Oh. My. God.

[dotvicky]

Please, please, someone tell me that the questions (specifically the quantative reasoning questions) in the '600 UK Cat Practice Questions' book by Picard, Tighlit, Tighlit and Phillips are harder/longer than the real thing because, holy cr*p, I know that 'baby ate my brain' but I'm taking at least twice as long to get even vaguely the right answers.

I'm sure that all other practice questions I've seen have been far far easier.

Cheers
Vicky

Edit: For example, there seems no other way to do one particular question but to multiply a different 6-digit number by a different 4-digit number a total 6 times and then calculate a percentage of another (6-digit x 4-digit) number. From what I can tell, the calculators we are given are like the rubbish Windows ones. Assuming that it takes you 5 seconds to work out what you've got to calculate and 1 second to write down each of the 6 interim answers, you then have around .2 seconds to hit each key on the calculator?!?!?

[Katy83]

Hi Vicky,

I agree. Why don't they simply allow us time to do the questions properly? The UKCAT should test whether or not we know the material, not who happens to be the fastest reader or guesser. Is that what a great physician or dentist is?...a fast reader or quick finger mover on a crappy calculator?

[hoonosewot88]

Hi Vicky,

I agree. Why don't they simply allow us time to do the questions properly? The UKCAT should test whether or not we know the material, not who happens to be the fastest reader or guesser. Is that what a great physician or dentist is?...a fast reader or quick finger mover on a crappy calculator?

Wrong, the whole point of the UKCAT is to test how you deal with pressure and having to work within tight time constraints. It also tests mental aptitude as opposed to book knowledge.

Basically it's meant to be an IQ test with time constraints. They know you can learn and regurgitate book knowledge from your good A level/degree grades.

[Ashdon]

I've always thought the UKCAT was a quick way to make money. Since when was it reasonable to charge someone £60 to sit at a computer for 2 hours??

[hoonosewot88]

I've always thought the UKCAT was a quick way to make money. Since when was it reasonable to charge someone £60 to sit at a computer for 2 hours??

Well it's probably that as well, frankly it's effectiveness as an admissions tool is doubtful. Either way, what i wrote above is what they're meant to be achieving.

[MW52]

I did the UKCAT last year and was let in 30 mins late because of a bomb scare on the central line (took it in Holborn.)

I did minimal practice except to familarise myself with the layout. I am not a whiz at exams by any means and I am a pretty slow wokrin out maths sans le calculator.

BUT...even with all these factors I actually managed to scrape above avregae which apprently is over 600 for each point. To be fair I got 450 for the first section, but I was still sweating and shaking from the trip into London at break neck speed by car.

This time around I will be more prepared, but I guess what I am tryint to say is, although good prep is sound, there is no way you can "learn" the material...

..it is more to do with your innate ability rather than what you can regurgitate, as mentioned above.

Also, I currently work in an internship charity and we screen students based on CV, cover letter, interview and numerical test...very similar to what us pre meds all have to go through..

...in general you will find that institutions will consider your application as a whole, if you have slightly lower results in the test but you have a cracking CV and CL then they will consider you. More over if you can interview well then you will be okay.

[lexipower]

Wrong, the whole point of the UKCAT is to test how you deal with pressure and having to work within tight time constraints. It also tests mental aptitude as opposed to book knowledge.

Basically it's meant to be an IQ test with time constraints. They know you can learn and regurgitate book knowledge from your good A level/degree grades.

~ it's true its good that it's not book knowlege but aptitude - but the time constraint is completely ridiculous! lots of people are probably totally able to do the calculations with a bit more time; when in your medical career are you going to have to solve a problem in 30 seconds? i think thoroughness is in a way more important, you dont want to make mistakes.

[Singh.Simran]

I've always thought the UKCAT was a quick way to make money. Since when was it reasonable to charge someone £60 to sit at a computer for 2 hours??

Since someone somewhere thought capitalism and privatisation was a good idea... interestingly the bmat, funded and sat primarily by what are effectively if not technically government is both a longer, on paper (i.e. more expensive) test, better regarded, but cheaper to sit.

[SeeTee]

DotV, I'm in the same situation - my test is in a few days time and I just did the 600 question QR mock paper in the 21 minute time frame.
OMG.
I was on question 5 with 8 mins to go and that just panicked me!

Can I ask people here did they attempt every single question? And if not how many did they leave out? I'm seriously worrying - I have a maths degree and I'd far rather sit a bl**dy group theory paper than do this!!!

Advice, anyone??

[dotvicky]

For what it's worth, although I did do some more practice and got a bit better after I wrote my original post, I still didn't find the final mock exam in the '600 questions...' book very easy.

In the end, I found the actual exam easier than the book. Below you can see my marks and my feelings on how each of the sections in the actual exam compared to the book.

V: 680 - exam about the same difficulty
Q: 760 - exam significantly easier
A: 640 - exam a bit easier
D: 710 - exam a bit harder
Average = 697.5

Of course, YMMV and it's just a feeling rather than a scientific comparison of marks on mock and actual.

Cheers
Vicky