DAT Biology section

[Molarcule]

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Hello everyone,

I am new to the forums and June will be the first time that I will be taking the DAT. I am currently attending the Kaplan Live online class. I was reading my required reading for Biology and when I take the subject exams I score very low. I am currently a Chemistry major and biology is one of my weakest subjects. Are there any suggestions on how to effectively study for the biology portion? I find myself reading and taking notes for at least 4-5 hours per chapter.

All responses will be greatly appreciated.

 

[UndergradGuy7]

Read Cliff's ap biology ~2 times or as many as you need to.

 

[newmexomfs]

i was in the same situation last year. I am a biochem major and was scoring poorly on kaplan's live online course practice tests. One lesson that I learned was that Kaplan is more than enough to score 18-20 on bio section. I scored 18 on Bio and 20+ in both GC and OC. So my advice is that just stick to kaplan and carefully read all explanations. Sometimes you will be curious to know th details, which is fine, but do not use 5 different sources to study bio. Use that time on PAT, RC and QR. I wasted a lot of time on learning unnecessary details and bombed PAT (didnt spend much time on it). Do not ignore the ecology and evolution stuff in Kaplan lesson book. You will do just fine!

 

[azar87]

bio is one of the hardest subjects to study for because it covers so many subjects and is 40 percent of ur total science grade........i used cliffs ap bio kaplan subject tests and destroyer the most useful i would have to say was my review of cliffs and just all the questions in destroyer which have out of the park questions that will most likley appear on your dat so i'd invest in these resources and it would help significantly.

 

[dentalWorks]

With regards to biology, there are 40 questions, and 25 will be giveaways (meaning high school biology should be enough to answer them). approx 10 of the 40 are "brain busters" meaning they'll take you about 1 minute to elevate your thinking to reach the right answer, but you should be able to reach the right answer. The last 5 are what I call "WTFs", you will not have any idea where those questions come from lol, and it will require strong reasoning and educated guessing to land the "correct" answer.

The best study method I found for Biology is to use Kaplan blue book biology, then hit Cliffs AP biology (atleast 2-3 times), don't forget to answer the behind-each-chapter questions on AP bio, they are really nice. Meanwhile your reading kaplan and AP bio, use your biology text book to supplement the information that you needed help with. Another thing you can try (after your doing with AP bio and kaplan) is to hit the biology destoyer questions, there are like 380 or something, most of those are like odd-ball questions that WILL require you to have your biology reference material next to you for pretty much 90% of the questions.

Since you haven't taken upper level biology courses (like physiology, microbiology, anatomy, biochemistry, and such), you will need that reference biology book....many people around here like to use Campbell cause it is the reference guide DAT makers use to write biology questions, I personally Used "biology by Raven" cause I thought it was easier to read. Obviously I am not suggesting you need upper level biology courses to handle the biology section, but you do need a biology text book just as a reference guide