Nora Ayache
New Member
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2022
- Messages
- 1
- Reaction score
- 1
Over the course of the last 6 months, I’ve really appreciated these DAT breakdowns and wanted to do my part. I completed my DAT yesterday 03/21/2022 and everything from the way I felt to the way I studied is still fresh in my mind.
Scores:
PAT - 20
QR - 19
RC - 20
Bio - 23
GC - 30
OC - 22
TS - 24
AA - 23
Before I talk about what I used to study and how I studied, I just wanted to say that studying for this test has been a rollercoaster. I took 16 units during winter quarter, I had a job as a dental assistant and this test just added so much stress and panic for me. I sacrificed spending time with friends and family. BUT you need to know that 2 or 3 months of keeping your head down and studying for YOUR future and what you really want is so worth it. The feeling I got after submitting my test, I mean, I can’t even explain it. Relief? Happiness? Peace? Pride? That’s what you can look forward to after putting your best foot forward. Being proud of yourself for making it this far, because that in itself is an achievement. In other words, if I can do it, you can too and I wholeheartedly believe that.
Now, I definitely struggled with finding time to study for my DAT considering the intense schedule I had. So, how did I do it? What resources did I use? Let’s get into it.
Resources:
My first purchase was DAT Booster. I heard such good things about the Feralis Biology notes and since I knew that the bio section of the DAT was the most dense with material, I needed to have his notes. Why did I pick DAT Booster over DAT Bootcamp? There are several reasons. First, because of the bio notes and second because of the affordability. As students, especially if we’re responsible for supporting ourselves financially, having an affordable way to learn everything for the DAT is definitely preferred. DAT Booster offers both one month or 3 month long access to all of their resources, lectures, question banks and practice tests. They also offer crash courses if you need a little extra oomf, I guess you could say. However, I also used DAT Bootcamp towards the last month of my study journey. I’ll explain to you the differences as I break down each section below.
Biology - DAT Score 23
Bio Practice test scores:
Booster: 19, 22, 21, 23, 23, 21
Bootcamp: 19, 18, 18, 23, 21, 19
For biology I HIGHLY recommend the Feralis notes. Super detailed, super easy to understand and I truly believe that I got a 23 on this section because of the Feralis notes. I read BOTH the Feralis notes on Booster as well as the notes on Bootcamp THREE TIMES EACH and saw that the Feralis notes included things that Bootcamp excluded. More specifically, Booster had extensive Evolution and Ecology notes which Bootcamp did NOT have. However, since I am more of a visual learner and I like to be taught verbally rather than read a whole bunch of words, Bootcamp offered a whole series of videos for the Bio section for every single section, whereas Booster did have bio videos, but didn’t have enough to cover all sections. Furthermore, Bootcamp offers more practice question banks than Booster does. But, I heard recently that Booster is working on releasing a whole series of videos for the Biology section that will cover all topics as well as add more questions to their question banks and therefore, with that being said, my final recommendation IS BOOSTER FOR BIO.
The way I studied for the bio section was I simply read over the notes a bunch of times. The way I thought of it was, I kept on adding layer after layer of knowledge as I went through the Feralis notes. It was definitely active learning though. Don’t just read blindly. Read to truly understand. Read and visualize. Read and then repeat out loud or grab your sibling or mother or father and explain to them what you just read. It helps so so much. Then of course, I tested myself using the question banks Booster offered and what’s cool is, they also have already made flashcards. I didn’t have to make any on my own. So, definitely make use of those.
General Chemistry - DAT Score 30
GC Practice test scores:
Booster: 21, 23, 21, 22
Bootcamp: 22, 23, 23, 21, 22, 22, 21
I GOT A 30! The lecturer on Booster is Professor Dave. You may know him from YouTube. He does a great job in explaining exactly what you need to know in short, easy to understand videos. I basically learned everything I needed to know for Gen Chem from Booster. I didn’t watch all of Dr. Mike’s videos on Bootcamp because I simply didn’t have time and I didn’t think I needed to. I did watch his explanation videos though for questions I got wrong during my Bootcamp practice tests. After watching a particular section of Gen Chem like acids and bases, for example, I would go and do the practice questions that Booster offers in their question bank strictly for acids and bases to test my knowledge and I basically did that for all topics (Nuclear chemistry, electrochemistry, thermochemistry etc).
Organic Chemistry - DAT Score 22
OC Practice test scores:
Booster: 25, 23, 25, 22
Bootcamp: 24, 19, 20, 24, 23, 22, 25
This score bummed me out. Based on my practice test scores, I really thought this would be my highest science score in the sciences. I don’t know what happened during the test. I felt pretty good about it, but I guess I didn’t get the score I expected. I might’ve ignored organic chemistry towards the end and focused my attention on other areas since my practice test scores seemed fine for ochem. Anyways, Professor Dave was also the lecturer for Ochem and also did a wonderful job. A little monotone but honestly, the videos are so short and straight to the point that you get over it. I played a lot of his videos at 2x speed and was able to get through so many videos faster. Like with gen chem, I’d watch an ochem video series and then go to the question banks and do the correlating questions. That helped me solidify what I had just learned. Furthermore, Booster offers an awesome document for all the reactions you need to know for the DAT. It was so handy that the morning of my test, I took it out, skimmed over it to make sure I knew the reactions before heading into the testing center. I did not watch Bootcamps ochem videos so I can’t comment on theirs. With that being said, Booster’s Ochem prepared me well for the test, and my score (which I was not that happy with) was NOT a result of their content. They have excellent content and I know that if I reviewed a little bit more I could’ve gotten at least a 25. The score I got was because I reviewed the material last minute, because I got COCKY, which messed me up. DON’T GET COCKY. Review as much as possible!
I finished the entire science section with about 20 minutes remaining. I spent 5 minutes prepping for the PAT section (drawing out the 16 square boxes for hole punching and the little tally area for cube counting) and then WENT BACK and reviewed my test. Please, if you finish with enough time remaining, go back and review your test. You’d be shocked at the questions you could’ve gotten wrong had you not gone back to double check. I wasn’t able to go over my Ochem section and I think that’s another reason why I got a score I wasn’t happy with.
Quantitative Reasoning - DAT Score 19
QR Practice test scores:
Booster: 19, 20, 20, 21, 20
Bootcamp: 18, 20, 19, 20, 19, 21, 25
Super disappointed. I mean, I knew that I wasn’t going to get a 24 or anything, but really hoped for at least a 21. Booster did a good job in the quick 1 to 2 minute videos teaching me the concepts I needed to know to tackle QR questions on the DAT. I hoped that they would have provided more detailed examples at the end of each lecture video similar to the difficulty of the DAT, but the example questions they gave were too easy and when I took my first practice test, I was thrown off by the difficulty of the QR section. I didn’t feel as prepared on QR as I did for the other sections. Booster offers a wide variety of questions in their question bank for math which were more representative of what showed up on the practice tests, so that did help me out. Do the question bank questions before you do a practice test!!!!!! The biggest issue in this section for me was time. And here’s a little trick that I only started implementing super late into my study journey – the first 15-20 questions of the QR section are MORE DIFFICULT than the last 15-20 questions, at least in my experience. I spent more than a minute trying to figure out the correct answers to the first 15 or 20 questions and that wasted so much time. I couldn’t get to the easier questions towards the end before the timer ended. So, IF YOU CAN’T FIGURE OUT THE QUESTION ON YOUR FIRST TRY OR IF YOU DO NOT RECOGNIZE HOW TO DO THE QUESTION WITHIN THE FIRST 30 SECONDS, PICK A RANDOM ANSWER, MARK THE QUESTION AND MOVE ON. Finish the test first. Having answered all the questions gives you a better chance of scoring well than having to quickly guess the last 12 questions because you have 50 seconds on the clock remaining. Then, once you’re done, go back to the questions you marked and work on them. On top of the practice tests and question banks, I used the 2019 DAT Math Destroyer. I timed myself for every test. Yes, the Destroyer is more difficult than Booster or Bootcamp tests but it gave me speed, which is what you’ll need for this section. Thankfully I did finish the QR section on time on the real DAT, and to be honest, the questions were not that difficult. I’d say that they were easier than the practice tests on Booster, Bootcamp and Destroyer. So the 19?? No idea where it came from. I did not watch Bootcamp’s lecture videos for math so can’t comment on those.
Reading Comprehension - DAT Score 20
Practice test scores:
Booster: 19, 18, 21, 20, 20
Bootcamp: 18, 20, 19, 20, 19
UGGHHH I hated this section. I tried so many methods. I tried search and destroy, I tried making notes on a paper of the key words that the questions had. I even tried summarizing the paragraphs in two to five key words so that I could quickly locate the paragraph that the question was referring to. Nope. Never finished on time. This section asks you to read three 9-14 paragraph passages and answer 15-17 questions per passage in AN HOUR. Trust me, get the vanilla method down. The vanilla method is simply reading the whole text first, before answering the questions. Work on your reading. I’m horrible at comprehension. I tend to lose focus easily when I’m reading for a long period of time, but you can TRAIN yourself to stay focused. Read the passage as though you care. Towards the end of my study journey I caught myself whispering “That’s actually so cool” as I was reading, because the passages can be boring but you can force yourself to be interested in them. If you’re interested, finding the answers is not that difficult. Some of the answers I already knew without having to refer back to the text at all because I UNDERSTOOD the message the author was trying to portray and the interesting details stuck with me. Read and comprehend the passage in 8-10 minutes and spend the remaining 12-10 minutes answering the questions. In other words, spend 20 minutes per passage, no matter which method you choose. I’ll be honest, both Booster and Bootcamp’s practice test RC passages were more difficult than the real DAT. The real DAT RC section was actually pretty straightforward and they gave me some really interesting passages to read. I also finished on time. There’s also a feature that you can use to highlight key things like dates or names of bacteria, scientists, locations, that make finding the answer 100x easier in my opinion. UTILIZE THIS. In all honesty, I ignored RC until probably the last two weeks before my test. I was scared of it because I knew I wasn’t good at it. Don’t do that. If you’re like me and reading comprehension is difficult for you, you need to start early. Booster and Bootcamp offered different techniques you could use to tackle the RC section, but at the end of the day, this is truly a you thing. You need to figure out what works best for you and practice to excel at it. I mean literally, read a science article every night before bed, time yourself and see how much information you retained.
Perceptual Ability - DAT Score 20
Practice test scores:
Booster: 20, 20, 20, 21, 21
Bootcamp: 20, 19, 20, 19, 20
Let me quickly summarize this for you. Holepunching is a strategy, cube counting is a strategy. Those two sections, there is no excuse for you guys not to score a 15/15 per section. Booster offers SO MANY practice questions on holepunching and cube counting that you NEED to practice to get your speed down, because these sections are not luck or guessing like angle ranking might be. They are straight strategy. Practice practice practice. Booster prepared me well for angle ranking but my DAT looked a lot more like Bootcamp’s angle ranking. Keyhole and TFE is where I struggled the most. Again, practice. Booster does an excellent job in explaining what you did wrong, what you didn’t see properly in the TFE and Keyhole questions. They also offer a 3D visualizer so you can see what shape you’re actually looking at. Pattern folding I did well in. Initially. But my real DAT pattern folding was MORE difficult than the questions Booster and Bootcamp offered and I feel like this subsection brought my PAT score down. Try to finish each subsection in 10 minutes. Angle ranking, you could probably do in 4-7 minutes and that extra time you gain from finishing angle ranking super quickly, you can add to another subsection that you struggle the most in. That’s what I did.
Summary:
I started briefly getting accustomed to what the DAT was all about and what subjects were going to be tested on around summer 2021. I began to look over Feralis biology notes during summer because those notes are available on Booster even without having to purchase the membership! Fall quarter of 2021, I purchased DAT Booster to start my studying because I wanted to take the test in December 2021. That didn’t happen. When school started up again in the fall, I was full-time. My classes were a lot and I couldn’t do both. LISTEN TO ME: IF YOU BOUGHT DAT BOOSTER AND AREN’T GOING TO USE IT IMMEDIATELY, PAUSE YOUR MEMBERSHIP SO IT DOESN’T EXPIRE ON YOU. I didn’t know I could do this, so by the time I was able to study after my fall quarter ended in December, my membership had already expired and I needed to purchase Booster for another 3 months. Middle of December, I started by following Ferali’s 10 week study plan but because I wanted to double down on my study time, I did two days worth of suggested material in one day. Some days I did three days worth of suggested material. It’s not that bad. I could’ve done more if I wanted to but I was still a full-time student with a job. So nah. Gage what works best for you and plan accordingly, but definitely use the study schedule because it kept me on track and I could mark off things I was able to get done. Visually, that let me know I was making progress. By the time February 6th came around, I took my first practice test and did a practice every week initially and then every 3 days as I got closer to test day. I needed to give myself time before each practice test in order to review review review and go over the questions I did wrong AND right. Even if you got the question right, go over it and make sure you know WHY it’s right, and watch the explanation videos that Booster provides for each question. Take the time. It’s worth it. The week before my test, I focused mostly on nailing down the sections that I struggled the most on (QR, RC and PAT). The only review I did for the other sections was just the practice tests I took and going over ochem reactions. Anyways, I scheduled my test for March 8th but I only did that the first week of February and I thought I’d be ready by my scheduled date. On March 3rd, I was like NOPE, not ready. So I pushed it to the 21st. I’m glad I did because I realized I really wasn’t ready. And that’s okay! You can take it when you want and when YOU feel ready enough.
Day of Test:
PLEASE READ THIS!!!!!!!!! If you’re taking your test at a Prometric site, be cautious of this. We all know the DAT is a time sensitive exam. I mean, every second counts. You need to know that the computer lags. When you press next to go to the next question, there’s a 1-1.5 second delay before the next question pops up. AND ON TOP OF THAT, MY COMPUTER FROZE THREE TIMES FOR 7 SECONDS. I could not select an answer, I could not move onto the next question. I mean it was literally frozen. I HOPED the timer would freeze too but it DIDN’T! When normal function resumed, the time had dropped by 10 second… I’m not telling you this to scare you. I’m telling you this so that you can prepare. I didn’t know about this until like 3 days before my test and that wasn’t enough time for me to speed up in ANYTHING. Don’t worry. They give you a survey at the end of the test and I let them know what happened.
Motivation speech:
All in all, you guys will be just fine. If you choose to go with Booster, you will not be disappointed. Not only do they include all necessary material for the test, but they are also up to date with any changes that might be happening in terms of content for the DAT. They are super responsive on their intercom where you can ask them any question for clarification on topics or a specific question. They also care about their users’ feedback. They are relatively newer compared to Bootcamp, but they are definitely the best option.
Also, I’m not a genius. I’m not naturally smart. I used to see posts of students who studied for two weeks and scored a 25 AA and I felt less than for some reason. But no. Everyone is different. For me, studying for two and a half months did me fine. I put my sweat and tears into this test and got the best score I could. That’s all you can really ask of yourself. Do the work and you will be rewarded.
I tried my best to summarize everything I could, but if you have any further questions, feel free to reach out. I’d be more than happy to help. Goodluck!
Scores:
PAT - 20
QR - 19
RC - 20
Bio - 23
GC - 30
OC - 22
TS - 24
AA - 23
Before I talk about what I used to study and how I studied, I just wanted to say that studying for this test has been a rollercoaster. I took 16 units during winter quarter, I had a job as a dental assistant and this test just added so much stress and panic for me. I sacrificed spending time with friends and family. BUT you need to know that 2 or 3 months of keeping your head down and studying for YOUR future and what you really want is so worth it. The feeling I got after submitting my test, I mean, I can’t even explain it. Relief? Happiness? Peace? Pride? That’s what you can look forward to after putting your best foot forward. Being proud of yourself for making it this far, because that in itself is an achievement. In other words, if I can do it, you can too and I wholeheartedly believe that.
Now, I definitely struggled with finding time to study for my DAT considering the intense schedule I had. So, how did I do it? What resources did I use? Let’s get into it.
Resources:
My first purchase was DAT Booster. I heard such good things about the Feralis Biology notes and since I knew that the bio section of the DAT was the most dense with material, I needed to have his notes. Why did I pick DAT Booster over DAT Bootcamp? There are several reasons. First, because of the bio notes and second because of the affordability. As students, especially if we’re responsible for supporting ourselves financially, having an affordable way to learn everything for the DAT is definitely preferred. DAT Booster offers both one month or 3 month long access to all of their resources, lectures, question banks and practice tests. They also offer crash courses if you need a little extra oomf, I guess you could say. However, I also used DAT Bootcamp towards the last month of my study journey. I’ll explain to you the differences as I break down each section below.
Biology - DAT Score 23
Bio Practice test scores:
Booster: 19, 22, 21, 23, 23, 21
Bootcamp: 19, 18, 18, 23, 21, 19
For biology I HIGHLY recommend the Feralis notes. Super detailed, super easy to understand and I truly believe that I got a 23 on this section because of the Feralis notes. I read BOTH the Feralis notes on Booster as well as the notes on Bootcamp THREE TIMES EACH and saw that the Feralis notes included things that Bootcamp excluded. More specifically, Booster had extensive Evolution and Ecology notes which Bootcamp did NOT have. However, since I am more of a visual learner and I like to be taught verbally rather than read a whole bunch of words, Bootcamp offered a whole series of videos for the Bio section for every single section, whereas Booster did have bio videos, but didn’t have enough to cover all sections. Furthermore, Bootcamp offers more practice question banks than Booster does. But, I heard recently that Booster is working on releasing a whole series of videos for the Biology section that will cover all topics as well as add more questions to their question banks and therefore, with that being said, my final recommendation IS BOOSTER FOR BIO.
The way I studied for the bio section was I simply read over the notes a bunch of times. The way I thought of it was, I kept on adding layer after layer of knowledge as I went through the Feralis notes. It was definitely active learning though. Don’t just read blindly. Read to truly understand. Read and visualize. Read and then repeat out loud or grab your sibling or mother or father and explain to them what you just read. It helps so so much. Then of course, I tested myself using the question banks Booster offered and what’s cool is, they also have already made flashcards. I didn’t have to make any on my own. So, definitely make use of those.
General Chemistry - DAT Score 30
GC Practice test scores:
Booster: 21, 23, 21, 22
Bootcamp: 22, 23, 23, 21, 22, 22, 21
I GOT A 30! The lecturer on Booster is Professor Dave. You may know him from YouTube. He does a great job in explaining exactly what you need to know in short, easy to understand videos. I basically learned everything I needed to know for Gen Chem from Booster. I didn’t watch all of Dr. Mike’s videos on Bootcamp because I simply didn’t have time and I didn’t think I needed to. I did watch his explanation videos though for questions I got wrong during my Bootcamp practice tests. After watching a particular section of Gen Chem like acids and bases, for example, I would go and do the practice questions that Booster offers in their question bank strictly for acids and bases to test my knowledge and I basically did that for all topics (Nuclear chemistry, electrochemistry, thermochemistry etc).
Organic Chemistry - DAT Score 22
OC Practice test scores:
Booster: 25, 23, 25, 22
Bootcamp: 24, 19, 20, 24, 23, 22, 25
This score bummed me out. Based on my practice test scores, I really thought this would be my highest science score in the sciences. I don’t know what happened during the test. I felt pretty good about it, but I guess I didn’t get the score I expected. I might’ve ignored organic chemistry towards the end and focused my attention on other areas since my practice test scores seemed fine for ochem. Anyways, Professor Dave was also the lecturer for Ochem and also did a wonderful job. A little monotone but honestly, the videos are so short and straight to the point that you get over it. I played a lot of his videos at 2x speed and was able to get through so many videos faster. Like with gen chem, I’d watch an ochem video series and then go to the question banks and do the correlating questions. That helped me solidify what I had just learned. Furthermore, Booster offers an awesome document for all the reactions you need to know for the DAT. It was so handy that the morning of my test, I took it out, skimmed over it to make sure I knew the reactions before heading into the testing center. I did not watch Bootcamps ochem videos so I can’t comment on theirs. With that being said, Booster’s Ochem prepared me well for the test, and my score (which I was not that happy with) was NOT a result of their content. They have excellent content and I know that if I reviewed a little bit more I could’ve gotten at least a 25. The score I got was because I reviewed the material last minute, because I got COCKY, which messed me up. DON’T GET COCKY. Review as much as possible!
I finished the entire science section with about 20 minutes remaining. I spent 5 minutes prepping for the PAT section (drawing out the 16 square boxes for hole punching and the little tally area for cube counting) and then WENT BACK and reviewed my test. Please, if you finish with enough time remaining, go back and review your test. You’d be shocked at the questions you could’ve gotten wrong had you not gone back to double check. I wasn’t able to go over my Ochem section and I think that’s another reason why I got a score I wasn’t happy with.
Quantitative Reasoning - DAT Score 19
QR Practice test scores:
Booster: 19, 20, 20, 21, 20
Bootcamp: 18, 20, 19, 20, 19, 21, 25
Super disappointed. I mean, I knew that I wasn’t going to get a 24 or anything, but really hoped for at least a 21. Booster did a good job in the quick 1 to 2 minute videos teaching me the concepts I needed to know to tackle QR questions on the DAT. I hoped that they would have provided more detailed examples at the end of each lecture video similar to the difficulty of the DAT, but the example questions they gave were too easy and when I took my first practice test, I was thrown off by the difficulty of the QR section. I didn’t feel as prepared on QR as I did for the other sections. Booster offers a wide variety of questions in their question bank for math which were more representative of what showed up on the practice tests, so that did help me out. Do the question bank questions before you do a practice test!!!!!! The biggest issue in this section for me was time. And here’s a little trick that I only started implementing super late into my study journey – the first 15-20 questions of the QR section are MORE DIFFICULT than the last 15-20 questions, at least in my experience. I spent more than a minute trying to figure out the correct answers to the first 15 or 20 questions and that wasted so much time. I couldn’t get to the easier questions towards the end before the timer ended. So, IF YOU CAN’T FIGURE OUT THE QUESTION ON YOUR FIRST TRY OR IF YOU DO NOT RECOGNIZE HOW TO DO THE QUESTION WITHIN THE FIRST 30 SECONDS, PICK A RANDOM ANSWER, MARK THE QUESTION AND MOVE ON. Finish the test first. Having answered all the questions gives you a better chance of scoring well than having to quickly guess the last 12 questions because you have 50 seconds on the clock remaining. Then, once you’re done, go back to the questions you marked and work on them. On top of the practice tests and question banks, I used the 2019 DAT Math Destroyer. I timed myself for every test. Yes, the Destroyer is more difficult than Booster or Bootcamp tests but it gave me speed, which is what you’ll need for this section. Thankfully I did finish the QR section on time on the real DAT, and to be honest, the questions were not that difficult. I’d say that they were easier than the practice tests on Booster, Bootcamp and Destroyer. So the 19?? No idea where it came from. I did not watch Bootcamp’s lecture videos for math so can’t comment on those.
Reading Comprehension - DAT Score 20
Practice test scores:
Booster: 19, 18, 21, 20, 20
Bootcamp: 18, 20, 19, 20, 19
UGGHHH I hated this section. I tried so many methods. I tried search and destroy, I tried making notes on a paper of the key words that the questions had. I even tried summarizing the paragraphs in two to five key words so that I could quickly locate the paragraph that the question was referring to. Nope. Never finished on time. This section asks you to read three 9-14 paragraph passages and answer 15-17 questions per passage in AN HOUR. Trust me, get the vanilla method down. The vanilla method is simply reading the whole text first, before answering the questions. Work on your reading. I’m horrible at comprehension. I tend to lose focus easily when I’m reading for a long period of time, but you can TRAIN yourself to stay focused. Read the passage as though you care. Towards the end of my study journey I caught myself whispering “That’s actually so cool” as I was reading, because the passages can be boring but you can force yourself to be interested in them. If you’re interested, finding the answers is not that difficult. Some of the answers I already knew without having to refer back to the text at all because I UNDERSTOOD the message the author was trying to portray and the interesting details stuck with me. Read and comprehend the passage in 8-10 minutes and spend the remaining 12-10 minutes answering the questions. In other words, spend 20 minutes per passage, no matter which method you choose. I’ll be honest, both Booster and Bootcamp’s practice test RC passages were more difficult than the real DAT. The real DAT RC section was actually pretty straightforward and they gave me some really interesting passages to read. I also finished on time. There’s also a feature that you can use to highlight key things like dates or names of bacteria, scientists, locations, that make finding the answer 100x easier in my opinion. UTILIZE THIS. In all honesty, I ignored RC until probably the last two weeks before my test. I was scared of it because I knew I wasn’t good at it. Don’t do that. If you’re like me and reading comprehension is difficult for you, you need to start early. Booster and Bootcamp offered different techniques you could use to tackle the RC section, but at the end of the day, this is truly a you thing. You need to figure out what works best for you and practice to excel at it. I mean literally, read a science article every night before bed, time yourself and see how much information you retained.
Perceptual Ability - DAT Score 20
Practice test scores:
Booster: 20, 20, 20, 21, 21
Bootcamp: 20, 19, 20, 19, 20
Let me quickly summarize this for you. Holepunching is a strategy, cube counting is a strategy. Those two sections, there is no excuse for you guys not to score a 15/15 per section. Booster offers SO MANY practice questions on holepunching and cube counting that you NEED to practice to get your speed down, because these sections are not luck or guessing like angle ranking might be. They are straight strategy. Practice practice practice. Booster prepared me well for angle ranking but my DAT looked a lot more like Bootcamp’s angle ranking. Keyhole and TFE is where I struggled the most. Again, practice. Booster does an excellent job in explaining what you did wrong, what you didn’t see properly in the TFE and Keyhole questions. They also offer a 3D visualizer so you can see what shape you’re actually looking at. Pattern folding I did well in. Initially. But my real DAT pattern folding was MORE difficult than the questions Booster and Bootcamp offered and I feel like this subsection brought my PAT score down. Try to finish each subsection in 10 minutes. Angle ranking, you could probably do in 4-7 minutes and that extra time you gain from finishing angle ranking super quickly, you can add to another subsection that you struggle the most in. That’s what I did.
Summary:
I started briefly getting accustomed to what the DAT was all about and what subjects were going to be tested on around summer 2021. I began to look over Feralis biology notes during summer because those notes are available on Booster even without having to purchase the membership! Fall quarter of 2021, I purchased DAT Booster to start my studying because I wanted to take the test in December 2021. That didn’t happen. When school started up again in the fall, I was full-time. My classes were a lot and I couldn’t do both. LISTEN TO ME: IF YOU BOUGHT DAT BOOSTER AND AREN’T GOING TO USE IT IMMEDIATELY, PAUSE YOUR MEMBERSHIP SO IT DOESN’T EXPIRE ON YOU. I didn’t know I could do this, so by the time I was able to study after my fall quarter ended in December, my membership had already expired and I needed to purchase Booster for another 3 months. Middle of December, I started by following Ferali’s 10 week study plan but because I wanted to double down on my study time, I did two days worth of suggested material in one day. Some days I did three days worth of suggested material. It’s not that bad. I could’ve done more if I wanted to but I was still a full-time student with a job. So nah. Gage what works best for you and plan accordingly, but definitely use the study schedule because it kept me on track and I could mark off things I was able to get done. Visually, that let me know I was making progress. By the time February 6th came around, I took my first practice test and did a practice every week initially and then every 3 days as I got closer to test day. I needed to give myself time before each practice test in order to review review review and go over the questions I did wrong AND right. Even if you got the question right, go over it and make sure you know WHY it’s right, and watch the explanation videos that Booster provides for each question. Take the time. It’s worth it. The week before my test, I focused mostly on nailing down the sections that I struggled the most on (QR, RC and PAT). The only review I did for the other sections was just the practice tests I took and going over ochem reactions. Anyways, I scheduled my test for March 8th but I only did that the first week of February and I thought I’d be ready by my scheduled date. On March 3rd, I was like NOPE, not ready. So I pushed it to the 21st. I’m glad I did because I realized I really wasn’t ready. And that’s okay! You can take it when you want and when YOU feel ready enough.
Day of Test:
PLEASE READ THIS!!!!!!!!! If you’re taking your test at a Prometric site, be cautious of this. We all know the DAT is a time sensitive exam. I mean, every second counts. You need to know that the computer lags. When you press next to go to the next question, there’s a 1-1.5 second delay before the next question pops up. AND ON TOP OF THAT, MY COMPUTER FROZE THREE TIMES FOR 7 SECONDS. I could not select an answer, I could not move onto the next question. I mean it was literally frozen. I HOPED the timer would freeze too but it DIDN’T! When normal function resumed, the time had dropped by 10 second… I’m not telling you this to scare you. I’m telling you this so that you can prepare. I didn’t know about this until like 3 days before my test and that wasn’t enough time for me to speed up in ANYTHING. Don’t worry. They give you a survey at the end of the test and I let them know what happened.
Motivation speech:
All in all, you guys will be just fine. If you choose to go with Booster, you will not be disappointed. Not only do they include all necessary material for the test, but they are also up to date with any changes that might be happening in terms of content for the DAT. They are super responsive on their intercom where you can ask them any question for clarification on topics or a specific question. They also care about their users’ feedback. They are relatively newer compared to Bootcamp, but they are definitely the best option.
Also, I’m not a genius. I’m not naturally smart. I used to see posts of students who studied for two weeks and scored a 25 AA and I felt less than for some reason. But no. Everyone is different. For me, studying for two and a half months did me fine. I put my sweat and tears into this test and got the best score I could. That’s all you can really ask of yourself. Do the work and you will be rewarded.
I tried my best to summarize everything I could, but if you have any further questions, feel free to reach out. I’d be more than happy to help. Goodluck!
