- Joined
- May 8, 2018
- Messages
- 57
- Reaction score
- 63
I took my DAT on May 3, 2018 and received these scores
DAT scores:
PAT - 24
QR - 20
RC - 20
BIO - 25
GC - 24
OC - 22
TS - 23
AA - 22
Background
I studied hardcore for about 4 months. For the first two months, I would study around 5-6 days/week for about 6-8 hours a day. For the last two months, I would study around 6-7 days/week for about 10-12 hours a day. I had many setbacks throughout my studying schedule because I was hospitalized twice. Let's get started with the breakdown!
Materials
Make sure to prepare for the worst and everything else will be easy for you. Don't go in expecting that you'll get an easy version of the exam because that's not always the case. Make sure to give yourself enough time to really prepare for the DAT and make sure to take breaks as well. You don't want to tire yourself out because it will backfire on you. There were days that I was mentally fatigued and wanted to give up entirely. This was mainly due to not taking enough breaks. If you're having trouble with a section, making flashcards can help. On the day before your exam, make sure to not study too much as it will only cause you to be anxious and you'll start forgetting information. Go outside, hangout with friends, play video games, do whatever relaxes you. Lastly, I want to thank @Ari Rezaei , @orgoman22 ,and @FeralisExtremum for all of the materials!
DAT scores:
PAT - 24
QR - 20
RC - 20
BIO - 25
GC - 24
OC - 22
TS - 23
AA - 22
Background
I studied hardcore for about 4 months. For the first two months, I would study around 5-6 days/week for about 6-8 hours a day. For the last two months, I would study around 6-7 days/week for about 10-12 hours a day. I had many setbacks throughout my studying schedule because I was hospitalized twice. Let's get started with the breakdown!
Materials
- DAT Bootcamp
- DAT Destroyer 2018
- Math Destroyer 2018
- Chad's videos
- Cliff's AP Biology
- DAT QVault Biology
- Feralis Notes
- Khan Academy
- Coursesaver BIO and QR
- Studying: I started off studying for biology by reading a chapter from Cliff's AP Biology a day and wrote detailed notes. Then, I moved on to the biology videos and quizzes that were provided by coursesaver but I felt like they weren't as useful. After, I used Feralis notes and DAT Bootcamp Biology Book to further solidify my knowledge of biology. I then moved on to DAT Destroyer and did around 100 biology questions per day (going over the biology section of DAT Destroyer for a total of three times). DAT Destroyer Biology is great because each question explanation had so much information that you can take away from it. It was almost like having 4 questions in one if you know what I mean. One thing to keep in mind is that the anatomy and physiology is extremely lacking in Cliff's AP Biology so don't reply on that chapter for content review. Instead, look at the anatomy and physiology that is covered in Feralis notes. I'm so glad that I took anatomy and physiology during undergrad because when it was time to review, everything was already fresh in my head and it made everything so much easier. So if there was one class that I highly recommend taking during undergrad, it would be anatomy and physiology! Finally, I took a bunch of biology subject tests on DAT Bootcamp, quizzes for each chapter in AP Cliff's, and all biology exams from DAT Qvault. DAT Bootcamp Biology exams 6-10 were golden! It was much harder compared to tests 1-5 but the explanations for each question were phenomenal. Also, DAT Qvault Biology was amazing because the explanations really helped and the charts they provide for Biodiversity is great for people who learn better by looking at an organized chart instead of reading the information from a textbook. I also made flashcards and had probably 1500 in total but it was well worth it. Every night before bed, I would randomly test myself on 50 flashcards and made sure I knew them. Overall, I read Cliff's AP Biology a total of 3 times, Feralis Notes a total of 2 times, DAT Bootcamp Biology Book a total of 2 times, and did DAT Bootcamp Biology subject tests 1-10 numerous times.
- Test day: I had a lot of plant and biodiversity questions to my surprise. Good thing I prepared for the worst! Overall, the questions were about the same as DAT Bootcamp in terms of difficulty but the wording of the questions on the actual DAT was simpler. While a good chuck of the questions were about plants/Biodiversity, the remaining questions were equally distributed among the biology subjects. I ended up marking about 3 questions (questions that I've never seen before in my studies) and finished this section in about 20 minutes.
- Studying: I started off with Mike's GC videos on Bootcamp but didn't think it was much help. My friend introduced me to chad's videos and holy crap, Chad is an angel sent from heaven. Honestly, Chad is all you need for gen chem. I started off watching his videos and took very detailed notes. I wrote down every single thing that he said. His quizzes were exceptional. I moved on to DAT Bootcamp and did all of the subject tests numerous times. Again, reading the explanations for DAT Bootcamp subject test 6-10 is a great way to enhance your understand of gen chem. Lastly, I moved on to DAT Destroyer Gen Chem and went over this section 3 times.
- Test day: Much easier than I expected! It was mostly conceptual questions with a handful of calculations. Chad's videos and quizzes will help you out so much for this section! DAT Destroyer gen chem helped me with a couple of odd ball questions on the exam and I'm thankful to have gone over DAT Destroyer 3 times. DAT Bootcamp gen chem will help you with timing for this section. I also finished this section in about 20 minutes.
- Studying: I did the same thing here as I did for gen chem. I went over chad's, DAT Destroyer, and DAT Bootcamp. Take advantage of the roadmaps in DAT Destroyer. It gives you every single reaction that you can possibly see on test day and more. For this section, I also used the OC Lab tests & techniques provided for DAT Bootcamp which was extremely helpful.
- Test day: Very straightforward overall. I had a handful of NMR questions so be prepared for that as you will never know what questions you will get on test day. I raced through this section and finished in 15 minutes. After finishing my SNS, I had around 35 minutes left to review my questions. I spent a majority of that time reviewing the marked questions from Biology and Gen Chem so I didn't get a chance to review my OC section. I remember spending 5 minutes on a marked question from my bio section. I should have just answered that question to the best of my ability and moved on so I can use that extra time to review other questions. I advise you not to spend so much time on a question that you're unsure of and to use that time to answer a question that you are sure of.
- Studying: I started off watching the videos from DAT Bootcamp and made sure to do the generators every day. I was really frustrated with this section in the beginning because I got so many questions wrong and that unmotivated me. I especially had trouble with the angle ranking section because I had a tough time distinguishing between angles that were only 3 degrees apart and in different orientations. I'm talking about getting 5/15 on the angle ranking sections on some of my PAT exams on DAT Bootcamp. However, you will get better with practice! Don't be discouraged if you feel like you'll never master some sections of the PAT. Come up with your own techniques to tackle the PAT. I'm telling you that if you just spend 15-20 minutes a day using the generators, you will get better with time.
- Test day:
- Keyholes: I had 6 rock keyholes but the rest of the keyholes were on par with DAT Bootcamp
- TFE: A little more difficult than DAT Bootcamp
- Angle Ranking: Surprisingly more difficult than DAT Bootcamp. I had many questions in which the angles were only 3 degrees apart and in different orientations. My angle ranking section was similar to DAT Bootcamp PAT tests 6-10 in term of difficulty.
- Hole punching: On par with DAT Bootcamp
- Cube counting: Slightly easier than DAT Bootcamp
- Pattern folding: On par with DAT Bootcamp
- Studying: I didn't really study for this section. I only took DAT Bootcamp RC exams 1-5 and developed some strategies to tackle this section. I learned about search and destroyer and mapping. For me, I would read about 50% of my passage and highlight keywords for each paragraph.
- Test day: Holy crap. I was expecting this section to be way easier compared to DAT Bootcamp based on what I've heard from others. For this section, I did what I always did on DAT Bootcamp and read 50% of the passages, highlight important keywords, and created a mental map of the passage. I had a lot of statement and inference questions and only a handful of search and destroy type of questions. The passages were easier to read compared to DAT Bootcamp but it was the questions that were killing me. I thought I bombed this section and had to retake the DAT.
- Studying: I started studying for this section by watching the QR videos provided by coursesaver and watching Khan Academy on YouTube. After learning the basics, I started my first DAT Bootcamp QR test and got a 16. I had trouble with timing and figuring out how to start a problem in a reasonable amount of time. I used Math Destroyer and DAT Destroyer QR in the back of the book to practice. Best investments I've made! Math Destroyer and DAT Destroyer QR helped with my timing tremendously!
- Test day: Not bad at all! Most of the questions were straightforward with a couple of hard questions mixed in there. I was mentally drained and couldn’t concentrate for the first 2-3 minutes of this section because I thought I completely bombed the RC section. Don’t dwell on that and move on! It will only negatively impact your performace on other sections. I had quite a bit of quantitative comparison questions but DAT Bootcamp prepared me well for it. Shoutout to Math Destroyer as well! I had no trigonometry but I did have 1-2 geometry questions so be prepared for that!
- Note: Most people tend to neglect this section of the DAT and hold off on studying up until 2 week before the exam because they've heard that many dental schools don't care about this section. Remember, the quantitative reasoning section makes up 1/5 of your AA so why would you not put in the effort to do well?
Make sure to prepare for the worst and everything else will be easy for you. Don't go in expecting that you'll get an easy version of the exam because that's not always the case. Make sure to give yourself enough time to really prepare for the DAT and make sure to take breaks as well. You don't want to tire yourself out because it will backfire on you. There were days that I was mentally fatigued and wanted to give up entirely. This was mainly due to not taking enough breaks. If you're having trouble with a section, making flashcards can help. On the day before your exam, make sure to not study too much as it will only cause you to be anxious and you'll start forgetting information. Go outside, hangout with friends, play video games, do whatever relaxes you. Lastly, I want to thank @Ari Rezaei , @orgoman22 ,and @FeralisExtremum for all of the materials!
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