- Joined
- Jul 7, 2008
- Messages
- 52
- Reaction score
- 0
Wow, so I can't believe that after 3 and a half months of crazy studying its all finally over! It so strange not having to study reactions and count cubes and stuff!
Anyways, here are my scores
Biology: 26 -99.6%
Gen Chem 23 -94.5%
Organic Chem 21 - 87.7 %
PAT - 17 - 52.4 %
QR 16 - 52.3%
Reading 18 - 39 % !!
Total Science 23 - 98.3 %
Academic Average 21- 91.5 %
Study Materials - So basically , I studied for this for about 3.5 months, from early June as my exam date kept being pushed off because I didn't feel prepared enough.
Biology - About 5 straightforward questions, everything else was thinking questions, people say random, I don't know if that's the word for it because its stuff that you've read before and kinda faintly remember but you really need to apply the principles to try to figure out what the heck theyre asking you. I think Exam Crackers was good for basic review of knowledge, and destroyer is goood because it has those thinking application type questions.
Chemistry- I definitely had calculations, maybe about 1/3 was calculations, and the rest was a lot of theory, some was straightforward but a few were little things you might not have realized were important. I think destroyer was most helpful for this, the Kaplan book was a lot of calculations, but if you read through it you can get a good sense of the theoretical concepts that are needed to answer those questions.
Organic Chemistry- I had a lotttt of reactions, so was a little pressed for time by the end of this section, there were also a few enantiomer, type questions with basic SR RS stuff which was ok. The best for this is def Destroyer, know roadmaps, and topscore OChem was also really similar for mine. I would also say Kaplan book helps for this because it covers some of the reactions that Destroyer doesn't have or focus on too much. Also know some theoretical stuff about why / how things happen the way they do, like orbitals and activating/deactivating etc.
PAT- This was never my best section , and by this point I was already kind of tired. I spent a lot of time in the beginning, and was really pressed for time in the end, so try to work at a reasonable pace. The angles were much bigger and therefore clearer than all the other programs, the hole punching was not as hard as CDP or Achiever, I think closer to TS, and everything else was pretty close to CDP, which is helpful especially in their explanations. However, Achiever is also good for this section because its harder, and I like how you can rotate the object in the explanations whichever way you want as opposed to CDP which only goes in certain directions.
Reading- RC was always my best section on the practice tests, I was consistently getting 21s so I was pretty confident, and I did well on SAT verbal so I thought I was pretty much set for this section, and didnt study for it much. When I saw the FRAP question in biology it hit me that I was getting the notoriously hardest passage of the DAT so that made me nervous. I did search and destroy for the other two passages which were first and thankfully ethics was last so it didnt kill the timing that much. I tried to do about 20 minutes each passage, and had a good amount of tone/ how did he feel etc questions. For FRAP, its def overrated ! It was long yes, and maybe I shouldve read it and then gone back and answered qs but that might have taken a lot longer. Also some of the answers arent really in the passage, like implied or inferred points so I think its better to read just that paragraph its talking about and try to answer as best you can.
QR- This i def couldve studied more for, thankfully I didnt have that many word problems but every time I saw one I just picked one and marked it to go back. I would say go through it once, do the easy qs first and then go back and do the rest just to be smart with the time. I used for this destroyer, Kaplan practice tests and TS and Achiever to study.
And that is all!
Advice or Comments are welcome. I'm a Biology Major with a 3.5 overall, 3.2 science, 3.9 nonscience, which 3 + years of dental experience and volunteering. Still a little worried about my sGPA and pat/ math /reading but I hope everything else will help.
Thanks!
Anyways, here are my scores
Biology: 26 -99.6%
Gen Chem 23 -94.5%
Organic Chem 21 - 87.7 %
PAT - 17 - 52.4 %
QR 16 - 52.3%
Reading 18 - 39 % !!
Total Science 23 - 98.3 %
Academic Average 21- 91.5 %
Study Materials - So basically , I studied for this for about 3.5 months, from early June as my exam date kept being pushed off because I didn't feel prepared enough.
- Kaplan Lecture notes book (Didn't really read it much except Bio, but did almost all the questions)
- DESTROYER - I did this book about 4 times, It seems that with the tricky problems a lot of it is stuff you forget, so I would recommend trying to go through it multiple times to make sure it actually sticks in your head. This was my main resource, I would say.
- Exam Crackers MCAT Biology book and AUDIO OSMOSIS which is great because its entertaining and you wont fall asleep with all those BIO facts. Also, I dont think it really went beyond the scope of the DAT, so that was helpful.
- Topscore- helpful for Bio, getting used to timing, holes on PAT were closer to topscore than anything else) and also good for organic
- Achiever- I liked the level of difficulty on this because it made me feel like I still had a lot more to study and motivated me, however its also very discouraging because I kept getting around 18 /17/16s in sciences. So I would say, after about a month of studying you should take these tests to see your weak points but DEF don't do them right before the test b/c it will make you feel like 😡
- Kaplans flashcards from the class... I didn't end up going through all of them, but they were helpful in the beginning , just very overwhelming because theres a whole lot of info on them!
- Kaplan subject tests - a few in each section are helpful if you have time
- I referred to the Campbell textbook for BIO for things I didn't understand, but definitely didn't read the whole thing.
- CDP- I just got like a week before the test because everyone was raving about it, and I suppose it helped. I was getting around 17 on CDP consistently, and so I would say that its pretty indicative of your grade.
Biology - About 5 straightforward questions, everything else was thinking questions, people say random, I don't know if that's the word for it because its stuff that you've read before and kinda faintly remember but you really need to apply the principles to try to figure out what the heck theyre asking you. I think Exam Crackers was good for basic review of knowledge, and destroyer is goood because it has those thinking application type questions.
Chemistry- I definitely had calculations, maybe about 1/3 was calculations, and the rest was a lot of theory, some was straightforward but a few were little things you might not have realized were important. I think destroyer was most helpful for this, the Kaplan book was a lot of calculations, but if you read through it you can get a good sense of the theoretical concepts that are needed to answer those questions.
Organic Chemistry- I had a lotttt of reactions, so was a little pressed for time by the end of this section, there were also a few enantiomer, type questions with basic SR RS stuff which was ok. The best for this is def Destroyer, know roadmaps, and topscore OChem was also really similar for mine. I would also say Kaplan book helps for this because it covers some of the reactions that Destroyer doesn't have or focus on too much. Also know some theoretical stuff about why / how things happen the way they do, like orbitals and activating/deactivating etc.
PAT- This was never my best section , and by this point I was already kind of tired. I spent a lot of time in the beginning, and was really pressed for time in the end, so try to work at a reasonable pace. The angles were much bigger and therefore clearer than all the other programs, the hole punching was not as hard as CDP or Achiever, I think closer to TS, and everything else was pretty close to CDP, which is helpful especially in their explanations. However, Achiever is also good for this section because its harder, and I like how you can rotate the object in the explanations whichever way you want as opposed to CDP which only goes in certain directions.
Reading- RC was always my best section on the practice tests, I was consistently getting 21s so I was pretty confident, and I did well on SAT verbal so I thought I was pretty much set for this section, and didnt study for it much. When I saw the FRAP question in biology it hit me that I was getting the notoriously hardest passage of the DAT so that made me nervous. I did search and destroy for the other two passages which were first and thankfully ethics was last so it didnt kill the timing that much. I tried to do about 20 minutes each passage, and had a good amount of tone/ how did he feel etc questions. For FRAP, its def overrated ! It was long yes, and maybe I shouldve read it and then gone back and answered qs but that might have taken a lot longer. Also some of the answers arent really in the passage, like implied or inferred points so I think its better to read just that paragraph its talking about and try to answer as best you can.
QR- This i def couldve studied more for, thankfully I didnt have that many word problems but every time I saw one I just picked one and marked it to go back. I would say go through it once, do the easy qs first and then go back and do the rest just to be smart with the time. I used for this destroyer, Kaplan practice tests and TS and Achiever to study.
And that is all!
Advice or Comments are welcome. I'm a Biology Major with a 3.5 overall, 3.2 science, 3.9 nonscience, which 3 + years of dental experience and volunteering. Still a little worried about my sGPA and pat/ math /reading but I hope everything else will help.
Thanks!
! 
