MCAT Strategies by Section

While you may think that knowing all your pre-req science courses back and forth should be enough to give you a good MCAT score, this alone is not enough. Other variables factor into your score, either to lower or to raise it. The MCAT does not just test you in your knowledge and its application; it tests you in your test-taking ability, how you can outsmart the test. Here are some of the strategies that helped me raise my score in each section.

A. Physical Sciences: Chemistry+ Physics

1) Since no calculator is allowed learning tricks to do quick math will help a LOT. The test won't have complicated numbers but it will have very big or small numbers. Converting those numbers to their scientific notation equivalents will make things faster.

2) Don't just memorize the equations, learn the relationships between variables. If you double the volume, what happens to the pressure? Many students read the questions searching for an equation to use, but if you know the variable relationships, you won't even need to use the formula. If you get stuck, try to think about what is going on in the problem conceptually. For example: if you double the volume that means the molecules will be less compressed and have more space to move around, hence the volume should decrease by the same factor.

3) Another variable relationship trick: If in the equation the variables are multiplied, they are inversely proportional. If they are divided (or you can rearrange the equation to make it so), then they are directly proportional. For example: PV=nRT. P and V are inverse to each other, but they are both directly proportional to T.

4) DON'T skip passages and do the easy ones first. Do the passages in order. This way you have a better idea of how much you have left in relation to the time left. Skipping sections gives you a false sense of confidence because you feel you have plenty of time. Then when you get stuck in the harder passages you will spend more time in them thinking you can afford it and time will slip. When this happens you will rush the remaining passages and get a higher percentage of the questions wrong. Spending and equal amount of time in each passage and then going back to double check the harder ones will work in your favor.

5) If the answer seems to easy, it's probably wrong. Amateurs fall for this one, you must eliminate it at once.

6) Educated guessing!!! Especially in harder questions when you are pressed for time. You are graded in the amount of questions you get right, but you are not penalized for the wrong ones. So never leave a question blank!

B. Verbal Section


1) Find what works for YOU. Many test prep companies offer recycled advise from the SAT verbal. However, the MCAT is made foolproof against those strategies. The whole summarizing each paragraph?  Time wasted. Identifying the type of subject (i.e. philosophy, art, religion) in the passage? Time wasted. Looking for the main idea? Time wasted. The test will rarely ask you that directly because it's what everyone expects. Experiment with different tips and use the ones that benefit you the most.

2) Paraphrase the questions AND the answers.

3) With the allotted time for the section, training yourself to do each passage in about 7-8 minutes should give you enough time to finish and go back to double check answers. So memorize the time intervals for each passage, for example, by 52 minutes left you should be in the second passage already and so on. This one helped me a lot.

4) Pretend everything you are reading in the most interesting thing in the world!!!! Allowing yourself to start thinking it's boring will let your focus slip, make you lose information and re-read. Actual interest in the subject makes you capture more information without re-reading.

5) Read the first half of the passage first. Then read the questions and answer the ones pertaining to that half. The read the second half and answer the remaining questions. Sometimes you don't even have to read the whole passage to answer all the questions.

6) Reading the questions first might make you focus on searching for the answers to them. But some of them are application, so you need to get the basic theme of the passage to answer them. I advise against reading the questions first.

7) Practice taking the verbal section right after you have taken a practice physical section. This is the order in which the sections appear in the MCAT. You may do great taking a verbal practice by itself. But when you take it after the Physical your score may lower because of the weariness of your mind from the previous section. This will give you a more accurate idea of what your score will be.

C. Biological Sciences: Bios+ Orgos

1) Index cards are your friends! Write it all out and test yourself over and over. Bio is mainly memorization.

2) Watch Youtube videos on the bodily systems. It helps you learn and visualize better. If your native language is not English, then watch them in your native language; it helps you remember the system better.

3) Orgo questions are very basic. Memorizing every single reaction there is will be pointless. Learn to recognize possible products from reactions.

4)Hormones: They're all about cause and effect. Learn not just what they do but what would happen to the rest of the body if they are in overdose, mutated, or deficient. Also recognize which symptoms would be caused by which hormones. There's an insane amount of questions on hormones, so learn to love them.

5)Genetics: know how to predict probabilities of genes occurring in different scenarios. Know how to read a  pedigree chart and trace back from offspring to grandparent the genotypes and phenotypes.

IN GENERAL


1) The more time you practice taking the test, the more comfortable you will feel for it. Practicing taking longer versions of the test will also help a lot.

2) Princeton Review's tests are known to be much harder than many of the other prep companies AND the actual MCAT itself. Their score is not accurate, so don't lose your cool if you keep scoring low in these.

3) When you practice, make the environment as similar to the test as possible. Shut off your phone, browsers, go to a quiet place where you can't be bothered and don't cheat in taking longer breaks than you should.

4) Study all sections equally. If you focus more time on a section you think is your weakest, the rest of them WILL fall a few points. Don't get cocky with your expertise in certain subjects.

5) Aim high. Hardly anyone actually gets the score they want, so the higher you aim, the higher your actual score will be.

Hope it helps! Good luck!