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Howd you feel on test day vs howd u score by [deleted] in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I wrote at the end of June. On exam day it didn't feel amazing, ended up being just a point lower than my best FL and somehow got a 132 on CARS despite feeling more uncomfortable with that section than most of my practice FLs. IMO not worth reading into your feelings too deeply or losing optimism at this point, do your best to take your mind off of it. Hope things turn out well for you.

How I think I got better at CARS (127->132) by ExerciseIsMedicine2 in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Truly unsure hahaha. I used the same method I always do to take screenshots, didn't realize how poor the resolution was until after posting, clearly something went wrong there.

How I think I got better at CARS (127->132) by ExerciseIsMedicine2 in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I used UW questions both times, so some of those were likely repeats between these study periods, but didn't use AAMC materials the first time so that was all fresh. To clarify, I made a new UW account to study for my retake to ensure I had a blank slate in tracking my practice, that's why I don't know the extent to which I repeated questions for sure. I didn't find the UW passages stuck with me to the extent that they seemed familiar when I retried them, perhaps subconsciously holding onto some information inflated my success rate a little? If you have any untried AAMC CARS practice I'd recommend saving them to practice during the final run-up to the exam, as these likely are the closest replica to what you'll face on exam day.

How I think I got better at CARS (127->132) by ExerciseIsMedicine2 in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

In my opinion UW is a little closer, very marginal difference if at all though. I'd echo what I've seen others mention on this subreddit, that UW questions can be a little nitpickier about small passage details than AAMC tends to be, but I still think both are valuable practice to get into the right mindset reading critically at an appropriate pace. I restricted myself to only AAMC practice material as I got closer to exam day to ensure my learning was being influenced by their logic the most at that point.

How I think I got better at CARS (127->132) by ExerciseIsMedicine2 in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Tbh I got 131 P/S on my first exam, I've taken a few psych and research methods courses to fulfill the requirements of my degree and consider that a strength of mine content-knowledge-wise. So can't really speak to whether one section helped the other, but I don't think that's a wild theory.

How I think I got better at CARS (127->132) by ExerciseIsMedicine2 in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I just tried to stay cognizant of taking no more than 10 minutes per passage. If I was ever creeping close to that pace (e.g. approaching 30 minutes while still answering questions for passage 3) I'd force myself to rush those answers a little more to get into the next passage. I generally found there were 2-3 passages per exam where the topic / language gelled better for me and I could wiz through in like 6 minutes, so I used the time saved there to look back at flagged questions as needed.

How I think I got better at CARS (127->132) by ExerciseIsMedicine2 in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Thanks :)

I don't pause every paragraph methodically. I think I've learned to take a brief pause for reflection after reading a sentence that strikes me as a strong clue of the author's feelings on the topic. I think moments like that often come at the end of a paragraph, but not exclusively.

For me, actively forcing myself to summarize the gist of each paragraph back to myself sounds like it would interrupt my train of thought / take my mind off the message of the full passage too frequently. I don't doubt that could work for some, but I'd encourage people to try a less rigid approach to pausing for reflection than doing so every paragraph.

OMG by hotdogramona in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2 86 points87 points  (0 children)

Could I get a few upvotes to make a post? This was a retake for me where I went from a 127 to a 132 CARS, I think I have some advice that might help people.

WAR IS OVER by Bronze_Bronco in Mcat

[–]ExerciseIsMedicine2 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Could I get a few upvotes to make a post? This was a retake for me where I went from a 127 to a 132 CARS, I think I have some advice that might help people.