<p>With a little under seven weeks from test day, I'm wondering if there is anything that I can do to bump up my verbal scores by a few points. Thus far, I have worked on five Kaplan verbal section tests. In terms of questions missed per test, I have missed 6, 1, 11, 11, and 9 questions, respectively. I've averaged about 9 wrong on some of the EK 101 tests I've taken. Ideally, I'd like to get the number of incorrect questions down to 5.</p>
<p>The only thing that I can think of doing is reading each passage more carefully and practicing. Any advice?</p>
<p>To be honest, 1 week out is not much time to make any changes. The technique that helped me the most in the least amount of time was to do passages and instead of trying to find the right answer, try to figure out why all the others are wrong. Write out your explanations and compare them to the study guide.</p>
<p>(Psst. Seven weeks out. Not seven days out. 
)</p>
<p>Are you taking a Kaplan class? If so, are you drinking the Kool-aid about passage mapping? Took me a while to buy into that idea, but once I started doing it and getting faster at it, I saw my scores improve a couple points. They recommend mapping every single passage you read that’s not MCAT related (just for practice); while I think that’s a little extreme, I definitely mapped lots of passages in periodicals (Scientific American, Time, Economist). Who knows if it was the mapping practice or just the extra reading that helped, but regardless I saw my score improve a little.</p>
<p>My D’s verbal score has always been her lowest in all standardised test, if I remember, going back to 4th grade in elementary. It has been lowest in her MCAT, she did not improve it during preparation which lasted much longer because of her busy time at college. she did everything that was suggested by others, it did not happen. Thankfully , she had enough to get accepted to few Med. Schools, including top 20. Do not worry too much, do what is suggested, but you cannot go beyond your way of reading. We have discussed it and decided that her way of reading has served her very well in HS, UG, Med. School. There is no reason to change it. Do not worry too much, focus on improving all other sections.</p>
<p>Oops. Sorry. 7 weeks is obviously plenty of time for improvement. Still do what I said to do occasionally. It works wonders.</p>
<p>Well, 2 points seems to be a normal variation. D’s score went exactly 2 points up and down and never imporved. She just got very lucky to get her highest test Verbal score on real exam, she was very happy. It did not happen to other sections, but she had much more cusion there and did OK. As I said, she has followed every single suggestion except that she has not use examcracker which was mentioned to be the best for Verbal. She just did not have any faith that she could improve, so she did not waste much time on Verbal.</p>
<p>When you score yourself on practice tests, what are you getting in the verbal? Does caffeine help at all? </p>
<p>My son feared the Verbal the most. He didn’t have time to study before his MCAT because it was taken the day after his eng’g projects were due and finals were starting on Monday. :(</p>
<p>When I met with him at midnight, the night before his test, he was pretty upset. He had just taken a practice test and had gotten a 9 on the Verbal. 
We felt very lucky that he managed an 11 on the actual MCAT. (it was a relief!!! We feared a 9 or worse!)</p>
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<p>I have yet to take my first full-length (will take one early next week), but I scored a 10 on my last verbal practice section test (32 correct out of 40 questions). After going over the questions that I missed, I feel like I could have gotten at least four of them right. I missed some because of mis-reading the question. On other questions, I talked myself out of the correct answer.</p>
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<p>I’ve been reluctant to give Kaplan’s passage mapping technique a shot; it seems like a waste of time. For the practice tests, I just highlight important parts of the passage and try to answer the questions very literally. I may give mapping a shot depending upon my performance on FL #1.</p>
<p>I was in the same boat! I viewed it as a huge gamble and as a waste of time. And then somehow my tutor talked me into trying it, first by doing a section untimed so I was focusing on the method rather than the time. Worked shockingly well (which I was really irritated by–I mean, heck, I’d done great on reading comprehension tests up until this point…who are YOU to tell me I need to change my methods?!). </p>
<p>For me, what worked so well was that it got me thinking about the passage in terms of what the questions were looking for, which meant that I was no longer misreading questions or talking myself out of correct answers (eg: I knew that certain question stems were referring to topic, scope, or purpose, so I focused on those answer choices instead of ones about details for the passage). I guess it gave me a strategy for each passage. If I remember correctly, one of the things Kaplan suggests is summarizing the topic, scope, and purpose of the passage with one phrase each (this takes no more than 30sec). Once I consistently honed in on the topic, scope, and purpose of passages (from lots of practice!), I saw my scores improve. I went from getting 9s to getting 11s and 12s, with my all-time high being 14. I got an 11 on the actual thing.</p>
<p>It takes a little while to get the hang of it, and it feels cumbersome for a while. But once you figure it out, as much as I hate to admit it, I think it worked pretty well!</p>
<p>(It’s sickening that this is still with me after a few years. Really makes me look forward to the USMLE.)</p>
<p>mom2college,
" 9 on the Verbal. We felt very lucky that he managed an 11 on the actual MCAT. (it was a relief!!! We feared a 9 or worse!) "</p>
<p>-This is unbelievable as it was exactly D’s range. She did have time as she started preparing in October and took test in May. She always plan everything and her schedule in UG was very very busy as she did all her EC’s (including non-medical) during schools year. Anyway, no matter what she did, her range ramained the same 9 - 11 in practice Verbal. It was not improving, while other sections were steadily getting higher. And just like your S., she managed 11 on real MCAT, it was such a relief and made her score balanced. She never ever got higher than 11 on Verbal, not a single time. She was not frustrated though at all as she is used to lower Reading / Verbal scores. Her real strenght is writing/English, which has always been the highest and has helped her tremendously is every class that she ever took, including all those cruel lab reports in her UG.<br>
Anyway, I would keep it cool in regard to Verbal as sometime you just have to accept things as they are. Focus on what you can control much more - science sections.</p>
<p>Updated after FL #1:</p>
<p>Overall - 27 (+5 from diagnostic)
PS - 7 (Physics is the bane of my existence)
Verbal - 11 (+3 from diagnostic)
BS - 9 (+2 from diagnostic)</p>
<p>Let’s hope that I can consistently score an 11, while I work on bumping up the other two sections. I would hate to see an improvement in the science sections counterbalanced by a drop in verbal.</p>
<p>Looking good. The other two are purportedly more “study-able”. Keep plugging away.</p>