- Joined
- Sep 3, 2013
- Messages
- 1,058
- Reaction score
- 960
Took the DAT few days ago. Here's my breakdown of it.
PAT: 20
QR: 23
RC: 23
Bio: 21
Gen chem: 22
O Chem: 22
TS: 22
AA: 23
------------------------------------
QR - 24
Test : Was not expecting this high of a score. I didn't spend a whole lot of time studying for this section because I thought it was the least important ( but lo and behold. the irony). I would do practice exams and always skip the questions on this portion. Only advice I can give on this section is to think fast. And oh, the calculator on the exam is actually pretty reliable
study material:
DAT math destroyer ( moderate usefulness ) - A somewhat accurate representation of the test. From what I have seen, 90% of the math portion is very simple straight forward questions that always appear. The other ten percent is tricky and can represent a range of problems. I did a few test but I never completed them because it got really boring.
-------------------------------------------
RC - 23
Test: I was surprised by the format of the test. It was entirely search & destroy. The irony? I never practiced search & destroy. I read a few breakdown saying that the S&D would not work. That might be true for other test, but there was no tone inference on my test. So even though it was all search&destroy questions, I read through every passage entirely. I was left with a minute to spare to check my marked questions
study material
various free practice test from bootcamp, qvault, crackthedat, free adea - There are free trials of passages on the interweb so I took a jab at it. I was never able to finish a full one hour section because I got really bored; I did one passage for 17 minutes and just gave up. It was mainly to gauge how fast I could read. I realized I could read fast enough so I didn't study any further.
---------------------
Bio - 21
Honestly, I can't say I was very happy about this score. I was scoring from a range of 21 to 25 on my practice tests; so it wasn't like this score was an outlier but I could definitely have done a lot better. On the actual test, I got a lot of questions that I recognized from my upper division classes. There were some questions that I couldnt answer at all because none of my study material covered it (or at least i don't recall EVER seeing it) . I did what I could for this section in terms of preparing for it.
Study material:
AP cliffs- Decent for covering all my basic understanding of biology.
AP baron- I read this to cover anything that wasn't mentioned on cliffs. The images are a lot better. All the phylum stuff wasn't covered that well in AP cliffs so I used this instead.
CHAD videos - Decent. But unnecessary
Feralis Biology - A good review after finishing the AP biology books
DAT Destroyer - Good for testing the nitpicky and random details that the DAT loves to throw at you. It helped me with 3-4 questions on the exam.
Practice tests (bootcamp, qvault, achiever, ADEA) : I am just going to generalize them because they were all very similar to me. It gave me a good feel for how the test was going to be like. But it didn't cover anything that the books + study guide + dat destroyer didn't cover (which is to be expected i suppose). It might be weird to say this, but it gave me a false sense of confidence.
-----------------
Gen Chem - 23
Chad and DAT destroyer was very on point with 85% of the questions. There were quite a few lab based questions on my exam; there were some I knew because of my chemistry classes. There were 2, however, that were just completely bogus.
Chad - He was completely solid. The video is helpful. His notes are good review. And the problems were on point.
DAT destroyer: Really useful as well. The questions are very representative.
-------------
OChem - 22
Again, CHAD and DAT destroyer was very representative of the material. Although it isn't covered much, i recommend knowing your lab related topics REALLY well. I personally memorized all the organic chemistry reactions from the CHAD study guide, but it honestly isn't that necessary. Just work on your fundamentals and you should be fine.
-----------------
PAT - 20
This was arguably my most prepared section (or so I thought). On my last five CDP test, I always scored above a 23. So needless to say, I am very unhappy with my PAT score.
keyhole: The level of difficult was similar to CDP.
TFE: So I read on other breakdowns that the line method isn't very reliable on the actual DAT. On the CDP, however, it was pretty reliable. But once I got the hang of TFE, I just started visualizing the object completely and I was able to score with near 100% accuracy on my practice exams. On my actual exam, I think the line method would have certainly failed me if I relied on it.
Angle ranking: Was really unhappy with how this section turned out, and I think this section was what killed me. A majority of the questions came down to two angles that were three degrees apart. Usually on CDP and my practice exams, I can usually answer more than half of them with confidence. On the actual exam, I was able to only answer two of them with confidence.
Hole punching: There are a lot more folds on the CDP questions. Try to practice your 1/3 folds; the CDP do not cover those.
Cube counting: All the tests I did had at least three questions per shape. On my test, most of my questions were two questions per shape. Really killed my timing along with the angle ranking.
Pattern folding: My observation on the CDP is that there are two types of questions they usually challenge you on: choosing the correct shading pattern or figuring out the shape. On the CDP, you can figure out the shape by looking at the answer key and looking for the unique shape. On the actual DAT, the shortcuts do not work; you will actually have to visualize it in your head.
I believe that the CDP is outdated now. The strategies I used on my CDP was not very effectively on the actual DAT. I was still able to finish all the questions, but I did not have time to check my marked questions.
My advice: Start with the practice free PAT exams offered by qvault and bootcamp. They seem to be a bit more updated for their TFE and pattern folding questions. They offer pretty solid answer explanation as well so it should be a good place to start. After you get a good grasps of how PAT work, THEN move on to CDP. Doing CDP first would cause you develop bad habits. There are various angle ranking, hole punching, and cube counting generator on the web as well, so look into those.
Concluding thoughts: I am satisfied with my AA score. But I am not happy about my PAT score. I want to retake it because the schools because I am confident I can get a higher score if I did more bootcamp/qvault practice PAT instead of CDP. Alas I am poor so I won't; hope this won't bite me in the ass (because I am already butthurt about the PAT!). Cheers.
PAT: 20
QR: 23
RC: 23
Bio: 21
Gen chem: 22
O Chem: 22
TS: 22
AA: 23
------------------------------------
QR - 24
Test : Was not expecting this high of a score. I didn't spend a whole lot of time studying for this section because I thought it was the least important ( but lo and behold. the irony). I would do practice exams and always skip the questions on this portion. Only advice I can give on this section is to think fast. And oh, the calculator on the exam is actually pretty reliable
study material:
DAT math destroyer ( moderate usefulness ) - A somewhat accurate representation of the test. From what I have seen, 90% of the math portion is very simple straight forward questions that always appear. The other ten percent is tricky and can represent a range of problems. I did a few test but I never completed them because it got really boring.
-------------------------------------------
RC - 23
Test: I was surprised by the format of the test. It was entirely search & destroy. The irony? I never practiced search & destroy. I read a few breakdown saying that the S&D would not work. That might be true for other test, but there was no tone inference on my test. So even though it was all search&destroy questions, I read through every passage entirely. I was left with a minute to spare to check my marked questions
study material
various free practice test from bootcamp, qvault, crackthedat, free adea - There are free trials of passages on the interweb so I took a jab at it. I was never able to finish a full one hour section because I got really bored; I did one passage for 17 minutes and just gave up. It was mainly to gauge how fast I could read. I realized I could read fast enough so I didn't study any further.
---------------------
Bio - 21
Honestly, I can't say I was very happy about this score. I was scoring from a range of 21 to 25 on my practice tests; so it wasn't like this score was an outlier but I could definitely have done a lot better. On the actual test, I got a lot of questions that I recognized from my upper division classes. There were some questions that I couldnt answer at all because none of my study material covered it (or at least i don't recall EVER seeing it) . I did what I could for this section in terms of preparing for it.
Study material:
AP cliffs- Decent for covering all my basic understanding of biology.
AP baron- I read this to cover anything that wasn't mentioned on cliffs. The images are a lot better. All the phylum stuff wasn't covered that well in AP cliffs so I used this instead.
CHAD videos - Decent. But unnecessary
Feralis Biology - A good review after finishing the AP biology books
DAT Destroyer - Good for testing the nitpicky and random details that the DAT loves to throw at you. It helped me with 3-4 questions on the exam.
Practice tests (bootcamp, qvault, achiever, ADEA) : I am just going to generalize them because they were all very similar to me. It gave me a good feel for how the test was going to be like. But it didn't cover anything that the books + study guide + dat destroyer didn't cover (which is to be expected i suppose). It might be weird to say this, but it gave me a false sense of confidence.
-----------------
Gen Chem - 23
Chad and DAT destroyer was very on point with 85% of the questions. There were quite a few lab based questions on my exam; there were some I knew because of my chemistry classes. There were 2, however, that were just completely bogus.
Chad - He was completely solid. The video is helpful. His notes are good review. And the problems were on point.
DAT destroyer: Really useful as well. The questions are very representative.
-------------
OChem - 22
Again, CHAD and DAT destroyer was very representative of the material. Although it isn't covered much, i recommend knowing your lab related topics REALLY well. I personally memorized all the organic chemistry reactions from the CHAD study guide, but it honestly isn't that necessary. Just work on your fundamentals and you should be fine.
-----------------
PAT - 20
This was arguably my most prepared section (or so I thought). On my last five CDP test, I always scored above a 23. So needless to say, I am very unhappy with my PAT score.
keyhole: The level of difficult was similar to CDP.
TFE: So I read on other breakdowns that the line method isn't very reliable on the actual DAT. On the CDP, however, it was pretty reliable. But once I got the hang of TFE, I just started visualizing the object completely and I was able to score with near 100% accuracy on my practice exams. On my actual exam, I think the line method would have certainly failed me if I relied on it.
Angle ranking: Was really unhappy with how this section turned out, and I think this section was what killed me. A majority of the questions came down to two angles that were three degrees apart. Usually on CDP and my practice exams, I can usually answer more than half of them with confidence. On the actual exam, I was able to only answer two of them with confidence.
Hole punching: There are a lot more folds on the CDP questions. Try to practice your 1/3 folds; the CDP do not cover those.
Cube counting: All the tests I did had at least three questions per shape. On my test, most of my questions were two questions per shape. Really killed my timing along with the angle ranking.
Pattern folding: My observation on the CDP is that there are two types of questions they usually challenge you on: choosing the correct shading pattern or figuring out the shape. On the CDP, you can figure out the shape by looking at the answer key and looking for the unique shape. On the actual DAT, the shortcuts do not work; you will actually have to visualize it in your head.
I believe that the CDP is outdated now. The strategies I used on my CDP was not very effectively on the actual DAT. I was still able to finish all the questions, but I did not have time to check my marked questions.
My advice: Start with the practice free PAT exams offered by qvault and bootcamp. They seem to be a bit more updated for their TFE and pattern folding questions. They offer pretty solid answer explanation as well so it should be a good place to start. After you get a good grasps of how PAT work, THEN move on to CDP. Doing CDP first would cause you develop bad habits. There are various angle ranking, hole punching, and cube counting generator on the web as well, so look into those.
Concluding thoughts: I am satisfied with my AA score. But I am not happy about my PAT score. I want to retake it because the schools because I am confident I can get a higher score if I did more bootcamp/qvault practice PAT instead of CDP. Alas I am poor so I won't; hope this won't bite me in the ass (because I am already butthurt about the PAT!). Cheers.
Last edited:
You killed it
