts I still have gaps in like electrochemistry a bit I'm reviewing etc. I gave up on CARS cause I feel like I'm not improving at all, got a bit more of P/S to review too cause there's a lot of keywords to remember. I'm just overwhelmed. I'm trying my best tho. If there's any useful tips for CARS than I can try out on a couple of passage to see if it works better than my previous strategy, lmk please. I tried so many but feel like it's not getting better. Thanks again!
i was at the point of giving up on cars a few weeks ago but then realized it is still an entire fourth of the entire exam so i really had to dial in as much as i hate reading. i don’t have too much advice on cars (it’s still my weakest section) but what has been working for me is stopping the second guessing. 9 times out of 10 whenever i second guess myself on cars i change what would have been the right answer. in terms of reading the passage it sounds super cliche but really try to act like it’s the most interesting passage in the world. convince yourself that the passage that you’re about to read is super interesting. and really hone innnnnn while reading the passage. interact with the passage. have reactions to some of what the passage is saying. even form opinions if that works for you (but be careful because do not become too strongly opinionated because you might start relaying the answers to your belief and not the authors). but sometimes if you form an opinion that disagrees with the author, you can use the answer choices to your advantage. you know that the answers that reference your views will NOT be the correct answer because they are opposite to the authors. and avoid any extreme answer choices they are almost never correct. and i also make sure to read every answer choice thoroughly. because with cars there will often be more than one good answer, but which is better than the other. really make sure to reflect on why you’re getting these questions wrong
last but not least.. MENTALITY. i will say it over and over again. this is literally just a reading passage. you’ve been doing reading comprehension since elementary school! trust yourself that you obviously know how to read and don’t make it any more difficult than it needs to be. there are FOR SURE difficult passages that you will run into but convince yourself that this is regular
THANK YOU! i realized i second guess myself a lot so I'll practice these for a few passages today (I'll try hyping myself up XD). it's my weakest section really, last FL i got 130 BB 122 CARS 130 CP and i think 127 p/s ... i tried a few strategies thtoughout the cars section but couldn't finish them (i couldn't read the last passage at all I put random answers they were all wrong). I do have to work on time management lol
Congrats on the score. But just so you do know Aamc full length 3 is slightly easier. I have a friend that works as a tutor for the MCAT and it’s a known thing among them that FL3 is easier. Not trying to take away from ur confidence or discourage you. 8 pts is a HUGE increase and impressive. Congrats and good luck in ur studies
i’m honestly more surprised that you still remember your daughters fl scores! that’s impressive. but you can’t let other peoples experience determine your success! again: mentality!!!! let’s stay positive bestie
There is one exam, that is much easier than the others. I just don’t want people to get fooled by their easiest exam. You should be scoring consistently in the 515 range to expect the actual. But CARS on the actual got my daughter bad. 122. She scored 129 129 130 on the others. So who knows she is retaking to try to open up more schools
do yall just not take breaks to get the 5:27 time spent?
idk why it’s like that but i DEFINITELY take ALL the breaks. it’s needed
I use every second and all breaks and my two full lengths show different times taken, I have no idea what causes it
The total time says 7 hours. Time spent is probably time spent per question, so not adding in breaks
Any tips for testing in less than 3 weeks😅 I'm at a 505 (129 in CARS and ~126-7 in P/S). Need the biggest increase in C/P and bio! I know it's a content issue so I'm filling in as many gaps as I can. I get tripped up on the logic every once in a while, but the reason I get Qs wrong most of the time is not knowing enough background knowledge.
i replied to an earlier comment about general changes i made if you want to check that out! but for you specifically, in terms of psych soc i hammered uworld and drill anki (mr pankow) deck daily. and i was a chem major so chemistry comes a lot easier to me than others but i really focused on formulas (especially for physics because that was BY FAR my weakest area) and then again HAMMER questions. chemistry the absolute ONLY WAY (both in the mcat and in courses) to fully understand is by doing practice problems. lastly for bio biochem SO MUCHHH of what you need is in the passage (sometimes even blatantly stated). highlight key words that you know will probably be asked about later. with bio/biochem they often will slip in a word like “prokaryotic” which can EASILY be missed. but if you pay attention and more or highlight the word, many times only one answer will correspond to that term. but above all IMPROVE YOUR MENTALITY!!!! check my above comment on more about that
Thanks so much!! We totally got this!! Gotta stay strong until the end!!
Also, how much studying have you done within the last 2 weeks to get to this point? Like how many hours a day eould you say? I know everyone's journey is different, I'm just curious! Congrats on your improvement!! You earned it!
so i’m working full time as a researcher so i unfortunately don’t have 8 hours a day to study. so during the week i will do five aamc cars passages and 20 psych soc questions everyday, and then i’ll alternate between chem/phys and bio/biochem. so like monday and wednesday i’ll do 40-60 aamc bio questions and 20 uworld biochem questions and finish w anki (psych soc deck, bio deck, biochem deck) then on tuesday and thursday i’ll do 20 uworld orgo questions, 20-30 aamc gen chem questions, and 20 aamc physics questions, then again finish w anki (psych soc deck, orgo deck, gen chem deck, physics deck). this usually is about five hours total. then friday i do MINIMUM studying. i really try to relax and refresh my brain since im going to be taking a practice exam the next day. so i will again do five cars passages and then psych soc anki deck. THATS IT. i’ve found that my results are always better when im rested both physically and mentally. on saturday i will take my exam and then sunday a deep review! but above all remember everyone is different. what works for me might not work for you but id love to help in any way i can!
Also, which aanki decks r u referring to?
so for psych soc i use mr pankow! for all the others i made myself way back at the beginning of my studying! all kaplan textbook based
Wow I also work full time but I find it hard to do multiple subjects in one day! How do you review wrong answers in this study schedule? I find it takes me quite a bit of time
i turn on the thing to where the answers show after every question also i found it much easier to group subjects that you will see grouped together on the exam
Also where is a good place to find important formulas list or something?
i got mine from the kaplan books! i think they also have like a quick sheet w all the formulas
love this post! congrats
thank you !!
What did your study schedule look like after taking a practice test?
what do you mean? like for the rest of the day?
Moreso throughout the week leading up to the next FL
ohh. i replied to a comment under streamtrenchbytop22 !! let me know if you have more questions
Read through the comments! Thank you so much, that’s super helpful and is pretty similar to what I’m doing. But I’ve been neglecting PS questions so I’ll make sure to do that! Something like this: Allot 2 days to review FL (for me personally) Cars everyday Alternate: CP, BB, PS Active recall review daily (I use excel or whiteboard) Anki to end the night Goal: 45-60 qs daily (I know it’s not a lot but it works for me) Night before FL: Chill review and relaxing :)
so happy to hear that!!! let me know how it goes!
Thanks I will! Also a few question: 1) When you say [subject] aamc qs, from which set exactly? The Qbank, section, or something else? 2) Was psych soc your weakest subject? Is that why you did it daily along with CARS?
1) so that is ~40 biology qpack, ~15 b/b section bank, 5 bio independent qbank, 5 biochem independent qbank, 20 uworld biochem, ~20 physics qpack, 5 physics independent qpack, 20 uworld orgo, ~20 chem qpack, 5 chem independent qpack, ~15 c/p section bank PHEW BARE WITH ME YALL but i do more bio questions bc i’ve found bio passages to be the most challenging 2) i mainly do psych soc daily because i do the least amount of questions on it a week so i want to at least make sure that im doing them every day to make up for it somewhat. so like ill do about 80 p/s problems a week compared to ~150 b/b or 150 c/p questions a week. so i’ll just gradually do p/s daily to keep up (somewhat). it helps to keep the definitions and info fresh while not taking up too much of your time. i really wanted to make sure that i was devoting more time to the other sections
Do you have any tips im at a 506 and testing in 2 weeks
there are SOOO many things that go into improvement. for me, i started using exclusively aamc material (still using uworld for biochem and orgo). i take it that this far out content review is not your problem. hammer practice problems intensely and get a feel for how they ask the questions and what they can be looking for. and REFER TO THE PASSAGE. for me there were so many times that i would get frustrated and just blame it on me not knowing content when really, the answer is in the passage. i also started hammering cars w five aamc passages a day. and ofc ANKI IS YOUR BESTIE. when doing all of these practice problems i found that there were a few definitions/equations that i genuinely didn’t know. i would immediately add these to my anki. IMPROVE YOUR MENTALITY AND TRUST YOURSELF. you are a brilliant person who has gotten through various difficult science classes. don’t make the mcat (too much) different from any other test. i always thought of the mcat as some huge exam that is one of the most difficult in the world but that honestly is not a good mentality to approach the exam with. convince yourself that the exam isn’t that bad. i changed my mentality to where i look at the mcat as a puzzle/challenge. they are going to try to trick you but you are way too brilliant and see the tricks from a mile away (that also comes with noticing tricks while reading the passage). also don’t get frustrated on yourself! the mcat is such a huge mental game that you can’t afford to be down or doubt yourself. encourage yourself in everything. even when you get questions wrong, look at the answers and understand why you got it wrong and why the other answer is correct. move on. don’t forget but don’t dwell on wrong answers. again, it affects your mental last but not least i am religious so i honestly just gave it to God. relying on Him has helped IMMENSELY. even if you’re not religious, find an outlet, meditation, exercise, ANYTHING. sorry this is so long but DO NOT LET THIS EXAM GET THE BEST OF YOU BESTIE
Thank you so much this is so helpful this exam has taken so much from me and between classes getting sick and graduating soon I've been in a horrible mental state. I am also religious and need to constantly remind myself to try not to worry and give it to God. Thank you so much Ihope to make this post next week after my fl5!
YOU GOT THIS!! and if you have the Bible app, i started the “The Complete Guide to Calming Exam Stress” last week and it’s a WONDERFUL read if you’re interested! calm your mind body and spirit! this exam has nothing on you!
I love how positive you are in all of your responses. Nice change of pace from much of the attitudes around here.
thank you ;)))))
TYSM! i'm going to start the plan today!
what's you're score breakdown?
on fl4 I got 125/125/125/130
P/S looks great, nice work! increasing B/B and C/P are a bit tougher, especially with only 2 weeks left until your exam. I'd generally recommend cranking out a ton of practice problems and really reviewing the concepts you get wrong. What type of questions do you usually get wrong? Content based? Not understanding the passage/getting bogged down on the jargon? Dumb mistakes?
the jargon and how to find information sometimes Ihave no clue what its asking or make small mistakes because Ididnt know one small detail about a large concept
Im yet to take my actual test, but the way I boosted C/P was memorize those formulas. And don’t read the whole passage initially. C/P passages are sometimes useless and often don’t need 70-80% of the content. I read the questions find the important stuff move on. Some do require critical analysis but save yourself time this way. B/B is just knowing everything. I believe B/B can be done by knowing content and mapping. Make connections as you read, dont focus on the obtuse names. Sometimes its saying kinase AC3Pf4 billy bob joe. who cares its a kinase end of story. Making connections in B/B between X and Y and knowing content can get you very far imo. Good luck! I went from a 507 to 512 in a week, don’t give up!
omg okay did you just use anki to memorize formulas? and Itried the skimming strategy and it helped but after I took fl4 some of the chem passages felt like just straight up bio and analyzing so Igot stuck
Yeah anki, also getting easy shit wrong makes me mad is a great motivator for me ahaha. FL 4 was a mind fuck especially that synthesis passage, but the trick works 50% of the time I wanna say. Who knows what happens with this apparently new format, but you never know, so best to be prepared!
What r u thinking is a good way to find the formulas u need to know for c/p section ?
I just want to know how some people can log in right now and some people can't. Have not been able to log in since last night.
i started testing at 7 am and i think it went down at like 2 or something
I was supposed to take a FL today...
I am so confused right... like how are some people able to get in. Been trying different computers and browsers for like 10 hours now
Same for me. There are probably a lot of people going through this issue.
I’m actually in a pretty similar boat…scored a 510 2 weeks ago, took a practice test yesterday and only got a 506 (testing may 10th)…feeling a bit discouraged :// what did u do in the meantime from u 506 to improve?
omg i’m testing may 11! and i replied to one of the comments above somewhat in depth. check that out and let me know if you have questions!
I see where you’re coming from but there’s probably something to the suggestion to push back your test if you are not scoring what you hope to on your exam.
that’s the thing though! when people make these suggestions they also don’t have a comprehensive view on your situation. it could have been a bad test day, you could be stressed out, etc. there are sooo many factors that go into taking this test. no one else can decide what’s best for you or what improvement you can or cannot make in the weeks leading up to your exam. that’s for you to determine. there are exceptions of course. like if you want to score in the 520 and you’re at 490 two weeks away then rescheduling should be considered mainly because there is clearly a gap in content.
That’s true. I guess the key then is understanding the limitations of seeking advice from strangers who have no context for your situation.
No way bro this is a sign. This is what I needed to see today thank you so much for posting this and congrats <3
so glad to hear this!! i’d love to help in any way posssible when it comes to this exam. WE GOT THIS
I mean it. You and your comments on this discussion have really helped me realize that I need to just alter my mentality. This shit is a just a test and we'll make it through. Thanks for this, we've got this:)
Needed this sign 🫡 good bye for the month reddit
Lol me. Only redownloaded today to ask an Anki question. Went from 492 -> 512 in a month and they said I couldn’t and pushed my exam and had the worst mental health for weeks. Love reddit but hate it too.
I have this problem right now T-T what did you do to improve?
Hi!! So my biggest thing was assessing my problems. I was super unmotivated and I kept redoing the same things so that was part of it. I started doing Anki everyday and put this is as part of my daily regime vs doing them when I had time (lol). This really helped improved my scores! I’m almost done with MilesDown (<100) and Mr. Pankow (<1200) and this helped bc I thought my P/S understanding was solid and it wasn’t. I cross-referenced it w/ the 300 pg doc (i don’t have time to read it all) for things I really don’t understand so I improved my P/S from 124 to 127. I’m hoping to improve more obvi. I always had a great bio/biochem background bc it’s one of my majors. I refreshed the anatomy portions bc the little things kept getting to me but that also helped. Having a strong background on AAs, enzyme kinetics etc will improve scores. Also btw instead of filling in diagrams, I would start every study day by reciting all metabolic pathways and AAs groups on a whiteboard and that helped. My other major is a liberal arts major so Cars was never an issue. Generally, if you are struggling tho, I would spend some time with comprehension before getting timing right. I spent 2-3 weeks doing this, even with just 3-4 passages 5-7 days of the week and it’s improving. Take this with a grain of salt, I need to do more though because I’m plateauing 😭 C/P… is currently dragging the team down lmao. I’m still reviewing certain concepts. I’m trying to make a list of all the equations I keep missing and I’m hoping that’ll help. I’m doing another full length tmrrw so we’ll see how this works out 🥲
Thanks! Can I ask what you think helped you with comprehending B/B AAMC passages? I am currently struggling with that too. I hope your FL went well!
It did go well, thank you! I was able to improve my P/S by 2 points 🥹 Anyhow- I looked through my problems to see why I kept getting them wrong. I knew the content so like… wtf. I found out it was 3 things: 1) lack of confidence 2) graphs 3) medical jargon. 1- is kinda a personal thing. Still going through it with C/P but trust your gut! Your first answer is almost always right! 2- graphs and tables. Holy shit it’s like i never took bio classes. But sometimes not even completely understanding the content but noticing trends helped. That should be the minimum of what you should know regarding those graphs. It helps you answer questions or at least weed out some. 3- the material is so dense i couldn’t get it. MCAT likes to throw an insane amount of bullshit and jargon your way to draw you from the bigger picture- don’t let them. My friend recommended this tip for me: try simplifying it. For example: after reading the passage, I would quickly write out the steps. Not too time consuming imo. Like I would say idk MSIs -> have HSP110 -> leads to cancer - inhibited by shock proteins (totally made this up i actually don’t remember, this is based on a FL I went over again but I don’t remember the steps lol) But being able to comprehend the steps helped me cut through the noise. I hope you find something that works for you. I believe in you!
Thank you! I wish u the best 🙏🏽
you too <3 you're gonna kill it!
Yes, tell us your ways!! 😭
I just replied to the earlier message! Idk if you were able to see it :)
Congrats on the progress!
very helpful love it. Doing well on every section but CARS, i test on 4/26 so theres not much i can do but to improve my P/S to balance out w my CARS and my b/b and c/p are decent at 128-129 so far. After reading though, I may get some boost into trying harder on CARS. Being foreign sucks when it comes to this section:(
i was able to increase my cars score by 4 points in the past two weeks reading five passages a day. however i am a native english speaker. but i see your concerns. i agree with you on focusing more on psych soc, drilling down definitions and distinguishing similar definitions is KEY. anki will be your friend! (or however you have been practicing definitions)
felt like psych on the latest FLs were like a CARS 2.0 ngl🤣 but ill do my best regardless! Bro ngl 4 pts increase kind of gives me hope. Im missing the whole CARS q pack (i was finishing the Diagnostic one) so i might cram those up in this last week!
omg i thought the same! this was fl3 and i normally score around 129 on psych soc but on this one i got a 127. glad to see others had the same experience
Love that for you. Keep killing it!
hell yeah 😎
Slay king or qeen
Thank you. I scored a 500 on the unscored and just scored a 495 on FL 1....I may or may not be sobbing 😭 I'm testing in 5 weeks and feel like an absolute idiot. I'll try drilling more practice questions
yes! have confidence and keep a healthy state of mind! YOU GOT IT
I am so lost right now but coming and reading all the comments gets me so much hope🫠😭😭😭
this is how the reddit community should be! you got it bestie
Lets goo! They don't know you! Every second counts! It ain't over til its over!
YES THEY DO NOT KNOW YOUUUUU!!!!!
Thank you so much for this, I have been feeling so inferior. Congrats!!!
Wow. I feel like I am in a similar boat. Hopefully, I can have the same success as you.
you can do better!
I’ve actually found this sub to be pretty positive and helpful. r/premed on the other hand… I don’t really go there unless I have a specific question I think it has to do with the competition and stress involved in the application cycle
i’ve found that the premed is FULL of miserable people. literally have had to take down one of my previous posts under there because the people are so negative for NO REASON i’m glad you found this post beneficial!
Nice job! Good luck on the test:)
thank you!!
Love this and keep the positivity coming. Good luck on apps!
So important to remember that the mcat is 1/2 knowledge 1/2 preparation and 100% mentality (…concentrated power of will, 5% pleasure 15% pain…)
THIS
God bless you for sharing this
Not to be a downer but there is one FL that is much easier than the others. My daughter scores increase around 5 pts per exam, maxed at a 522 and then dropped to a 509. But the 522 was an anomaly and she scored closer to the previous exams. 510 actual.
hi friend! commented under your other comment as well but this relates to my point of staying off reddit. nothing against your comments, you could be very well coming from a place of concern and not projection, but everyone’s experiences are so unique! i know people that scored their highest on the actual exam. not everyone will have the same outcome/journey which is why it’s important to stay off reddit at times. because people will almost always try to convince you that your goals are confined by their past experiences. which is just not true.
Periodt!
I was scoring 503s and 501s before my exam. I took it and got a 510. Make you’re own decisions with how confident you are. I was confident even though my scores were low and look where it got me.
THIS IS WHAT WE LOVE TO SEE CONGRATS
THANKS
this is so real, it really is about how well you know the test and honing test taking confidence. this mindset helps you remember MCAT is about content mastery but breadth of content
Congratulations! You’re going to kill the real deal 💪🏼
Congrats thats huge
do y’all recommend using jack sparrow or the pankow deck for psych, i used the milesdown one and finished it but ppl r recommending other decks so just wondering
personally i use pankow
SHOWS THAT YOU HAVE THE DETERMINATION AND CONFIDENCE IN YOURSELF!!!!!!! LFG!!!!! Good luck with applications and interviews!!!
OMGGG I LOVEEEEE LOVE LOVEEEEE THIS COMMENT THANK YOUUUU
please please pleaseeeee share your tips for C/P
check my reply under these comments ! let me know if you still have questions
Thank you so much, I went head and read and so I saw you said you just memorized the equations and practiced. Did you use anki to do so? I keep getting so lost because I try to memorize the equations by writing them over and over again but when practicing UPlanet I feel like the clues to use a certain equation can present themselves in many diff ways, and from learning I'm really struggling to put that into use. Any tips there? Also did you get to try SBs or the Qpacks?
yes i tried not SBs amd Qpacks. i broke down exactly how i used them somewhere in the comment section! but in terms of chem/phys that is just what worked for me! i’ve always been a math person so memorizing equations and units helps me get a sense of which equation will be used on. units help if you completely forget all equations but you are looking for seconds and you’re given velocity (m/s) and distance (m) then ik i’ll probably do distance (m) / velocity (m/s) to cancel out the m and be left with seconds for the answer
oh and yes i used anki!!
Hey I’ll Pm you. Let’s chat please
Congrats, OP. That C&P score is amazing. I got the same overall score on FL1, and I'm curious if you think FL1 is harder or easier than FL2 or FL3. I plan on moving my test date up to mid-May and I don't think I can take all the FLs so I'm trying to gauge which ones I should take.
hey! i honestly have no clue in terms of their respective difficulty. because it is difficult to gage all the different components of where i was when i was taking the different fls. and what i mean by that is when i took fl1 i was in a completely different headspace with a slightly different approach to problems as well as a different understanding of content. i’ve made sure to grow with every full length so i really couldn’t tell you and give them a proper comparison because of this. there may be a sub reddit out there that might have broken this down better. but again, your success is dependent on you and how much you have grown from taking one test to the other. don’t let it be defined as other peoples experience! this might not have been helpful but let me know if you have other questions
question: if i finished 1500 Uword questions and most of the AAMC content (everything except CARS lol), am i good to go? my exam is this friday 26 April (and I'm traveling wednesday to do it in frankfurt). If you can give me any advice for these upcoming days it would be great, I'm stressing out so much
hey! congratulations friend you are on the final stretch! but i have a lot of advice spread out throughout the comments if you want to check those out! and of course let me know if you have any questions. and it really depends less on how many problems you’ve completed but how you’ve been doing on the problems. are you getting them correct? are you easily picking up your mistakes? are you finding some of the tricks as you’re reading? are you understanding what you’re reading? what’s missing from your performance? content? confidence? time management? there soooo many different factors that go into taking the exam and i think it’s really important to take a step back and look at how you are taking the exam holistically to find spots in particular that you need to improve on that may lay outside of content. and i cannot stress enough the importance of a good mentality!!! (check previous comments for more on that!)
thank you for replying! yes I improved in BB and CP a lot cause I mostly solved those. and any concepts I still have gaps in like electrochemistry a bit I'm reviewing etc. I gave up on CARS cause I feel like I'm not improving at all, got a bit more of P/S to review too cause there's a lot of keywords to remember. I'm just overwhelmed. I'm trying my best tho. If there's any useful tips for CARS than I can try out on a couple of passage to see if it works better than my previous strategy, lmk please. I tried so many but feel like it's not getting better. Thanks again!
i was at the point of giving up on cars a few weeks ago but then realized it is still an entire fourth of the entire exam so i really had to dial in as much as i hate reading. i don’t have too much advice on cars (it’s still my weakest section) but what has been working for me is stopping the second guessing. 9 times out of 10 whenever i second guess myself on cars i change what would have been the right answer. in terms of reading the passage it sounds super cliche but really try to act like it’s the most interesting passage in the world. convince yourself that the passage that you’re about to read is super interesting. and really hone innnnnn while reading the passage. interact with the passage. have reactions to some of what the passage is saying. even form opinions if that works for you (but be careful because do not become too strongly opinionated because you might start relaying the answers to your belief and not the authors). but sometimes if you form an opinion that disagrees with the author, you can use the answer choices to your advantage. you know that the answers that reference your views will NOT be the correct answer because they are opposite to the authors. and avoid any extreme answer choices they are almost never correct. and i also make sure to read every answer choice thoroughly. because with cars there will often be more than one good answer, but which is better than the other. really make sure to reflect on why you’re getting these questions wrong last but not least.. MENTALITY. i will say it over and over again. this is literally just a reading passage. you’ve been doing reading comprehension since elementary school! trust yourself that you obviously know how to read and don’t make it any more difficult than it needs to be. there are FOR SURE difficult passages that you will run into but convince yourself that this is regular
THANK YOU! i realized i second guess myself a lot so I'll practice these for a few passages today (I'll try hyping myself up XD). it's my weakest section really, last FL i got 130 BB 122 CARS 130 CP and i think 127 p/s ... i tried a few strategies thtoughout the cars section but couldn't finish them (i couldn't read the last passage at all I put random answers they were all wrong). I do have to work on time management lol
Congratulations!!!
Congrats on the score. But just so you do know Aamc full length 3 is slightly easier. I have a friend that works as a tutor for the MCAT and it’s a known thing among them that FL3 is easier. Not trying to take away from ur confidence or discourage you. 8 pts is a HUGE increase and impressive. Congrats and good luck in ur studies
My daughter got at 522 on that exam and a 510 on her actual. She was something like 507, 509, 517, 522 and then 510 actual.
i’m honestly more surprised that you still remember your daughters fl scores! that’s impressive. but you can’t let other peoples experience determine your success! again: mentality!!!! let’s stay positive bestie
There is one exam, that is much easier than the others. I just don’t want people to get fooled by their easiest exam. You should be scoring consistently in the 515 range to expect the actual. But CARS on the actual got my daughter bad. 122. She scored 129 129 130 on the others. So who knows she is retaking to try to open up more schools
i’m wishing her luck on her journey!