In this Leah4sci video, I'm going to show you how to improve your MCAT score
by 1 point. Wait.. just 1 point? I want you to think for a second, you've been studying
for a while, you're taking practice tests and you just can't get out of the plateau
so you go on youtube and you find these videos promising a 520 in some very short amount of time
or a jump of 10 points with just 3 weeks of studying, and you get excited, you get hopeful
but you're also a little overwhelmed because deep down you know this isn't going to work.
Here's the problem I see when most students work on their full lengths. They try to fix everything!
Tell me if that's you in the comments below. You finish a full length, you don't even take a break,
you go right into review and you fill out one of those massive ‘why I missed it’ spreadsheets.
Every single question, what you got wrong, why you got it wrong, what you have to study, which topic
it falls under, so much information! that if you go through the entire spreadsheet you study it,
you work on it, and you take this exam again, you will get a 528. The problem is, this spreadsheet
is so overwhelming you're got gonna have time to go back to it and even if you do, the idea is so
overwhelmingly scary that you're not motivated to continue. And most students have their
full-lengths so frequently that you don't even have time to work on everything. And before you
know it you're taking another full length, filling out another table having even more things on that
overwhelming spreadsheet and you just, well, you're stuck in a plateau. Because when you're
all over the place you wind up fixing NOTHING and this is why when I work with students to help them
bring up their MCAT score, I'm not looking to fix everything, I'm looking to find one point,
because what is better than being stuck in a scoring plateau having a slow and steady realistic
trajectory where you're constantly improving, getting better and seeing the results.
The review method that I use as well as the table to fill out are available on my website
at leah4sci.com/MCATFL. After you complete your full-length review table, I want you to take a
step back and analyze each section as a whole. And I want you to ask yourself, what is the one
biggest issue that stands out so that if I work on nothing else this week, except this one thing,
my score will go up by one point. Now, it might not happen for every section, but if you try
to specifically work on one issue per section and just one section is improved enough to raise your
score, that is your one point! And because you only have one thing to focus on in each section,
your mind is not all over the place, you're not completely scattered, you have enough time
and attention to work on this one thing and your scores will go up. Let's take a look at the full
length review table of one of my study hall members. Looking at this table, we see that
the student missed questions in so many different areas that it would take her so long to improve.
Of course she's going to review the individual questions and answers,
but what to focus on next is going to determine her success moving forward.
Take a look at the chem/phys section for example, we have questions missed in the content section
from material studied but forgot or concepts misunderstood. Formulas and equations forgotten or
application and manipulation issues, calculation setup errors, not sure how to apply graphs and
tables, questions taking too long, misreading and misunderstanding passages or questions, now what?
If she tried to focus on everything she'd be all over the place and completely lost. So instead,
we try to categorize what is going on, and pick the one area of focus. In the content area,
we have a total of 10 questions missed. That is because a forgotten equation is a fact forgotten
and so we have 10 right here. But in the timing issues, we have 11. The only thing I had her work
on before her next full length was timing, specifically on questions for the Chem/Phys
section. Yes, she was still doing passages, reviewing the passages and the content that came
along with it, but her primary focus, the bulk of her effort for the Chem/Phys section, was timing
as it related to questions taking too long. In the CARS section, she only categorized it
as reasoning within the text, beyond the text, and foundations of comprehension.
But within the text add 12 questions was her biggest issue. The only thing I had her focus on
was getting comfortable with reasoning within the text by doing critical reading of articles as well
as focusing on understanding the passages when she did practice. For the Bio/Biochem section,
we have 5 missed content, two calculation setup error, 2 graphs and tables, but 11
between misreading and misunderstanding passages and answer choices. Since she's already focusing
on critical reading and understanding passages for the CARS section, I had her focus specifically on
better breaking down the questions. And finally in the Psych/Soc section, we have 7 related to
content, 2 related to graphs and tables, and 7 again for misreading and misunderstanding.
In this case, it's a choice between content and misreading, misunderstanding, and we chose to
focus on content because the effort that went into improving Bio/Biochem should also translate to
Psych/Soc, this way she's not all over the place and gets to hone in on that one thing per section.
And if you look at her next full-length, were we successful in hunting for 1 point? Chem/Phys went
up a point, CARS went up a point, Bio/Biochem went up a point, and Psych/Social held steady. This is
not a typical improvement, you'll usually see a jump in one area but hey she had no complaints.
Now that you know what to do, I want you to go back to your most recent full-length and redo
the review. Not the entire review, just scan the questions that you got wrong to categorize why you
got it wrong. Take that step back and go hunting for a point. If you're ready to go on a hunt with
me, first give this video a thumbs up, make sure to subscribe to my channel and click that
bell icon so you don't miss out on any new videos then go to leah4sci.com/MCATFL for a quick review
on How to Review that full-length as well as a template for the table to fill out so that you
can go on the hunt. If you want my help reviewing your full-length review table as well as coming up
with a strategic plan so you know exactly what to do next, come work with me in the MCAT study hall
because this is exactly what we do in office hours. Full study hall details are available
on my website join.mcatstudyhall.com, you can see the link below or go to join.mcatstudyhall.com.