GAMSAT ACER GEM the journey and a few tips

Newry Commuter

I promised that if I got into Med School I would write my tips and hopefully I can remember them all. I just got offered and accepted on thursday and am in my office clearing out drawers (I am going back as experiences Grad from a completely different field). Goodby tech world hello medicine. I have wanted this for years and decided to actually go for it in 2016. I got offered my first choice in round Zero (which is the stage after all the school leavers in early July). Amazing.  I have 4 weeks to pack up London and love to Limerick Ireland

Newry Commuter

I promised that if I got into Med School I would write my tips and hopefully I can remember them all. I just got offered and accepted on thursday and am in my office clearing out drawers (I am going back as experiences Grad from a completely different field). Goodby tech world hello medicine. I have wanted this for years and decided to actually go for it in 2016. I got offered my first choice in round Zero (which is the stage after all the school leavers in early July). Amazing. I have 4 weeks to pack up London and move to Limerick Ireland

In 2016 I spoke to a friend of a friend who was a nurse who had gotten into Limerick (UL med school) -she was in year 3 and she told me the following:
Even if you have ZERO Chem / Physics / Biology you can pass this so start now.
Do the exam straight away don't wait. Give it a lash as the process of it is good experience in itself so you know what to expect if you sit it a second time with more prep.
Start learning Vocab Lists she said - your understanding of the meaning of english is tested
She said, the funny thing is that your score won't change that significantly on multiple attempts (she was kinda right i sat it 3 times- had 3 completely different experiences with the papers and there was only + or - 1-2 marks difference).

This conversation was on the 14th Jan. I got my finger our 2 weeks later (still in denial) I sat the exam 19th of March 2016 and had done probably - 7-8 weeks proper study in the library. 8 hours a day.

I sat the exams 3 times over the following 18 months and none of those times did I study ANY CHEM/ Bio / Physics. I didn't have time to cover the courses as I was working full time in tech. My strategy was score high in the first 2 and guess the 3rd section. I researched this and there is a school of thought that you pick C and statistically if you pick C you will get higher then randomly picking. Or you could go for picking A for each answer. Or D. just keep to one. THERE IS NO NEGATIVE MARKING. LEAVE NOTHING BLANK EVER.

So I had to SKILL up fast on Humanities and reading and VOCAB ** I went to the internet. I knew NOTHING. No philosophy, no social sciences NOTHING. They say read the papers and news articles to pre for this - I didnt. I used old papers to prepare as it was from there i wrote down words I didnt understand the meaning of and wrote the meaning on the other side of the page so i could test myself on the Tube.

WHERE TO START OMFG - DON’T BE scared just start. There is lots online saying it is the toughest thing you will ever do and it is’nt easy but it is actually grand, the scaremongering is to help get money out of freaked out potential GAMSAT sitters from those peddling courses online- you can TOTALLY DO THIS ON YOUR OWN.

A few things that really helped me at the beginning where
The book The Meaning of Things Book by A. C. Grayling. It's only beginning stuff but it gives you an idea.

From there I listened to podcasts and took notes from the podcasts. That was like downloading a degree in Humanities in no time and was really enjoyable. This was with the aim of filling out 50 & topics so i could argue things in my essays - love, death, religion, art, fashion, fame, things like that in the essay question.

Philosophy Bites philosophy bites dot com/
This site is run by Nigel Warburton and his stuff and records are brill - he is a really clever bloke and i love him. He is responsible for me getting 85/100 on first attempt (i swear and i did this totally on my own). When there were words i didn't understand i looked them up and wrote them down and had a running list that i practically learned. * the reason i did this is that in the first 2 sections your vocab is actually really important and it is really easy to pick up marks based SOLELY on your understanding of literally one wok. START THIS RIGHT AWAY - VOCAB lists will save you.



mary-warnock-on.html

richard-reeves.html

peter-singer-on-henry-sidgwicks-ethics.html
Peter Singer is good listen to him even if you don't like him he will get you thinking about arguments.

peter-singer-on-life-and-death-decision-making.html

I was able to get 5-6 different famous people Stances that I could add into my essays to argue anything and be able to reference them to a famous person. This was the first time found out who JS Mills was and he gave me a good basis and grounding (I did marketing in my first degree so ALL of this was new to me).

3. I bought papers and practiced them. At the beginning i didn't time myself at all i just went easy on myself and just gave them a lash and worked through them and then corrected them against the answers. As i kept it up i timed myself and probably did no more that 8 timed attempts for Section 1 (ONLY timed myself for section 1 as I was not covering any of the Bio Chem Physics remember). I did this like the exam conditions and ONLY had the watch to time myself no alarms.

ON THE MOVE
On my phone i added in Magoosh Vocal Builder
Amazing and i worked the HECK out of these when i was on the bus and on the Tube.
I did listen to Khan Academy Biology now that i think of it - and my secret crush Hank Green for the coolest crash courses ever that are funny as well

youtube dot com crashcourse


2016 (first attempt) March 8-10 weeks full on solo study
55 in Section 1 REasoning in HUmanities & Social Science
85 Section 2 Written Communications
40 Section 3 Reasoning in Biological & Physical Sciences (i guessed C on everything)

Second attempt : Sept London 2016
ZERO Walk in COLD - LIKE NOTHING - I didn't do a seconds revision.

55 in Section 1 REasoning in Humanities & Social Science
79 Written Communications
37 Reasoning in Biological & Physical Sciences (I guessed C on everything)

Third Attempt : Dublin 2017
A weeks cramming before hand - ok at a push 4-5 days I was too tired from work but i had been listening to podcasts to refresh my brain

59 in Section 1 Reasoning in Humanities & Social Science
75 Written Communications
32 Reasoning in Biological & Physical Sciences (i guessed C on everything)


The one thing i have to say is (i am looking at these scores for the first time myself properly) is that the first time i did the GAMSATS i did practice essays. I wrote different essays under the time pressure. That's why i got 85. The second and third time i went over all the revision cards but i didn't write the essays and you can see the difference.


PAYING FOR COURSES :
I didn't BUT i did find when starting the whole process of understanding WHAT the GAMSAT was i found DR Tom the chap from Aus making money for prep courses good (as a taster he tells you how the exam is structured and the timings and that was SUPER helpful for me).
It's fine to give them your email and sign up you don't have to pay anything to get handy docs for prep on sitting the exam.

passgamsat DOT com

London course - i didn't in the end i didn't want to spend the 3k but apparently they are good


Other random tips:
When you are in the exam transfer 2 pages at a time into your answer book - DO NOT transfer after each answer. might sound silly but you loose time and you DON'T have time to lose.
With 10 minutes to go I filled in all the blank boxes in my answer book and THEN worked BACK and read the last few remaining questions i was tackling. I was less stressed doing this as i knew i had nothing blank. YOU WANT NOTHING BLANK as there is no negative marking.
You are going to run out of time and that's ok but try to pace yourself at least. Do it in Blocks of 15 minutes.
ONLY read a question ONCE - you don't have time to read it 2 times. Draw pictures beside the text and graph questions if that makes it easier for you to remember things.
YOU ARE ALLOWED to draw and write and mark the question book. If there is stuff on the web saying you are not that is BUL*&SH&^TE. It would be too hard otherwise.
HOWEVER it is NOT ok to mark your book during the reading time. I used this time to scan and see where the cartoons were and where the poetry was so i had my plan of attach. I like the big text Questions so that's where i went first. There is 10 minutes reading time.
It's ok to flick through the q book when you start in the exam and do the poetry and cartoons first- i didn't that and got a few easy ones done before i settled in.
I crossed out the entire page of the questions I answered so i was clear in the Q book what i hadn't done
I circles the a b c or d in the answer book over the 2 pages and THEN transferred them ALL in one lot to save time.
I checked myself that i wasn't putting the answers into the WRONG answer sheet (this apparently happens every year).
I didnt buy the gold standard book.
Eat dark chocolate 45 minutes before you go into the exam in the morning and again in the afternoon.



More to follow but this is a start I wanted to share ….

conal11

This is largely bad advice. One needs to spend a balanced amount of time on all three sections. To ignore the sciences is silly

Celestial12

You had an exceptional score for section 2, other people may not be able to depend on getting such a score in one section to effectively ignore the others.

Can't see myself scoring well in Section I, not sure about section II. It could go well, but it's highly dependent on what the topics are. Starting to feel overwhelmed by section III but I'll see how it goes. Definitely don't have time to study for 8 hours a day! I've lots to try to cover over the next few weeks...

Best of luck with everything in UL.

cloudmed

conal11 wrote: »

This is largely bad advice. One needs to spend a balanced amount of time on all three sections. To ignore the sciences is silly

Congrats on getting your place Newry Commuter, but I have to agree with conal11 on this.

2/3 of the scores you posted were below the cut-off points, and the other was the exact cut-off for UL only, and below the other schools. While this does not concern you as UL was your first choice, the majority of the cohort won't be in your situation.

You have exceptional essay skills, clearly. However, others don't have scores like these, so cannot afford to completely disregard whole sections, especially section 3 as it is counted twice when calculating overall scores.

Not only that, but the very basis of the medical degree is science-based so if you struggle with science that much, or disregard it entirely you will have a much harder time keeping up, particularly at the beginning when the courses are heavily focused on the sciences.

I think you were very lucky if this was your strategy. Nonetheless, your random tips are good ones! And best of luck starting med school, it's very exciting!

Jack_L101

Hey guys! Good luck to everyone who will be sitting the next upcoming GAMSAT in September! I just wanted to expand on some of the points made by Newry Commuter and hopefully they'll be of some help to anyone reading this.

Timing is in my opinion the most important factor of performance on the day. For context, I come from a science background so I was nervous about Sections I and II the most but found them manageable enough on the day by just being strict with time. From what I remember I managed to finish section I with only a few minutes left and for section II I was able to write one essay that I was happy with and about 75%-80% of another (probably not ideal but the best I could do). For Section III, I believe I maybe got on to the last 10 or so questions as time was running out and probably just scribbled down the last 5 (as Newry Commuter said, leave nothing blank).

A. C. Grayling's 'The Meaning of Things' is an absolute must for the GAMSAT. The book focuses on various topics from love and hate to nationalism and religion which are broken down into bite-size chunks (I believe the texts were originally used for a Sunday newspaper column but I good be wrong). Also, each topic includes a few quotes that can be thrown into your essays to really give them a boost. I couldn't recommend it more.

Whilst I definitely do not advise ignoring an entire section of study (especially for one that is equal in worth to the other two combined lol) I will say that there is at least some method in the madness. As I said, I come from a science background so I had at least some sort of advantage in this section but some of the stuff I hadn't seen since secondary school haha (particularly some physics and organic chem). What I would say about this section is that as long as you have an OK understanding of a topic you should be able to deduce the answer from the text provided or at least narrow down the answer and increase your probability of getting your guess right if worst comes to worst. The catch here obviously is that this will take time and you have to balance the risk/reward.

All in all, stay motivated and stay hydrated! It is a marathon of an exam and by the end my head was swimming lol I however am no expert so take everything with a pinch of salt :P  best of luck folks!

March 2017, Dublin
Section I: 65
Section II: 76
Section III: 64

medennial

Thanks for sharing your tips everyone.

I suppose it's a case of what works for one may not work for another.


I would be really interested to know how anyone structured their essays for Section II? Did you have a method you found worked in most circumstances? I'm finding it hard to just stick to one thing, and it's hard to know what works with so many differing opinions out there.

inca2

medennial wrote: »

Thanks for sharing your tips everyone.

I suppose it's a case of what works for one may not work for another.


I would be really interested to know how anyone structured their essays for Section II? Did you have a method you found worked in most circumstances? I'm finding it hard to just stick to one thing, and it's hard to know what works with so many differing opinions out there.

I just made sure I had a strong introduction and conclusion, and distinct paragraphs, each covering a different point. I don't think you can go too far wrong with a good structure like that.

Totally agreed with some of the above posts - you can't just ignore an entire section, nor can you rely on any one section to boost your mark. Give everything your best go.