- Joined
- Jan 24, 2011
- Messages
- 386
- Reaction score
- 8
I know these scores aren't as great as some you'll see here, but I'm beyond thrilled.
Study Method:
I studied pretty casually all summer. I say I wound up studying about 2-3 hours a day for a little over two months. Starting last week, I upped it to about 5-6 hours a day, and since Thursday it's been about 11-12 hours a day. Was really worried toward the end that I wasn't going to be able to get it done, but it turns out I knew it better than I thought.
Materials:
Chad (10/10): Can't really say anything that hasn't been said. It's amazing how much chem I had forgotten in the last two years, but I really learned a ton from the videos. Stuff that I never quite understood from studying hours on end in college was made clear in 30 minute video increments.
Cliffs (8/10): If you know Cliffs, you'll do well. Obviously it won't cover everything(and no single bio resource will), but it highlights all the key points. From my experience, success in bio is not how well you know the tiny details, but just that you have a general understanding of everything. That said, I probably had 2-3 questions that I couldn't have gotten right if I had Cliff's open in front me.
DAT Destroyer (7/10): This thing will kick your tail. However, just because I was short on time until the end, I didn't really get to understand it all, and it was kind of a mood killer even last night when I missed about 40% of the 50 or so gchem questions I did. It was more helpful on ochem to me, but even then it had stuff that I feel like wouldn't show up in a million years. That said, it was a good resource and going through it once really showed me where I was strong and weak. My theory is that knowing Chads alone will get you in the 20's, and mastering this will get you in the elite range.
Math Destroyer (8/10): Didn't really get to spend a lot of time on this and only made it through 4 tests. Much harder than the real thing, but there were several problems on my DAT that were almost word for word with new numbers. Again, know this 100%, you'll get an elite score. Did really help work on my timing.
CDP (7/10): Really your only option for studying for the PAT section. Tests did help my timing and my average toward the end was a 19(my highest being a 22 last night), so I guess it represented my true score. The only thing is, some of the sections on my DAT were completely different. I'll go into more detail later.
KBB(4/10): PAT tutorials were alright and it was the only RC practice I did.
Practice tests:
None. I really should have done a few, but I was crunched on time toward the end, and thought my time was better spent making sure I had my info down pat rather than depressing myself by doing poorly. I'm always a really fast test taker, so I wasn't too concerned on being able to finish on time. The only section that really cut it close was reading, but I still had a few minutes to double check.
Test:
Bio (22) - Pretty stunned by this one. Like everyone says, it's random. Thankfully, that worked in my favor as I avoided any taxonomy or plant questions which was my weakest area by far. Had a few anatomy questions that I had never seen before, but thankfully I knew the rest of the questions well enough to get a good score.
GC(20)- About everything you need to know is in Chad's. There was one experimental one that I had never even heard of that I had to have missed. Besides that, there were a few calculation set ups I just blanked on. It was my weakest science area, and after miserably failing in my destroyer practice last night, I have to say I'm content with my score.
OC(22)- Got one reagent I didn't recognize at all. One NMR that I probably missed. Besides that, it was pretty straightforward. I really struggled taking Ochem in college, but for some reason, it comes easy to me when I have a multiple choice test rather than having to draw out long synthesis reactions or predict the products myself. Even the Destroyer I was getting most right.
PAT(19)- Harder than the CDP's I took. I'm pretty surprised I even got the 19. I had about 5 mins left after science so I went ahead and drew HP grids and made cube charts.
Keyhole: Much harder than CDP. CDP I was getting either 14/15 right and only eating up about 6-7 minutes of my time. I was so frustrated halfway through that I just skipped ahead to get my mind off it. Came back and they didn't seem as bad, but still way harder than CDP.
TFE: About the same difficulty as CDP. I don't really do the line counting thing that most people here do, I just really try to picture it in my head. Most breakdowns say that line counting is tougher, but since I don't really do that they seemed about the same.
Angles: Easier for sure. I actually felt like I could tell a difference in them.
Hole punch: Same difficulty to me. That said, the last few days I got to where I could get 14 or 15 everytime. The triple fold did show up on mine, but there wasn't a hole through it so I didn't have to even figure it out.
Cubes: Much easier. Pretty straightforward and the figures were smaller.
Pattern folding: WTF. Seriously, CDP didn't prepare me for this in the slightest. Every single one was a really complex shape, and about half had shading to deal with too. None of the dice. None of the ones where you just pick the biggest side. None of the simple fold ups where you have to match shading. 15 complex patterns. Didn't really have practice so I had to wing it. Probably where most of my points off came from.
RC(20)- Have to take this. My entire studying was reading one passage out of the KBB and trying to answer questions last night at like midnight. So to break in the 20's is comforting. I had a passage on different types of cables, a passage on prions, and a passage about genetic disorders. First was pretty tough, second was allright, and the third I knew about half the questions without even looking them up. I started out trying to use S&D, but as I went on, I skimmed the second passage and actually read the third because I had some time to spare. I recommend actually reading them if you can do it fast enough.
QR(20)- Can't complain here either. Didn't really have my trig down at all, so I probably missed the 3 or so questions from that. Math destroyer is overkill, but go through it for sure. A lot of really similar questions. The only advice I'll give is if you don't know the answer, use process of elimination. There were probably 3-4 I blanked on, but could easily mark out 3/5 answers and have a pretty good guess on which of the two it was.
Overall, with a 21/21/19, I can't complain. Glad it's done as it was a long process. Don't stress out too much. Stay active(probably gained 10 pounds this summer as I've been lazy about going to the gym and eating too much fast food when lazy to cook). And be confident. Test morning, you won't learn anything else, so just be confident and relax. Mark ones that you don't know how to do and keep going. Don't get down on yourself midtest if you don't think you did well on a previous section. There's nothing you can do about it, and you may do better than you thought. I was pretty surprised when I saw my scores at the end as I thought I did worse on about every section.
I have a 3.6 overall(3.45 science) and should be sending my app in within the next week. Hopefully it's not too late this cycle. Good luck studying everyone!
Study Method:
I studied pretty casually all summer. I say I wound up studying about 2-3 hours a day for a little over two months. Starting last week, I upped it to about 5-6 hours a day, and since Thursday it's been about 11-12 hours a day. Was really worried toward the end that I wasn't going to be able to get it done, but it turns out I knew it better than I thought.
Materials:
Chad (10/10): Can't really say anything that hasn't been said. It's amazing how much chem I had forgotten in the last two years, but I really learned a ton from the videos. Stuff that I never quite understood from studying hours on end in college was made clear in 30 minute video increments.
Cliffs (8/10): If you know Cliffs, you'll do well. Obviously it won't cover everything(and no single bio resource will), but it highlights all the key points. From my experience, success in bio is not how well you know the tiny details, but just that you have a general understanding of everything. That said, I probably had 2-3 questions that I couldn't have gotten right if I had Cliff's open in front me.
DAT Destroyer (7/10): This thing will kick your tail. However, just because I was short on time until the end, I didn't really get to understand it all, and it was kind of a mood killer even last night when I missed about 40% of the 50 or so gchem questions I did. It was more helpful on ochem to me, but even then it had stuff that I feel like wouldn't show up in a million years. That said, it was a good resource and going through it once really showed me where I was strong and weak. My theory is that knowing Chads alone will get you in the 20's, and mastering this will get you in the elite range.
Math Destroyer (8/10): Didn't really get to spend a lot of time on this and only made it through 4 tests. Much harder than the real thing, but there were several problems on my DAT that were almost word for word with new numbers. Again, know this 100%, you'll get an elite score. Did really help work on my timing.
CDP (7/10): Really your only option for studying for the PAT section. Tests did help my timing and my average toward the end was a 19(my highest being a 22 last night), so I guess it represented my true score. The only thing is, some of the sections on my DAT were completely different. I'll go into more detail later.
KBB(4/10): PAT tutorials were alright and it was the only RC practice I did.
Practice tests:
None. I really should have done a few, but I was crunched on time toward the end, and thought my time was better spent making sure I had my info down pat rather than depressing myself by doing poorly. I'm always a really fast test taker, so I wasn't too concerned on being able to finish on time. The only section that really cut it close was reading, but I still had a few minutes to double check.
Test:
Bio (22) - Pretty stunned by this one. Like everyone says, it's random. Thankfully, that worked in my favor as I avoided any taxonomy or plant questions which was my weakest area by far. Had a few anatomy questions that I had never seen before, but thankfully I knew the rest of the questions well enough to get a good score.
GC(20)- About everything you need to know is in Chad's. There was one experimental one that I had never even heard of that I had to have missed. Besides that, there were a few calculation set ups I just blanked on. It was my weakest science area, and after miserably failing in my destroyer practice last night, I have to say I'm content with my score.
OC(22)- Got one reagent I didn't recognize at all. One NMR that I probably missed. Besides that, it was pretty straightforward. I really struggled taking Ochem in college, but for some reason, it comes easy to me when I have a multiple choice test rather than having to draw out long synthesis reactions or predict the products myself. Even the Destroyer I was getting most right.
PAT(19)- Harder than the CDP's I took. I'm pretty surprised I even got the 19. I had about 5 mins left after science so I went ahead and drew HP grids and made cube charts.
Keyhole: Much harder than CDP. CDP I was getting either 14/15 right and only eating up about 6-7 minutes of my time. I was so frustrated halfway through that I just skipped ahead to get my mind off it. Came back and they didn't seem as bad, but still way harder than CDP.
TFE: About the same difficulty as CDP. I don't really do the line counting thing that most people here do, I just really try to picture it in my head. Most breakdowns say that line counting is tougher, but since I don't really do that they seemed about the same.
Angles: Easier for sure. I actually felt like I could tell a difference in them.
Hole punch: Same difficulty to me. That said, the last few days I got to where I could get 14 or 15 everytime. The triple fold did show up on mine, but there wasn't a hole through it so I didn't have to even figure it out.
Cubes: Much easier. Pretty straightforward and the figures were smaller.
Pattern folding: WTF. Seriously, CDP didn't prepare me for this in the slightest. Every single one was a really complex shape, and about half had shading to deal with too. None of the dice. None of the ones where you just pick the biggest side. None of the simple fold ups where you have to match shading. 15 complex patterns. Didn't really have practice so I had to wing it. Probably where most of my points off came from.
RC(20)- Have to take this. My entire studying was reading one passage out of the KBB and trying to answer questions last night at like midnight. So to break in the 20's is comforting. I had a passage on different types of cables, a passage on prions, and a passage about genetic disorders. First was pretty tough, second was allright, and the third I knew about half the questions without even looking them up. I started out trying to use S&D, but as I went on, I skimmed the second passage and actually read the third because I had some time to spare. I recommend actually reading them if you can do it fast enough.
QR(20)- Can't complain here either. Didn't really have my trig down at all, so I probably missed the 3 or so questions from that. Math destroyer is overkill, but go through it for sure. A lot of really similar questions. The only advice I'll give is if you don't know the answer, use process of elimination. There were probably 3-4 I blanked on, but could easily mark out 3/5 answers and have a pretty good guess on which of the two it was.
Overall, with a 21/21/19, I can't complain. Glad it's done as it was a long process. Don't stress out too much. Stay active(probably gained 10 pounds this summer as I've been lazy about going to the gym and eating too much fast food when lazy to cook). And be confident. Test morning, you won't learn anything else, so just be confident and relax. Mark ones that you don't know how to do and keep going. Don't get down on yourself midtest if you don't think you did well on a previous section. There's nothing you can do about it, and you may do better than you thought. I was pretty surprised when I saw my scores at the end as I thought I did worse on about every section.
I have a 3.6 overall(3.45 science) and should be sending my app in within the next week. Hopefully it's not too late this cycle. Good luck studying everyone!
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