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MCAT
Course: MCAT > Unit 1
Lesson 1: Critical analysis and reasoning skills (CARS) practice questions- CARS overview
- Foundations of comprehension
- Reasoning within the text
- Reasoning beyond the text
- Worked example: Living in a rational society
- Worked example: The happy American
- Worked example: Seeing color through Homer's eyes
- Worked example: Physical education in the UK
- Worked example: The honest truth about dishonesty
- Living in a rational society
- The happy American
- Seeing color through Homer's eyes
- Physical education in the UK
- The honest truth about dishonesty
- The ultimatum game
- Tools for thought
- Deconstructionism and literature
- Does free will exist?
- Designing courthouses
- Censorship: An unnecessary evil
- Puritan society
- Understanding Thomas Hardy
- Maternal psychology
- Huns and eurasian history
- Energy and sustainable development in Nigeria
- Primordial and complex jealousy
- What is life?
- Antenatal depression and anxiety in Pakistan
- Utilitarianism ethics
- Reflections on leaving Facebook
- Culture crossing and mixing in Mauritius
- Plain packaging tobacco
- Walt Whitman: poet of the people
- Political attitudes
- The human footprint in Mexico
- What separates science from art?
- Post-colonialism in Papuan culture
- Film adaptation of Chinese literature
- Disaster risk knowledge in Nepal
- The ethics of drug-induced happiness
- The roots of capitalism
- Adult learning across cultures
- Sociology of participation
- Let's stop playing politics with vaccines
- Buddhism and pessimism
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CARS overview
Visit us (http://www.khanacademy.org/science/healthcare-and-medicine) for health and medicine content or (http://www.khanacademy.org/test-prep/mcat) for MCAT related content. These videos do not provide medical advice and are for informational purposes only. The videos are not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the advice of a qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read or seen in any Khan Academy video.
Want to join the conversation?
- Since what grade would you start to practice MCAT? I'm in gr.10, I want to be a doctor, and should i start learning all this?(4 votes)
- You should focus on the ACT/SAT. The MCAT is an exam that you take in college, usually in your third year, and it is over the knowledge you should gain in college not in high school. For now, focus on getting into your undergrad university.(137 votes)
- What grade do you need to score to pass your MCAT?(7 votes)
- You don't "pass" or "fail" the MCAT. You get a score and percentile range, and med school use that as a factor in deciding whether to accept you. My advice would be to look up the average scoe for the latest matriculated class at the schools you are interested in. You'll run into the issue of the scores will no longer align because the MCAT has changed, but it can give you a percentile range to aim for, and you can look up the percentile range for the 2015 test to get a score range you should aim for.(25 votes)
- I don't understand how American colleges work i am not in US but i am study now in my final year in high school and i want to prepare for mid test in US should i learn mcat to enter mid school if not what should i learn to be ready to enter mid school in US, and please give me very explained info, also should ACT/SAT exam prepare me to mid school.(1 vote)
- Here is the college step process:
You go to the college's website, and find the APPLY NOW link that most college websites have (might be worded differently) and CLICK ON IT! You then set up an account and fill out your application and click SEND. They might ask for your transcript (which tells what classes you took and what your grades were in high school.) So ask your parents/ school/ college to send your transcript in to the university.
Early Enrollment usually ends in November (All this means is that you get a response within the next 2-3 weeks. You get an answer sooner in the year and can prepare for college. After Early enrollment, there is regular enrollment, which usually ends between January and May depending on the college. It takes a little longer to get a response and less of a garentee to get in. You usually apply in 12th grade.
Wait for a response from the colleges.
I would highly recommend taking the SAT or ACT if you haven't already... They occur almost monthly. You don't have to take both. But ask the college you want to go to which one they prefer. I am only taking both because they test different things. The SAT tests logic and the ACT tests knowledge. I am taking both to see which one I am better at/ got the highest score from. Even if you take both and send both in, the colleges will only accept the highest score, so you can take it as many times as you want to get the score you want. You typically take your SAT or ACT during the last 2 years of high school. It is mandatory for most colleges.
The Average SAT score is 1000.. Poor is 840 and under... Excellent is 1200 and above... (Scale is 400-1600)
The Average ACT score is 20... Poor is under 16.... Excellent is above 24... (Scale is 1-36)
I hope this is a point of reference!
I wish you the best of luck in your college process!(16 votes)
- Does CARS performance reliably predict medical school or USMLE performance?(3 votes)
- Medical school performance is a great deal more about endurance and consistency, less to do with standardized testing. If you want to be a doctor you will, the testing is there to show you areas of deficiency or review.(3 votes)
- When do you take this test?(2 votes)
- Most people take the MCAT in the spring semester of their junior year of college, and then apply to medical school that same semester.(4 votes)
- How much CARS practice should you do?(3 votes)
- Uwuwhyhyhyheyheyheyheyeheyheyehyheye(3 votes)
- I seem to keep missing 2 out of 4 questions for CARs questions. What would you recommend to do to improve?(1 vote)
- CARS is one of the hardest sections to see immediate improvement on but the longer you keep practicing the better you will be! Just keep doing a few practice passages a day (3-4 if you have time) and you should see improvement over a couple of weeks-months :) best of luck!(5 votes)
- I am in Ghana - West Africa, and will like to pursue Accelerator MD/ PHD Accelerator program,and seeking tuition free opportunity and I have to write MCAT. What guideli will you recommend in preparing. I have already completed a vision health related course and practising now ! Thanks(2 votes)
- Im in 9th, it is similar to the SAT and ACT. And is it optional?(1 vote)
- This is a test for college students that want to go to medical school.
It is required and usually taken at the end of college.
Similar to the SAT and ACT, the better you do then the better school you can go to.(2 votes)
Video transcript
- [Voiceover] Hello, my
name is Jennifer Riley, and I'm a cognitive scientist who studies text comprehension and reasoning. The goal of this video is to help you better understand the
new section of the MCAT, called the critical analysis
and reasoning skills section. Its main purpose is to figure out how well you can understand and reason
about the things you read. In this part of the test,
you'll read nine passages. Each one is about 500 to 600 words long, and you'll usually be asked between five to seven questions
about each passage. In total, you'll go through
53 questions in 90 minutes. That means you have about
10 minutes per passage, on average. In terms of the topics that
you'll be reading about, approximately half of these passages will come from the humanities, such as literature, philosophy or ethics. The other half will come
from social sciences, such as psychology,
sociology or economics. For example, one of the passages that's in the Khan Academy MCAT collection discusses how people negotiate
deals with one another, and when they believe they
are getting a fair deal. Another passage is about how computers, rather than just being
tools used by humans, might actually be changing
the way that humans think. The passages come from a
lot of different areas, and are meant to stretch your mind a bit. You'll probably find that the topics of these passages will be unfamiliar. You're not expected to already know about any of these topics. Sometimes the writing
styles will be complicated. Some words may be new to you, and some passages may
be tough to understand. Just remember, everything
that you need to know to answer the questions
will be in the passages. You're not expected to know
any background information. In fact, to do well, you
really need to just focus on the passage, and not information
that you already know from elsewhere. There are three types of
questions you'll be asked to answer in this section. The first type is called
foundations of comprehension. These questions mainly ask you to answer questions about the
author's intended message. They'll ask you about the overall idea, or about why the author used
specific words or phrases, or why the author organized
the passage in a specific way. The second category is called
reasoning within the text, and these questions
mainly ask you to think about the reasoning within
an author's argument, such as, what claim is an
author trying to support with a piece of evidence? Or, is an argument flawed? The third category is called
reasoning beyond the text. Questions in this
category ask you to apply ideas from the passage to new situations, or to think about how
the author's main message would change if there were
new information to consider. This new information will be
given to you in the question. About a third of the questions
will come from each category. You should expect about 30% foundations of comprehension questions, 30% reasoning within the text questions, and 40% reasoning beyond
the text questions. People often wonder how
the skills that are tested by the critical analysis
and reasoning skills section will ever be useful
for a future physician. These questions are on the MCAT because doctors need to be able to reason through a lot of clinical information. For example, these skills are needed when you need to analyze information to come up with a treatment
plan that makes sense for a patient, and also
so that you can explain your reasoning to others,
including the patient, family members, or other
members of your medical team. For more information on
this section of the test, and on each of the question types, be sure to see the other
videos in this section, which I hope will help you, too.