Abstract Reasoning for the UKCAT
UKCAT abstract reasoning throws everyone when they first try it. Most people when they ask for UKCAT tuition are actually asking for abstract reasoning tuition. It is very hard, so don’t feel like you’re the only one when you find it challenging. In our opinion here at Medicine Mentoring we don’t think it shows who is going to be a good doctor or not: it just shows you can see abstract (and very abstract at that!) patterns.
But that doesn’t mean you don’t need to do well in it to get an interview and a place at the medical school of your choice. So here are some of our tips for your UKCAT abstract reasoning revision:
1) Start easy. Most UKCAT revision books ease you into the problems. Solve the worked examples so you know how to approach the trickier questions.
2) Consider dependence. Sets can have condition aspects to them, i.e. when circles are black there are 5 squares. Try to think about what dependence is present in the set.
3) Always read the explanations. Make sure you understand why you got the question wrong (or right!) and try to use the principles for the next one.
4) Think about how the sets are related. The sets do not have to opposites of each other, but they are often variations on a theme. If you can work out what Set A’s rule is, Set B’s shouldn’t be too challenging.
5) Spend most of your time working out the rule. There’s no point trying to fit shapes until you’ve worked out the rule. Once the rule has been worked out fitting the shapes will be relatively instant.
6) Practice, practice, practice. Nothing beats plenty of practice for the UKCAT, especially abstract reasoning. So before signing up to a two-day course, buy a question book (we listed a couple we really like in our last blog post) and answer every question in it. If you still have difficulty then consider a lesson or two.
So ultimately they are all the pearls of wisdom we can offer. Plenty of practice and make sure you understand where you went wrong before using the answer explanations. With hard work you’ll crack it.
We’re going to be running a short 90 minute UKCAT seminar July 20th in London (£15 per person) to recap everything for the test. Email ukcat@medicinementoring.co.uk if you would like to register your interest. We don’t run a long course because we know that for the UKCAT, nothing beats practice and plenty of it.
All the best,
Matt
Medicine Mentoring
Source: Getting into Medicine
But that doesn’t mean you don’t need to do well in it to get an interview and a place at the medical school of your choice. So here are some of our tips for your UKCAT abstract reasoning revision:
1) Start easy. Most UKCAT revision books ease you into the problems. Solve the worked examples so you know how to approach the trickier questions.
2) Consider dependence. Sets can have condition aspects to them, i.e. when circles are black there are 5 squares. Try to think about what dependence is present in the set.
3) Always read the explanations. Make sure you understand why you got the question wrong (or right!) and try to use the principles for the next one.
4) Think about how the sets are related. The sets do not have to opposites of each other, but they are often variations on a theme. If you can work out what Set A’s rule is, Set B’s shouldn’t be too challenging.
5) Spend most of your time working out the rule. There’s no point trying to fit shapes until you’ve worked out the rule. Once the rule has been worked out fitting the shapes will be relatively instant.
6) Practice, practice, practice. Nothing beats plenty of practice for the UKCAT, especially abstract reasoning. So before signing up to a two-day course, buy a question book (we listed a couple we really like in our last blog post) and answer every question in it. If you still have difficulty then consider a lesson or two.
So ultimately they are all the pearls of wisdom we can offer. Plenty of practice and make sure you understand where you went wrong before using the answer explanations. With hard work you’ll crack it.
We’re going to be running a short 90 minute UKCAT seminar July 20th in London (£15 per person) to recap everything for the test. Email ukcat@medicinementoring.co.uk if you would like to register your interest. We don’t run a long course because we know that for the UKCAT, nothing beats practice and plenty of it.
All the best,
Matt
Medicine Mentoring
Source: Getting into Medicine
Dear writer,
ReplyDeleteI am writing from Medic Mind. We are a newly launched organization who are trying to make a difference by helping medical applicants up and down the UK. We are running 3 main initiatives:
1) Free talks- we are doing free talks at over 40 UK schools to the medical applicants
2) Free resources / blogs- we are working hard to write free UKCAT mocks for applicants, and have compiled 1000s of documents for A-level revision
3) Cost price courses- we are running UKCAT courses around the UK as well as in Singapore. However, we are not profit motivated but instead want to help as many students as possible, so have priced them at £25 for a full UKCAT Course Day.
We are looking to work with a medicine blog in a dual relationship. We can help you by:
1) Advertising your blog on our website. We have thousands of visitors each week, so I am sure it will help direct many medical applicants to your blog.
2) Advertising your blog at the 40+ schools we are speaking at in the coming months.
3) Giving you 10% commission on any UKCAT Course sales via your website. On the checkout for our course, we will have a tick box option for users to select how they found Medic Mind, so we can have your blog there (another form of advertising!).
In return, we would love it if you could advertise or recommend our UKCAT Course on your blog and to your followers. I believe that we have very similar incentives in the sense that we are not looking to rip students off or make money, we are trying to help as much as possible because we can both relate to the difficult journey medical applicants face.
I look forward to hearing from you soon!
Best wishes,
Kunal Dasani
Co-founder
Medic Mind
07838391792
Regards,
Kunal | info@medicmind.co.uk