GAMSAT Resource Links

[wannahockaloogie]

I’ve wondered before why no-one ever started a GAMSAT resource thread, so thought I’d start one myself as I’ve a bit of time on my hands. Maybe it hasn’t been done before because everyone always seems to be ultra-competitive when it comes to giving too much information away! Anyways, seeing as I have a place on a GEP this coming year so won’t be taking the GAMSAT again, I thought I’d put all the links I’ve found in a thread...

In terms of taking the GAMSAT, I didn’t do that much preparation for Section I – apart from doing practice papers it’s hard to see how to practice for this section – maybe reading newspapers, fiction, etc. Familiarity with the format of the practice questions certainly helps (get the ACER Practice material - I used this), and reading lots will help work up your reading speed, though you still need to make sure you’ve understood what you’ve read!!

For Section III I’d done sciences in my A levels and degree so I didn’t have to do a lot of revision. The official advice given is that your Chemistry and Biology should be to first year university level, and Physics to about A level standard. However, I found that this section was mainly a test of problem-solving ability – most of the information you need is generally in the question for maybe 80% of the questions. My familiarity with science concepts did probably help me in this section, but the best way of practising for this is probably to, again, get hold of some practice papers and do lots of questions. That way you’ll work up mental dexterity, and also find any potential gaps in knowledge. Personally I did the first 3 Ozimed papers, and areas I found I had to read up on were mendelian inheritance, electrical circuits, moments and torque and some organic chemistry.

I found Section II the hardest to prepare for because it had been a long time since I wrote an essay. Also, I have no idea what ACER mean by a discursive/reflective essay (and have to admit I still don’t really know!). In preparation for this section I didn’t really write a lot of essays, but I did follow a lot of the links listed below to read up on what should be in a good essay, plus I wrote a few essay plans. I would actually advise writing essays, though, as it builds up your writing speed and legibility, plus gives you an idea of how you would organise your thoughts. The argumentative essay is fairly straightforward, and probably similar to what is required in the MCAT (the American Med School entrance test), so read up on that. Most people tend to have a problem with the discursive essay. Personally I don’t really know what is required for this section. However, in the actual GAMSAT exam, for this essay I wrote in the first person about personal experiences (I think the quote I wrote on was something like ‘Nothing can withstand the onslaught of laughter.’ –Mark Twain). I don’t know what my separate mark for this essay was (my joint mark for both essays was 69, but I felt I’d done a lot better in the first essay which may have pulled my mark up – but no way to tell...). However, I found writing in this style very uncomfortable and after the exam I felt I’d done badly in this essay, so for the MSAT which I took a week later I approached the same type of essay in a different way. The quotes in the MSAT were on the lines of good and evil, and I wrote it in the third person and included lots of examples from history (which I already knew about as I’m interested in that kind of stuff!), plus wrote it as a thesis/synthesis essay. I got 77 for that essay.

A brief comment on the Ozimed papers. I found them generally helpful. However, from my experience of the actual paper the format is slightly different. Section I of the Ozimed papers seemed to be much easier than the real thing. The questions didn't require quite as a wide a vocab base, and the questions weren't as cryptic. For Section II, the quotes in the real paper all followed a particular theme, while for the Ozimed papers they don't. The problem with this is that in the real paper you're basically stuck with writing an essay on whatever theme the quotes tend to be on so there isn't as much choice as the Ozimed papers. However, the quotes in the Ozimed papers are still good starters for essay prompters. Finally, I found that Section III of the real test seemed to involve more problem-solving type questions where the answers could be worked out given the information in the question, while the Ozimed papers tended to have more knowledge based questions.

I’m beginning to ramble now! I hope this helps someone and good luck... :!: :!: :!:

If you're interested in how I did (might affect the quality of my advice...!), overall, on the GAMSAT I got:

Section I: 63
Section II: 69
Section III: 78
Overall: 72
Percentile: ~96/97 :shock:

On the MSAT I got:

Critical Reasoning: 75
Interpersonal Understanding: 68
Written Communication Task 1: 67
Written Communication Task 2: 77
Overall: 72
Percentile: 95 8)

[wannahockaloogie]

GAMSAT Links:

Official ACER GAMSAT website:

http://www.acer.edu.au/tests/univers...tuk/intro.html
http://www.acer.edu.au/tests/univers...oBooklet04.pdf
http://www.sghms.ac.uk/Courses/GAMSATUKinfo04.pdf

UCAS GAMSAT link:

http://www.ucas.ac.uk/packs/gamsat.html

GAMSAT prep courses:

http://www.gamsat.co.uk/about.htm
http://www.comptext.com.au/

GAMSAT practice papers:

http://www.ozimed.com/index.html

GAMSAT general essay resources:

http://essayinfo.com/
http://english.ttu.edu/kairos/3.1/ne...m/organize.htm
http://www.uk20.co.uk/searches/E/Essays.html
http://www.thinkquest.org/library/si.../contents.html

GAMSAT argumentative essay resources:

http://gradschool.about.com/cs/mcat/a/mcatwrite.htm
http://www.eslplanet.com/teachertool...b/frntpage.htm
http://bardeen.physics.csbsju.edu/mcat/writing.html
http://www.gre.org/pracmats.html#awprep
http://ftp.ets.org/pub/gre/awintro.pdf
http://www.gre.org/issuetop.html
http://www.gre.org/argutop.html

GAMSAT discursive/exploratory essay resources:

http://www.cchs.co.uk/students/study...al%20draft.doc
http://artsci.shu.edu/english/basics...r-students.htm
http://artsci.shu.edu/english/basics...xploratory.htm
http://www.powa.org/explore/index.html
http://www.georgetown.edu/faculty/bassr/hughes/open.htm
http://wps.ablongman.com/long_ramage...71022-,00.html
http://www.teacherblue.homestead.com/discursive.html
http://morrismurray.net/art_of_reflection_essay.htm

GAMSAT science resources:

http://www.biology.arizona.edu/mende..._genetics.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendelian_inheritance
http://www.scientia.org/cadonline/home.html
http://www.emc.maricopa.edu/faculty/...ioBookTOC.html
http://www.biozone.co.nz/

[hippopotty]

Good stuff ...although I don't think anyone will be able to find much more to add!

Well done btw, hope you get into where you wanted to go.

p.s can I get a bit of advice on the essay writing? did rambling cause a problem at all for you? Because I think I'm much an equal rambler as you!

Aliah

[wannahockaloogie]

hmmm, i know what you mean about rambling!! :roll:

actually, because we only had half an hour for the exam and i knew i do ramble, i tried to keep the discursive essay quite structured to keep the rambling to a minimum.

a good rule of thumb to remember for an essay (any essay) is to say what your going to say (introduction), say it (body of essay) and say what you said (conclusion)...

that's basically what i did for the discursive essay. in the intro i talked a bit about laughter and its importance and said i would explore how hard it was to resist it (because of the quote) by talking about a few personal experiences drawn from different situations. then i talked about those experiences (i found this the hardest as i couldn't remember any on the spot :!: ). lastly, in my conclusion i said what i had learned through all these experiences - namely that it was hard to resist laughter (doh)!!

so i guess my advice would be that even if you do ramble, try to do it within some formal essay structure!! :wink: