24 PAT
22 RC
22 QR
20 Bio
25 GC
28 OC
23 TS
23 AA
I am finally DONE!!!!! I would like to thank everyone on the forum. People were always patient about my silly/panic questions, and the breakdowns motivated me to work hard (I want to post a breakdown too!). Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with my scores. I'm a little disappointed in my bio and QR though. I'm pretty confident with my math skill, and I am a bio major...
But anyway, I'm just super happy to be done.
I studied for about 3 months in total. I studied on and off throughout the term for anywhere from 1 to 4 hours a day, and then about 12 hours a day for 10 days over spring break. I don't think studying for DAT over the term is a good idea. I wouldn't recommend it. I would've postponed it again (did it once in the summer), but my year expires... exactly today! (Perfect example of a procrastinator) It's definitely doable, but it's hard to get anything done with the school work.
So here's the breakdown.
Materials used:
Chad's Videos: simply a must.
Organic Chemistry as a Second Language: super useful. More on this later.
Destroyer (the destroyer book, orgo odyssey, and math destroyer): also a must.
Cliff's AP Biology: I believe it's good, but Bio is too random and you really need other sources
Crack the DAT Reading & PAT: pretty accurate representation of the DAT.
Achiever (3 tests version): I think it's a must. More on this later.
DAT Qvault: The bio section is very good. Not sure about the other sections.
Thinkwell Biology: explains things super clearly, but there are simply too many videos and I didn't have that much time. T_T
The following are supplementary materials. I only used them for reference or problems.
Kaplan Blue Book: not very useful... I think it's too easy in general. Not enough width and depth.
Schaum's outline Biology: used as a second source of material. read like a novel.
Kaplan's lesson book (WBB? Not entirely sure. Got it from someone else.)
Barron's DAT
Cliff's DAT
Alan's Biology Notes
Organic Chemistry: (Chad's video, Destroyer, Orgo Odyssey, Orgo as a second language, DAT Qvault)
Chad's video. Period. I started with almost ZERO orgo knowledge, a result from sleeping through orgo class two years ago. I watched Chad's video twice. The first time I watched it, I took detailed notes and thought I understood everything. But when I turned to destroyer, I could do less than 20% of the problems. So I went back to Chad's video, following along with the outline sheets this time, and focus more on memorizing. When I attempted Destroyer again, I was still only able to do ~50% of the questions at the beginning. I made flashcards for every reaction/concept that I didn't know or wasn't sure about. Orgo as a second language came very handy here. It explains the reaction mechanisms very carefully in great details. It helps me tremendously in memorizing reactions that Chad didn't mention or didn't explain very clearly. I went through destroyer at a rate of about 15 question/hour the first time. I did it a second time and went back to look at my results from the first time. I paid special attention to the questions I got wrong both times. I identified my weak spots and practiced more with orgo odyssey, orgo as second language, and qVault. I also studied the road maps very extensively. I made "road maps without products" and "road maps without reagents" by erasing the products or reagents and practiced with those everyday for the last 10 days. I wonder why I didn't study this hard when I was actually taking the class?
Biology: (Cliff's Biology, Destroyer, Thinkwell Biology, DAT Qvault)
I'm not entirely sure that I can give advice on this section seeing that this is my lowest score. I have a somewhat complicated story for bio. After finishing Chad's video, I realized I learn much better when the material is presented to me (vs just reading textbooks). I did some research and chose Thinkwell Biology. It's great. It's comprehensive and the professor explains things very clearly in great details. He also gives you useful examples that help you memorize stuff. The only problem is that there are too many videos and I didn't have the time to go through them all. So I turned to Cliff's bio, supplemented it with the thinkwell videos on the topics that I didn't understand very clearly. After going through Cliff's once, I did Qvault and used it as a way to identify weak spots. For each benchmark test, I would go back to Cliff's and thinkwell on my top three weakest categories and then do all the problems in those categories. I was able to get about 25 near the end of the 10 tests. After the term ended, I spent a whole day doing destroyer and got about 75%. The second time through was about 90%. I also read Schaum's outline and Alan's notes casually (in bath, before sleep, etc.) just to get additional information.
General Chemistry: (Chad's Video, Destroyer)
Chad, again, is the best. I watched Chad's video once. I have a pretty solid understanding for gen chem so it was mainly a review. I did destroyer after Chad's and was able to get about 80% the first time through. I then went back and looked at the questions I got wrong or was not sure about. Practiced on weak areas with qVault. That's about it. Man, I feel bad because this part is so short.
PAT: (KBB, Crack the DAT PAT, Achiever?)
PAT is really just practice. I read through the PAT section of KBB and was able to get most of the practice problems. But when I did my first CDP, I couldn't even finish 2/3 of the test. By the 3rd test, I was about to break 20s and after that it's 22-28. You just need to develop the skills to visualize the structures and a strategy that works for you. For example, TFE was my weakest part. At first I tried to draw out the actual structure. I quickly realized that this is just unfeasible and started to look at the answers to get clues. I realized that there are certain patterns for certain shapes, and you can eliminate answers very quickly if you just look at the distinguishable features. Of course there are subtleties that they try to trick you with, but you learn the details that you need to pay attention to with practice. CDP does have one drawback, though. It's a bit on the easy side. I'm not quite sure how to explain this. It kind of gets you to think that there are shortcuts to getting the answers, like recognizing patterns and counting the lines for TFE, and you don't think about the structure as a whole as much. I realized this when I did Achiever. Achiever questions are far more complex, and you have to be able to see the structures in your mind. The questions on real DAT wasn't even half as hard as Achiever, but I did have a couple questions that were significantly harder than CDP and I was happy that I practiced Achiever.
Reading Comprehension: (Crack the DAT Reading)
Haha, I didn't know what to do for this section, and I still don't really know how to prepare for it. I go to a very research-based college, so I'm used to reading scientific papers. I guess that helped a bit. But English isn't my first language (third, actually), so tone questions are always hard for me and sometimes there are vocabularies that I don't recognize. I practiced with CDR, but honestly I was just doing the problems and I'm not sure if I got any better or learned anything. But then again I guess more practicing can't hurt. I played with couple different strategies (search and destroy, reading ~5 questions at a time, read all questions and jot down keywords for each question, read passage and jot down keywords for each paragraph, etc.), and I ended up sticking with plain search and destroy. I think the point is find something that works for you. I also tried to memorize a couple more vocabs (studied my roommate's GRE book. Felt horrible b/c my last attempt to expand my vocab was SAT 
), but I don't know if that helped.
Qualitative Reasoning: (Destroyer, Chad's Video, qVault)
I'm extremely angry with myself about this section. I didn't study for QR that much. At the very beginning of my study, I did one test from the math destroyer and got most of it right. I was pretty satisfied and set QR aside. I realized that I have forgotten a lot of stuff (trig formula, area/volume formula, etc) after I did the first Achiever test. I watched a couple Chad's videos and practiced about 50 of the destroyer problems. I then practiced with 2 qVault tests and got 30 and 29, so I thought I was all set. I guess the moral of the story is that never be over confident. Expertise in upper level math does NOT translate to ability to perform simple calculations. PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE!
A couple words on the practicing materials:
I didn't do a lot of full-test practices because I ran out of time. I decided to use Achiever because I thought that would prepare me for the worst case scenarios. That was both a good and bad decision. Good because, well, it was the worst case scenario... Doing Achiever was so painful that I always felt I died a little inside when I finished it. The PAT section hurts my brain. But pain is good because on the test day, you'll find the actual DAT to be a breeze (mentally). You'll get through the test with less decrease in concentration at the end. The bad part, for me at least, was that it messed with my pacing, especially on the RC section. In Achiever, you're thankful when you can finish every question within the time limit. I didn't have any other practice material after I finish Achiever, so I went into DAT with the same mentality. I rushed through the test, probably making some careless mistakes in the process. These careless mistakes are hard to catch even if you have time to go back and check. I finished the natural science section with 20 minutes to spare, but 20 minutes wasn't enough for me to go through the test again, and usually you wouldn't mark the questions that you made careless mistakes in because you thought you knew the answer... If you have the time, I would recommend doing other full-test practices like topscore or Kaplan to work on pacing.
CDR and CDP are very close to the actual DAT. CDR has way too many humanities passages, but the types and difficulties of the questions are almost exactly the same. I talked about CDP in the PAT section. Even though I criticized it for being too simple, most of the questions I got on the DAT are similar to CDP.
I have a mixed feeling for qVault. I really liked the concept of categorizing the topics so you can easily see your weakness. Bio qVault is very good for reinforcing the things you studied. But the questions are mostly factual. I feel that the real DAT was a lot more about "concepts." Nevertheless, remember what part is called what is still very important. I would used the bio part of qVault like flashcards. Orgo and Chem have some pretty good questions, but (I think) there are some errors and I got no response after writing to them. As for QR... I think it's way to easy compared to the actual DAT, but I only did 2 benchmark tests so I can't really tell.
Miscellaneous advice:
1. My second time through destroyer, I grouped the questions into 40 bio, 30 orgo, 30 gen chem and timed myself. I think it helped with my pacing and got my brain used to doing 100 questions at a time.
2. Don't drink coffee on the morning of DAT. It makes you want to pee... Helms99 talked about something called Doxiderol. I didn't try it because I discovered this really close to my test and I didn't want to risk it. It may or may not help?
3. Speaking of morning... just do yourself a big favor and schedule your test in the afternoon, especially if you live in a small town in the midwest and need to drive 2 hours to Madison to take the test...
4. Eat your breakfast! I was so hungry near the end of PAT that I felt like I was going to faint. My stomach was also groaning like crazy and I felt bad for people sitting around me.
5. Youtube is more useful than you think! People have made songs for anything you can think of. I wonder how they find the time to do that. XD Here are a couple videos that I found helpful:
Animal Phyla Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=511nVzP6xr0
Fungi Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H15Po5vHiDs&list=UUJjstNDkwktHyvUdtcBfb2g&index=1&feature=plcp
Organic Reaction Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H15Po5vHiDs&list=UUJjstNDkwktHyvUdtcBfb2g&index=1&feature=plcp
Phew, that was LONG. Thanks for bearing with me, and I hope that was helpful. I am also selling everything. My thinkwell biology subscription lasts until January 2013. I am thinking about selling my laptop (Lenovo x200 tablet) that has CDR, CDP, and Achiever that expires on 7/14. I'm not really sure about it because I love my tablet too much, but I think it's a shame that these programs will go to waste. Anyway, PM me if you're interested.
22 RC
22 QR
20 Bio
25 GC
28 OC
23 TS
23 AA
I am finally DONE!!!!! I would like to thank everyone on the forum. People were always patient about my silly/panic questions, and the breakdowns motivated me to work hard (I want to post a breakdown too!). Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with my scores. I'm a little disappointed in my bio and QR though. I'm pretty confident with my math skill, and I am a bio major...
But anyway, I'm just super happy to be done. I studied for about 3 months in total. I studied on and off throughout the term for anywhere from 1 to 4 hours a day, and then about 12 hours a day for 10 days over spring break. I don't think studying for DAT over the term is a good idea. I wouldn't recommend it. I would've postponed it again (did it once in the summer), but my year expires... exactly today! (Perfect example of a procrastinator
) It's definitely doable, but it's hard to get anything done with the school work.So here's the breakdown.
Materials used:
Chad's Videos: simply a must.
Organic Chemistry as a Second Language: super useful. More on this later.
Destroyer (the destroyer book, orgo odyssey, and math destroyer): also a must.
Cliff's AP Biology: I believe it's good, but Bio is too random and you really need other sources
Crack the DAT Reading & PAT: pretty accurate representation of the DAT.
Achiever (3 tests version): I think it's a must. More on this later.
DAT Qvault: The bio section is very good. Not sure about the other sections.
Thinkwell Biology: explains things super clearly, but there are simply too many videos and I didn't have that much time. T_T
The following are supplementary materials. I only used them for reference or problems.
Kaplan Blue Book: not very useful... I think it's too easy in general. Not enough width and depth.
Schaum's outline Biology: used as a second source of material. read like a novel.
Kaplan's lesson book (WBB? Not entirely sure. Got it from someone else.)
Barron's DAT
Cliff's DAT
Alan's Biology Notes
Organic Chemistry: (Chad's video, Destroyer, Orgo Odyssey, Orgo as a second language, DAT Qvault)
Chad's video. Period. I started with almost ZERO orgo knowledge, a result from sleeping through orgo class two years ago. I watched Chad's video twice. The first time I watched it, I took detailed notes and thought I understood everything. But when I turned to destroyer, I could do less than 20% of the problems. So I went back to Chad's video, following along with the outline sheets this time, and focus more on memorizing. When I attempted Destroyer again, I was still only able to do ~50% of the questions at the beginning. I made flashcards for every reaction/concept that I didn't know or wasn't sure about. Orgo as a second language came very handy here. It explains the reaction mechanisms very carefully in great details. It helps me tremendously in memorizing reactions that Chad didn't mention or didn't explain very clearly. I went through destroyer at a rate of about 15 question/hour the first time. I did it a second time and went back to look at my results from the first time. I paid special attention to the questions I got wrong both times. I identified my weak spots and practiced more with orgo odyssey, orgo as second language, and qVault. I also studied the road maps very extensively. I made "road maps without products" and "road maps without reagents" by erasing the products or reagents and practiced with those everyday for the last 10 days. I wonder why I didn't study this hard when I was actually taking the class?
Biology: (Cliff's Biology, Destroyer, Thinkwell Biology, DAT Qvault)
I'm not entirely sure that I can give advice on this section seeing that this is my lowest score.
I have a somewhat complicated story for bio. After finishing Chad's video, I realized I learn much better when the material is presented to me (vs just reading textbooks). I did some research and chose Thinkwell Biology. It's great. It's comprehensive and the professor explains things very clearly in great details. He also gives you useful examples that help you memorize stuff. The only problem is that there are too many videos and I didn't have the time to go through them all. So I turned to Cliff's bio, supplemented it with the thinkwell videos on the topics that I didn't understand very clearly. After going through Cliff's once, I did Qvault and used it as a way to identify weak spots. For each benchmark test, I would go back to Cliff's and thinkwell on my top three weakest categories and then do all the problems in those categories. I was able to get about 25 near the end of the 10 tests. After the term ended, I spent a whole day doing destroyer and got about 75%. The second time through was about 90%. I also read Schaum's outline and Alan's notes casually (in bath, before sleep, etc.) just to get additional information. General Chemistry: (Chad's Video, Destroyer)
Chad, again, is the best. I watched Chad's video once. I have a pretty solid understanding for gen chem so it was mainly a review. I did destroyer after Chad's and was able to get about 80% the first time through. I then went back and looked at the questions I got wrong or was not sure about. Practiced on weak areas with qVault. That's about it. Man, I feel bad because this part is so short.
PAT: (KBB, Crack the DAT PAT, Achiever?)
PAT is really just practice. I read through the PAT section of KBB and was able to get most of the practice problems. But when I did my first CDP, I couldn't even finish 2/3 of the test. By the 3rd test, I was about to break 20s and after that it's 22-28. You just need to develop the skills to visualize the structures and a strategy that works for you. For example, TFE was my weakest part. At first I tried to draw out the actual structure. I quickly realized that this is just unfeasible and started to look at the answers to get clues. I realized that there are certain patterns for certain shapes, and you can eliminate answers very quickly if you just look at the distinguishable features. Of course there are subtleties that they try to trick you with, but you learn the details that you need to pay attention to with practice. CDP does have one drawback, though. It's a bit on the easy side. I'm not quite sure how to explain this. It kind of gets you to think that there are shortcuts to getting the answers, like recognizing patterns and counting the lines for TFE, and you don't think about the structure as a whole as much. I realized this when I did Achiever. Achiever questions are far more complex, and you have to be able to see the structures in your mind. The questions on real DAT wasn't even half as hard as Achiever, but I did have a couple questions that were significantly harder than CDP and I was happy that I practiced Achiever.
Reading Comprehension: (Crack the DAT Reading)
Haha, I didn't know what to do for this section, and I still don't really know how to prepare for it. I go to a very research-based college, so I'm used to reading scientific papers. I guess that helped a bit. But English isn't my first language (third, actually
), so tone questions are always hard for me and sometimes there are vocabularies that I don't recognize. I practiced with CDR, but honestly I was just doing the problems and I'm not sure if I got any better or learned anything. But then again I guess more practicing can't hurt. I played with couple different strategies (search and destroy, reading ~5 questions at a time, read all questions and jot down keywords for each question, read passage and jot down keywords for each paragraph, etc.), and I ended up sticking with plain search and destroy. I think the point is find something that works for you. I also tried to memorize a couple more vocabs (studied my roommate's GRE book. Felt horrible b/c my last attempt to expand my vocab was SAT ), but I don't know if that helped. Qualitative Reasoning: (Destroyer, Chad's Video, qVault)
I'm extremely angry with myself about this section.
I didn't study for QR that much. At the very beginning of my study, I did one test from the math destroyer and got most of it right. I was pretty satisfied and set QR aside. I realized that I have forgotten a lot of stuff (trig formula, area/volume formula, etc) after I did the first Achiever test. I watched a couple Chad's videos and practiced about 50 of the destroyer problems. I then practiced with 2 qVault tests and got 30 and 29, so I thought I was all set. I guess the moral of the story is that never be over confident. Expertise in upper level math does NOT translate to ability to perform simple calculations. PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE!A couple words on the practicing materials:
I didn't do a lot of full-test practices because I ran out of time. I decided to use Achiever because I thought that would prepare me for the worst case scenarios. That was both a good and bad decision. Good because, well, it was the worst case scenario... Doing Achiever was so painful that I always felt I died a little inside when I finished it. The PAT section hurts my brain. But pain is good because on the test day, you'll find the actual DAT to be a breeze (mentally). You'll get through the test with less decrease in concentration at the end. The bad part, for me at least, was that it messed with my pacing, especially on the RC section. In Achiever, you're thankful when you can finish every question within the time limit. I didn't have any other practice material after I finish Achiever, so I went into DAT with the same mentality. I rushed through the test, probably making some careless mistakes in the process. These careless mistakes are hard to catch even if you have time to go back and check. I finished the natural science section with 20 minutes to spare, but 20 minutes wasn't enough for me to go through the test again, and usually you wouldn't mark the questions that you made careless mistakes in because you thought you knew the answer... If you have the time, I would recommend doing other full-test practices like topscore or Kaplan to work on pacing.
CDR and CDP are very close to the actual DAT. CDR has way too many humanities passages, but the types and difficulties of the questions are almost exactly the same. I talked about CDP in the PAT section. Even though I criticized it for being too simple, most of the questions I got on the DAT are similar to CDP.
I have a mixed feeling for qVault. I really liked the concept of categorizing the topics so you can easily see your weakness. Bio qVault is very good for reinforcing the things you studied. But the questions are mostly factual. I feel that the real DAT was a lot more about "concepts." Nevertheless, remember what part is called what is still very important. I would used the bio part of qVault like flashcards. Orgo and Chem have some pretty good questions, but (I think) there are some errors and I got no response after writing to them. As for QR... I think it's way to easy compared to the actual DAT, but I only did 2 benchmark tests so I can't really tell.
Miscellaneous advice:
1. My second time through destroyer, I grouped the questions into 40 bio, 30 orgo, 30 gen chem and timed myself. I think it helped with my pacing and got my brain used to doing 100 questions at a time.
2. Don't drink coffee on the morning of DAT. It makes you want to pee... Helms99 talked about something called Doxiderol. I didn't try it because I discovered this really close to my test and I didn't want to risk it. It may or may not help?
3. Speaking of morning... just do yourself a big favor and schedule your test in the afternoon, especially if you live in a small town in the midwest and need to drive 2 hours to Madison to take the test...
4. Eat your breakfast! I was so hungry near the end of PAT that I felt like I was going to faint. My stomach was also groaning like crazy and I felt bad for people sitting around me.
5. Youtube is more useful than you think! People have made songs for anything you can think of. I wonder how they find the time to do that. XD Here are a couple videos that I found helpful:
Animal Phyla Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=511nVzP6xr0
Fungi Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H15Po5vHiDs&list=UUJjstNDkwktHyvUdtcBfb2g&index=1&feature=plcp
Organic Reaction Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H15Po5vHiDs&list=UUJjstNDkwktHyvUdtcBfb2g&index=1&feature=plcp
Phew, that was LONG. Thanks for bearing with me, and I hope that was helpful. I am also selling everything. My thinkwell biology subscription lasts until January 2013. I am thinking about selling my laptop (Lenovo x200 tablet) that has CDR, CDP, and Achiever that expires on 7/14. I'm not really sure about it because I love my tablet too much, but I think it's a shame that these programs will go to waste. Anyway, PM me if you're interested.
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