Any suggestions as reading materials to prepare for MCAT verbal?
I heard Wall Street Journal and Scientifc America are good materials to read. Any other suggestions?
I’m from computer science/mathematics background so I am very concerned about the MCAT Verbal section. Plus I read slow.
By the way, I will be taking my MCAT in about 2 years. So I do have time to improve my reading speed.
At the rsik of being lazy and because I just accidentally deleted what I wrote, I am pasting in something I wrote a few weeks back. I basically applied the examkrackers audio osmosis verbal advice and found it to the be best info I ever got for the MCAT
The key to the MCAT is not simply mastering the material, or mastering how to take the exam. It is even beyond focusing on the exam. It is limiting yourself to the here and now for every step of preparation as well as on each and every question during the exam. What I mean by this there is NOTHING but the question in front you at that moment. Not the question or passage that was a page ago, not the question coming up. But only that question which is in front of you. It is akin to playing learning to play an instrument. You don’t even start with a simple musical scale but you start with playing a single note. The discipline to this is not that hard IF every time you practice, you follow the same pattern. You read a passage carefully, you read the question carefully evaluate each answer, eliminate what you can, and choose the best answer within the time limit for each question. If you don’t have the answer within the minute per question, you mark one of your uneliminated ones and you move on. You never leave a question unanswered, even if it is a complete guess Like a puff a smoke, the last question is now gone, completely out of your mind, not to be thought about, not to be mulled over, not to be considered again. My only caveat to this is that within a passage, after you have answered all the questions, you may go back for a minute to a guessed question but again, when the minute is gone, you move on completely to the next passage, leaving the last one without a consideration. This methodology ensures that you will ALWAYS finish the exam. It keeps you from obsessing over one question and then frantically rushing thru many others carelessly. Only after you have completed the entire exam, can you go back. This is true for questions yet to come. I am a firm believer in not looking ahead. I think that jumping around just adds more potential for confusion and anxiety.
You can practice this by first doing questions without timing them. Your purpose here is to simply focus completely on that question. Getting your mindset is as important as the content. Then you start timing the questions (not the overall exam). You should be able to eliminate at least one answer almost immediately (BTW, that is my rule of thumb for preparedness: if you can’t rule out an answer almost immediately, then you are NOT ready take the MCAT)
That is my philosophy for “Zen and Art of MCAT”
I’m also in a similar situation. I plan on taking the MCAT in about two years, and I have a degree in Applied Math. My reading as of late has been focused mainly on tech manuals for work and books to help me explore medicine and what is really involved in my spare time. I’m at the point now that I’m almost ready to shift gears as I think I’ve pretty much decided I’m going to give it a shot, so I am quite interested in what other have to say about preparation for MCAT. Needless to say, I’ll be watching this thread!
I didn’t do this myself (I didn’t study at all for the verbal)-- but I think this would be a decent strategy:
You have probably already been reading leisurely your whole life, so I wouldn’t intentionally try to do more of it. I know that when I read for fun, I read very differently-- more for the info contained that interests me than for the author’s purpose (which is what is actually tested).
If I had the time that you do, I would get ahold of every “verbal reasoning” practice book out there (MCAT, GRE or LSAT) and work them all, even if it is only one passage a day. This way you are training yourself for MCAT type verbal thinking and you will be more than familiar with the question types and traps (there are only so many).
Also, probably a shot in the dark, BUT I saw on SDN somewhere where quite a few people (that admittedly studied a ridiculous amount) have seen verbal passages from study materials reused on their actual exam (lucky kids!).
anyways just my two cents-- regardless of what you do- good luck!
Great advice and pointers, Rich.