Counting lines???

[DDental]

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Does counting lines really work for Top End View on the actual DAT?? I know they don't work on achiever and a lot of kaplan questions.

 

[saaz55]

well i havent taken the exam yet, but i know from what ive seen, a majority of the time the line counting technique rarely works. Unless you are good enough to recognize the necessary space between the lines and whether they need to be solid or dotted, just counting the number of lines needed doesnt rly help. i try to resort to it only if the problem looks very intimidating or i dont feel like working it out in my brain. IMO, i feel you shouldnt use it on every top-front-end you see. it will kill the amount of time u have for other problems. hope that wasnt too confusing.

 

[Decan]

I've tried to find explanations of the "line counting" strategy...can you please explain to me how it works?

 

[sb1759]

yeah....can someone please explain the line counting in TFE b/c i didnt understand it the way it was explained in some other posts...thanks

 

[D.D.S.]

Well I photoshopped this in hurry, hope it helps...

Basically you take the top views number of vertical lines and match it with the front views amount of vertical lines, shown by the blue arrows. There are two of them.

Then, the amount of horizontal lines of the front view, must match the amount of amount of horizontal lines of the end view, this is shown by the red arrows/lines. Also keep in mind that everytime a straight line (vertical, horizontal or diagonal) changes its angle, this is known as an event change and no longer a single line.

Lastly, the number of horizontal lines of the top view must match the number of vertical lines of the end view. This is shown at the bottom by the red arrows and lines.

I hope this helps!! AND ALSO BEWARE THAT THIS STRATEGY DOES NOT WORK ALL THE TIME SO BECAREFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Dentalicous1234]

when does it not work? I use this strategy and it seems to work fine but then again I've only been doing kaplan and some topscore (test 1 and 2) PAT. As long as you pay close close attention to the line spacing it works...when does it not?

 

[saaz55]

when does it not work? I use this strategy and it seems to work fine but then again I've only been doing kaplan and some topscore (test 1 and 2) PAT. As long as you pay close close attention to the line spacing it works...when does it not?

I agree that answering the problem simply using this method is possible. However, for some people (with myself included at times), they find it too hard to remember where each line needs to be and having to recognize where each dotted line is required vs. a solid line. however, once u are able to master this methodology w/o spending years on a single problem u are most likely golden. IMO, i prefer picturing the object in my head and then imagining the front view. whichever you end up choosing, whether its the former or the latter, all the power to you.

 

[Decan]

Well I photoshopped this in hurry, hope it helps...

Basically you take the top views number of vertical lines and match it with the front views amount of vertical lines, shown by the blue arrows. There are two of them.

Then, the amount of horizontal lines of the front view, must match the amount of amount of horizontal lines of the end view, this is shown by the red arrows/lines. Also keep in mind that everytime a straight line (vertical, horizontal or diagonal) changes its angle, this is known as an event change and no longer a single line.

Lastly, the number of horizontal lines of the top view must match the number of vertical lines of the end view. This is shown at the bottom by the red arrows and lines.

I hope this helps!! AND ALSO BEWARE THAT THIS STRATEGY DOES NOT WORK ALL THE TIME SO BECAREFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you!

 

[Dentalicous1234]

so the method will work for everything as long as you can keep track of the lines?

 

[saaz55]

pretty much, if u do it correctly

 

[D.D.S.]

During tests, I usually see couple of the answer choices with the same amount of lines... so i use this method to narrow my choices down, then choose the best answer by trying to visualize the object in my head... its hard!!!!!

 

[Mia305]

Counting lines is actually the only strategy I used for this PAT section, and it works perfectly if you know to use it. For example, horizontal lines on the Top View will be vertical lines on the side view. From this alone, you may be able to eliminate 1 or 2 answer choices. After that, look at each of those lines from the Top view and determine if it could be solid or dashed in the end view. This method actually makes this section extremely easy.

 

[xtractime]

while kaplan teaches this as one of their strategies...i felt that on my DAT (granted i didn't count lines everytime) that there was always the right amount of lines and so counting them would not have saved me. i would only count lines as a last ditch effort.

 

[Mia305]

while kaplan teaches this as one of their strategies...i felt that on my DAT (granted i didn't count lines everytime) that there was always the right amount of lines and so counting them would not have saved me. i would only count lines as a last ditch effort.

That's because you are not supposed to just count the lines. Most of the answer choices will have the exact same amount of lines. What you have to do is take each individual line of a specific view (ex: a solid line on the Top View) and apply it to its corresponding line on another view (ex: a solid/dashed line on the end view)....just counting lines is not the complete strategy. I wish I could explain it better by just typing a response, it's just hard to actually explain it without physically demonstrating it.

 

[D.D.S.]

so basically you're saying just take a single line and compare it with the corresponding view? I dont see how that helps... is there anyway you can demonstrate this... photoshop, video, comeover, etc???

Thanks

 

[Dentalicous1234]

Well I photoshopped this in hurry, hope it helps...

Basically you take the top views number of vertical lines and match it with the front views amount of vertical lines, shown by the blue arrows. There are two of them.

Then, the amount of horizontal lines of the front view, must match the amount of amount of horizontal lines of the end view, this is shown by the red arrows/lines. Also keep in mind that everytime a straight line (vertical, horizontal or diagonal) changes its angle, this is known as an event change and no longer a single line.

Lastly, the number of horizontal lines of the top view must match the number of vertical lines of the end view. This is shown at the bottom by the red arrows and lines.

I hope this helps!! AND ALSO BEWARE THAT THIS STRATEGY DOES NOT WORK ALL THE TIME SO BECAREFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!

this explains it great...just keep in mind how far apart the lines are too...usually they switch that up so if you look fast and just count overall or something you'll miss it but look very closely