{"id":287,"date":"2016-09-30T22:27:47","date_gmt":"2016-10-01T05:27:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/?p=287"},"modified":"2016-09-30T22:31:30","modified_gmt":"2016-10-01T05:31:30","slug":"creating-your-mcat-study-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/creating-your-mcat-study-guide-2016-09-30\/","title":{"rendered":"Creating Your MCAT Study Guide!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\">Preparing for the Medical College Admission Test is a <em>daunting undertaking<\/em> and you need a <em>proper plan of action to succeed<\/em>! If you\u2019ve been following along the blog for a bit the idea of creating your own personalized MCAT study guide has come up before so now let\u2019s really get into it!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-288\" src=\"http:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/WikihowStudyGuide-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"wikihowstudyguide\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/WikihowStudyGuide-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/WikihowStudyGuide.jpg 728w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>There are actually quite a few study guides and strategy suggestions floating around but unfortunately, like a lot of MCAT information, it\u2019s likely <em>wildly outdated<\/em>! With the major overhaul of the MCAT in 2015 much of the advice and general thinking around how to study for the big test reflects the old exam. It would be better to create a personalized MCAT study guide that is catered to you anyway so let&#8217;s explore how to do that!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">AAMC\u2019s Suggestions<\/span><\/h3>\n<p>The 5-part guideline outlined by the American Association of Medical Colleges is a pretty good place to start and adding in the blog wisdom<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-292\" src=\"http:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-30-at-11.17.00-PM-1-1024x173.png\" alt=\"screen-shot-2016-09-30-at-11-17-00-pm\" width=\"740\" height=\"125\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-30-at-11.17.00-PM-1-1024x173.png 1024w, https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-30-at-11.17.00-PM-1-300x51.png 300w, https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-30-at-11.17.00-PM-1-768x130.png 768w, https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-30-at-11.17.00-PM-1.png 1040w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px\" \/><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Understand \u2013 Know The Enemy<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">\u00a0Learn all the ins and outs of the MCAT! Check out this quick overview <a href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\/133117858\">video<\/a> from AAMC. Luckily there&#8217;s conveniently quite a few MCAT Cracker blog posts focusing on breaking down the test! Example: <a href=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/mcat-2015-section-breakdown-critical-analysis-reasoning-skills-2014-08-09\/\">CARS Section Breakdown<\/a><\/p>\n<ol start=\"2\">\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Establish \u2013 Know Where You Stand<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">\u00a0Run a <a href=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/mcat-diagnostic-test\/\">MCAT Cracker diagnostics test<\/a> to discover your starting point\u00a0and find out where you stand with the material so you can best decide how to move forward!<\/p>\n<ol start=\"3\">\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Study \u2013 Know Your Stuff<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Personalize here! You know yourself best so set yourself up for success and get organized! Explore further with the blog posts we&#8217;ve covered in the past \u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/mcat-2015-study-tips-2014-10-27\/\">MCAT Study Tips<\/a>\u00a0and <a href=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/mcat-2015-tools-resources-2014-11-30\/\">MCAT Tools &amp; Resources<\/a>! Work smarter not harder.<\/p>\n<ol start=\"4\">\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Practice \u2013 Practice Practice Practice<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">And Practice! Knowing the mountain of material is important but don&#8217;t underestimate the power of practice! Not only have we&#8217;ve been preaching\u00a0the importance of practice here on the blog&#8230;<a href=\"http:\/\/mcatcracker.com\">MCAT Cracker<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0specialize in it! Did you know you can take practice exams focusing on a specific section? So if you&#8217;re less strong on one section you can focus on working on that!<\/p>\n<ol start=\"5\">\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Simulate \u2013 Dress Rehearsal<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Test day is a big day!<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Gain some confidence and calm your nerves by going through test day like a practice run. This means wake up and prepare to take a full timed test and simulate the real thing at least once before real test day!<\/p>\n<p>Check out the AAMC guide in full <a href=\"http:\/\/cta-service-cms2.hubspot.com\/ctas\/v2\/public\/cs\/c\/?cta_guid=b1a52be2-1b33-4939-aaf6-c7a42b761c8c&amp;placement_guid=c483f9c0-0859-4486-893b-89bfd363fdcf&amp;portal_id=259636&amp;redirect_url=APefjpHxLQ46xVU765NzLrxMteTHMpcQqZC_S8v8Ef6KPu6-Bq0j_pE0zpyPgBPcoH6A-bCCIzxD6IfTiiGfkWDqaBSnrfbD3lQ26ovDccmobckVtxPFvBNzHyWhlbLQwjuBFtfx9cyk9grRr2Ge3qNxsdk1xHw-fQSaVDpTql5ZHiWR_oa-VkNshbo36tVPn64fKgoqvIQWwOHjwGpNwAq0rH3I8dzPXep6Z2GVAQ8E0FlHxrcLLR_p0vmAA36pmOYFGPj_L69JSPXuKxMCx46NltaTnx3CHtml0dtRVdKwQCwLWP2ACXA-8YXg4WN8lOiDhWahKa2I&amp;hsutk=13afe8a8a61fd0ea507b64b7b3e0ff16&amp;utm_referrer=http%3A%2F%2Foffers.aamc.org%2Fmcat-study&amp;canon=http%3A%2F%2Foffers.aamc.org%2Fmcat-study&amp;pageId=3751523333&amp;__hstc=109962074.13afe8a8a61fd0ea507b64b7b3e0ff16.1475068350197.1475292936275.1475297606049.3&amp;__hssc=109962074.1.1475297606049&amp;__hsfp=863237107\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">You Do You.<\/span><\/h3>\n<p>By now throughout your many years of schooling you know what works best for you so don\u2019t stray and stay true to what works. Basically <strong>you know you best<\/strong> and if that means studying in the early mornings versus late afternoon or visual tools instead of textual guides then no need to drastically change your all study habits just adapt and expand! Check out Wikihow\u2019s guide to formatting a personalized guide for you <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wikihow.com\/Create-Study-Guides\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>You now hold the keys to success in order to create your very own MCAT study guide to conquer the test!\u00a0<\/em>As you may have noticed we have covered a lot of these topics already so stay tuned for more MCAT and medical school insight around the blog \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<h3>Happy Practicing!<\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Preparing for the Medical College Admission Test is a daunting undertaking and you need a proper plan of action to succeed! If you\u2019ve been following along the blog for a bit the idea of creating your own personalized MCAT study guide has come up before so now let\u2019s really get into it! There are actually... <br \/><a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/creating-your-mcat-study-guide-2016-09-30\/\">Continue reading...<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,18,21,22,1],"tags":[58,26,63,40],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":294,"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287\/revisions\/294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcatcracker.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}