ntdentist
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I took the DAT on July 31, 2023 and here are my thoughts and experiences.
Summary of preparation:
I took my first diagnostic test in late April, towards the end of the semester, to get a feel for the test. I felt this helped with my initial planning because I then knew how the test was structured, my main weak points (Biology, Organic Chemistry, and PAT), and how quick the timing was for each section. I then finished out the semester, took a break for about a week, then hit the ground running in the middle of May. My goal was to be done with the test in 1 attempt if possible, so I utilized both DAT Booster and DAT Bootcamp. I also treated studying like a full time job, so I would study 5-6 days a week from around 8:30am - 5pm, with PAT studying at night. I limited my social life to evenings/weekends, but my main thing was to put full throttle in the 10 weeks I studied so that I wouldn’t have to take it again. I planned to finish the content phase by the end of June, so that I would have all of July to bang out practice tests. Also worth mentioning is that I knew my test was going to be on a Monday (July 31 was a Monday), so I set a practice test schedule. From the beginning - end of June, I would take a full length timed practice test every other Monday, and then all of July I took a full length timed practice test every Monday. I made sure to start at the same time as my real test would and take the timing exactly to what it would be. During the break, I would eat an energy bar and a banana and keep that consistent through practice and the real test. I used only Booster for full length timed tests and thought the real test felt very similar to a Booster test. This was to get my endurance up, because the DAT is as much of an endurance test as a knowledge test.
Content phase:
For Biology, I utilized the Feralis Anki deck on Booster. This was very helpful personally because of the large amount of content. I set my Anki options to 150 new cards/day, and with 2200 cards in total, it took me about 2 weeks to expose myself to all possible cards. After that, I continued reviewing Anki for the remainder of my studying until the last day. This helped because I exposed myself to all possible Biology concepts that could be tested. I also utilized Bootcamp for the video content to understand material I hadn’t learned before, such as all of the Anatomy systems, Reproduction and Development, and brushed up on all other Biology topics. Throughout my time studying, I also completed all the Question Banks on Bootcamp and reviewed the material multiple times for repetition purposes. I constantly referenced the High-Yield biology notes on Bootcamp as well as the individual cheat sheets on Booster.
For General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry, I watched Mike’s videos on Bootcamp which were incredible. I actually felt like I wanted to learn chemistry, which helped the material stick. There are less lessons in the chemistry sections than biology, so this went by a bit quicker. I also utilized the premade Anki decks on Bootcamp for the two chemistry sections. The Organic Chemistry Anki deck helped greatly with understanding the many reactions, and the General Chemistry Anki deck helped with concepts.
For PAT, I initially watched the strategy videos on Booster then went into practice. This was always my weakest section, so I made sure to practice every single day for at least an hour or two at night, when my mind couldn’t handle any more science. Timing is the biggest factor in PAT, so I made a plan. During my practice and the real test, I went straight to question 31. I aimed to finish angles in 6 minutes, then hole punching in 7-8 minutes, then cube counting in 7-8 minutes. I would then have around 38 minutes to complete the rest of the sections. Pattern folding I tried to finish in around 10-12 minutes, and then Top Front End in 12-13 minutes, then the rest of the time for Keyholes. In the beginning, I would get stuck on a question or two and spend way too much time on it. I realized that if that happened, I would have less time for the other sections and that would make me panic and cause a snowball effect of many wrong questions. So I kept telling myself that if I was spending too much time on a question, I would mark it and move on, which was very hard for me to do. I can’t stress enough how time management was the most important factor here.
For reading comprehension and math, I didn’t spend too much time preparing as I was fortunate to have a strong foundation in those subjects. For reading though, I initially tried Search and Destroy, but that didn’t work best for me as I wasted too much time scrolling through the entire passage to find the answer to the question. What ended up working was I would spend around 7 minutes reading the passage in its entirety. While I would read each paragraph, I would summarize what the paragraph was about in my head and just repeat that over and over for each paragraph. Then when I got to the questions, I knew the general area or paragraph the answer would be in and could go to it quickly. I had around 10-15 minutes remaining in the section when I used this strategy. For math, I did not do much practice outside of the practice tests. I did look through the cheat sheets provided for formulas.
Practice test phase:
As I mentioned, all of July was for practice. I made a plan to complete all of the individual section tests. A typical week would look like this: Monday - full length timed test from Booster. Tuesday - individual General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry section test. Wednesday - individual Biology and PAT section test. Thursday - individual General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry section test. Friday - individual Biology and PAT section test. Saturday and Sunday - review each section test, do question banks, refresh on material. When reviewing the practice tests, I made sure to review every single question even if I got it correct. I would spend time reviewing every answer choice to make sure I understood it as well. I would do the Anki decks as well every morning to refresh myself on Biology, General Chemistry, and Organic Chemistry reactions.
Comparison to real test:
PAT (23): A week before the test, I got thrown for a loop. For Angle Ranking, this was always my most unpredictable section as I got anywhere from 8-13/15 correct. I always used Booster for Angle Ranking, though the week before I used Bootcamp and got 5/15 correct. My philosophy was that the more I saw angles, the less I would see angles, so I barely touched this section since the beginning of my studying. I then figured that I would have to do better on the other sections to compensate and left it at that. During the real test though, the angles looked similar to Booster which was a huge relief to me. The rest of the PAT sections were about the same as Booster or slightly easier, except for Keyholes. The Keyhole shapes were very weird on the real test, but thankfully I allocated enough time for each one. Another thing worth mentioning is that I spent the most time practicing Top Front End, and many of the questions on the real test I could determine from projection alignment and line widths instead of understanding the figure.
Biology (25): Biology felt exactly the same as a Booster test. I marked 7 questions, when I would mark 7-10 questions in practice.
General Chemistry (26): General Chemistry was slightly easier, as there were no complex calculations. Some of the questions were really weirdly worded and it felt I was having more trouble understanding what the question was asking instead of the chemistry. I marked 2 on the real test, when I would mark around 5-7 in practice.
Organic Chemistry (30): Same with Organic Chemistry, no complex mechanisms except one tricky one and a lot of stability questions. I marked 2 on the real test, when I would mark 5-7 in practice as well.
Reading Comprehension (26): Reading Comprehension felt relatively similar in terms of the question types, and it honestly felt a bit more simple in terms of the answer being right in the passage word-for-word. The passage lengths were a bit weird though, as the first passage was 20 paragraphs, 20 questions, and pretty dense, and the other two were shorter/less dense. I marked 4 questions, when I would mark 5-6 in practice.
Math (30): Math felt exactly the same as a Booster test. I marked 3 questions, when I would typically mark 3-4 questions in practice.
Last comments/miscellaneous:
This test was a beast and had a roller coaster of emotions throughout preparation. I would suggest not letting any practice test scores deter you one way or another. Instead of the numerical score of my practice tests, I would more so look at how many questions I was getting wrong and in what areas. One practice test may be easier or harder and it is important not to let that change how you study.
I strongly feel if you dedicate a consistent amount of time, manage external factors as much as possible, and put full focus on truly understanding the material, anyone can do very well. Sleep is also very important. I would sleep no later than 11 and wake up at 7:30am nearly every single day. While friends were hanging out, family was doing things, I knew how important this was to me and wanted to make sure I didn’t leave any stone unturned or have regrets later on about how I prepared. Even though it may seem I was studying all the time, it didn’t feel like it because I enjoyed what I was doing and tried to see light at the end of the tunnel. What also helped was having a few friends also studying for the DAT at the same time. I would call them many times per week to discuss questions, strategies, or just talk. I also went to the gym or exercised outside 5-7 days/week, which helped clear my mind off of studying. At a certain point, every week felt the same, but it was important to have an end goal in mind. Good luck with studying!
Summary of preparation:
I took my first diagnostic test in late April, towards the end of the semester, to get a feel for the test. I felt this helped with my initial planning because I then knew how the test was structured, my main weak points (Biology, Organic Chemistry, and PAT), and how quick the timing was for each section. I then finished out the semester, took a break for about a week, then hit the ground running in the middle of May. My goal was to be done with the test in 1 attempt if possible, so I utilized both DAT Booster and DAT Bootcamp. I also treated studying like a full time job, so I would study 5-6 days a week from around 8:30am - 5pm, with PAT studying at night. I limited my social life to evenings/weekends, but my main thing was to put full throttle in the 10 weeks I studied so that I wouldn’t have to take it again. I planned to finish the content phase by the end of June, so that I would have all of July to bang out practice tests. Also worth mentioning is that I knew my test was going to be on a Monday (July 31 was a Monday), so I set a practice test schedule. From the beginning - end of June, I would take a full length timed practice test every other Monday, and then all of July I took a full length timed practice test every Monday. I made sure to start at the same time as my real test would and take the timing exactly to what it would be. During the break, I would eat an energy bar and a banana and keep that consistent through practice and the real test. I used only Booster for full length timed tests and thought the real test felt very similar to a Booster test. This was to get my endurance up, because the DAT is as much of an endurance test as a knowledge test.
Content phase:
For Biology, I utilized the Feralis Anki deck on Booster. This was very helpful personally because of the large amount of content. I set my Anki options to 150 new cards/day, and with 2200 cards in total, it took me about 2 weeks to expose myself to all possible cards. After that, I continued reviewing Anki for the remainder of my studying until the last day. This helped because I exposed myself to all possible Biology concepts that could be tested. I also utilized Bootcamp for the video content to understand material I hadn’t learned before, such as all of the Anatomy systems, Reproduction and Development, and brushed up on all other Biology topics. Throughout my time studying, I also completed all the Question Banks on Bootcamp and reviewed the material multiple times for repetition purposes. I constantly referenced the High-Yield biology notes on Bootcamp as well as the individual cheat sheets on Booster.
For General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry, I watched Mike’s videos on Bootcamp which were incredible. I actually felt like I wanted to learn chemistry, which helped the material stick. There are less lessons in the chemistry sections than biology, so this went by a bit quicker. I also utilized the premade Anki decks on Bootcamp for the two chemistry sections. The Organic Chemistry Anki deck helped greatly with understanding the many reactions, and the General Chemistry Anki deck helped with concepts.
For PAT, I initially watched the strategy videos on Booster then went into practice. This was always my weakest section, so I made sure to practice every single day for at least an hour or two at night, when my mind couldn’t handle any more science. Timing is the biggest factor in PAT, so I made a plan. During my practice and the real test, I went straight to question 31. I aimed to finish angles in 6 minutes, then hole punching in 7-8 minutes, then cube counting in 7-8 minutes. I would then have around 38 minutes to complete the rest of the sections. Pattern folding I tried to finish in around 10-12 minutes, and then Top Front End in 12-13 minutes, then the rest of the time for Keyholes. In the beginning, I would get stuck on a question or two and spend way too much time on it. I realized that if that happened, I would have less time for the other sections and that would make me panic and cause a snowball effect of many wrong questions. So I kept telling myself that if I was spending too much time on a question, I would mark it and move on, which was very hard for me to do. I can’t stress enough how time management was the most important factor here.
For reading comprehension and math, I didn’t spend too much time preparing as I was fortunate to have a strong foundation in those subjects. For reading though, I initially tried Search and Destroy, but that didn’t work best for me as I wasted too much time scrolling through the entire passage to find the answer to the question. What ended up working was I would spend around 7 minutes reading the passage in its entirety. While I would read each paragraph, I would summarize what the paragraph was about in my head and just repeat that over and over for each paragraph. Then when I got to the questions, I knew the general area or paragraph the answer would be in and could go to it quickly. I had around 10-15 minutes remaining in the section when I used this strategy. For math, I did not do much practice outside of the practice tests. I did look through the cheat sheets provided for formulas.
Practice test phase:
As I mentioned, all of July was for practice. I made a plan to complete all of the individual section tests. A typical week would look like this: Monday - full length timed test from Booster. Tuesday - individual General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry section test. Wednesday - individual Biology and PAT section test. Thursday - individual General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry section test. Friday - individual Biology and PAT section test. Saturday and Sunday - review each section test, do question banks, refresh on material. When reviewing the practice tests, I made sure to review every single question even if I got it correct. I would spend time reviewing every answer choice to make sure I understood it as well. I would do the Anki decks as well every morning to refresh myself on Biology, General Chemistry, and Organic Chemistry reactions.
Comparison to real test:
PAT (23): A week before the test, I got thrown for a loop. For Angle Ranking, this was always my most unpredictable section as I got anywhere from 8-13/15 correct. I always used Booster for Angle Ranking, though the week before I used Bootcamp and got 5/15 correct. My philosophy was that the more I saw angles, the less I would see angles, so I barely touched this section since the beginning of my studying. I then figured that I would have to do better on the other sections to compensate and left it at that. During the real test though, the angles looked similar to Booster which was a huge relief to me. The rest of the PAT sections were about the same as Booster or slightly easier, except for Keyholes. The Keyhole shapes were very weird on the real test, but thankfully I allocated enough time for each one. Another thing worth mentioning is that I spent the most time practicing Top Front End, and many of the questions on the real test I could determine from projection alignment and line widths instead of understanding the figure.
Biology (25): Biology felt exactly the same as a Booster test. I marked 7 questions, when I would mark 7-10 questions in practice.
General Chemistry (26): General Chemistry was slightly easier, as there were no complex calculations. Some of the questions were really weirdly worded and it felt I was having more trouble understanding what the question was asking instead of the chemistry. I marked 2 on the real test, when I would mark around 5-7 in practice.
Organic Chemistry (30): Same with Organic Chemistry, no complex mechanisms except one tricky one and a lot of stability questions. I marked 2 on the real test, when I would mark 5-7 in practice as well.
Reading Comprehension (26): Reading Comprehension felt relatively similar in terms of the question types, and it honestly felt a bit more simple in terms of the answer being right in the passage word-for-word. The passage lengths were a bit weird though, as the first passage was 20 paragraphs, 20 questions, and pretty dense, and the other two were shorter/less dense. I marked 4 questions, when I would mark 5-6 in practice.
Math (30): Math felt exactly the same as a Booster test. I marked 3 questions, when I would typically mark 3-4 questions in practice.
Last comments/miscellaneous:
This test was a beast and had a roller coaster of emotions throughout preparation. I would suggest not letting any practice test scores deter you one way or another. Instead of the numerical score of my practice tests, I would more so look at how many questions I was getting wrong and in what areas. One practice test may be easier or harder and it is important not to let that change how you study.
I strongly feel if you dedicate a consistent amount of time, manage external factors as much as possible, and put full focus on truly understanding the material, anyone can do very well. Sleep is also very important. I would sleep no later than 11 and wake up at 7:30am nearly every single day. While friends were hanging out, family was doing things, I knew how important this was to me and wanted to make sure I didn’t leave any stone unturned or have regrets later on about how I prepared. Even though it may seem I was studying all the time, it didn’t feel like it because I enjoyed what I was doing and tried to see light at the end of the tunnel. What also helped was having a few friends also studying for the DAT at the same time. I would call them many times per week to discuss questions, strategies, or just talk. I also went to the gym or exercised outside 5-7 days/week, which helped clear my mind off of studying. At a certain point, every week felt the same, but it was important to have an end goal in mind. Good luck with studying!
