How long should it take me to get thru DAT Destroyer?

[Cofo]

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Okay, I'm giving in. I told myself I wasn't going to spend that much money but...I'm gonna get the DAT Destroyer + DAT Math combo.
How long do I need in order to go thru these?
I was planning on taking my DAT around June 23rd. I'm gonna start studying hardcore for it May 23rd so that gives me about 30ish days to study for the DAT.

I've read thru CliffsAP Bio twice. I've read thru KBB math twice. I've read thru KBB genChem once. I'm pretty good at organic chemistry, so I've only watched Chad's vids. That being said...should I be able to handle studying using the DAT Destroyer? (please answer my first question though too 😀)

 

[Vokalyzd]

Don't start with Destroyer until you have literally memorized all of your Ochem reactions and most of your bio facts. Destroyer definitely helped me alot but I used it the last 2 weeks of my studying and I spent about 2 solid months. The real DAT is easier than Destroyer but it's definitely good practice to make sure you cover your bases.

 

[sfoksn]

If you have everything ready and understood, then it should take you maybe 2 days to finish the whole thing.

But if you haven't studied everything solidly yet, prepare to lose some points in Ochem and Bio.

Gchem and QR are very easy on Destroyer

 

[RunDMD2b]

If you have everything ready and understood, then it should take you maybe 2 days to finish the whole thing.

But if you haven't studied everything solidly yet, prepare to lose some points in Ochem and Bio.

Gchem and QR are very easy on Destroyer

How many hours would you put in per day?

 

[sfoksn]

8 hours or so... So that's 480 minutes of study time... 2 days is 960 minutes of study time...

We are supposed to do 100 problems in 90 min, so lets say we do 1 problem per minute roughly..

I think we have less than 1000 problems in the book, right?

 

[dentalWorks]

Well I did something TOTALLY different with the destroyer.

After I finished KBB biology and Cliffs AP biology, I went ahead to the destroyer biology section ALONE and only did 20 problems a day. After about 18 days, all the biology problems were complete (20 * 17.5 = 350). So after I was done, I went back to biology problem #1 again, and did the whole process all over, 20 problems a day.

While I was reading 20 problems of biology a day (which was taking me only like 1 hour) I was in the same time studying GC KBB. After I was done with KBB GC, I went a head to the destroyer GC section and only did 15 problems a day. So at this point, every day, I was doing 15 GC and 20 biology destroyer problems every day.

Finally, When I was done with KBB orgo, I started to do 15 orgo / 15 GC / and 20 biology destroyer problems EVERY day. I kept doing this over and over and over..... I believe this is a much smarter way to keep things CONSTANTLY freash in your head instead of cramming for the destroyer in a matter of 4-5 days.

 

[jmascis24]

About how long did it take you to get through it all studying that way, Dentalworks? After Ochem did you do Destroyer math as well? It took you about an hour to get through 10 Bio questions, towards the end of your study (with all the subjects combined), how much time were you putting in a day? About how long did you do this before you took the DAT? (Sorry for the onslaught of questions!)

Your method sounds right up my alley. Although necessary at times, I've never been a big fan of cramming, and luckily I have about 4-5 months before I start the DAT...so if I do things right, I won't need to cram. I've been doing PAT stuff about 30 minutes a day for the past month and have seen some steady improvement. Just this week I added math to my schedule. I started going over Barons SAT mathbook in preparation to going over destroyer about an hour a day for the next while.

Thanks for the good advice!

 

[dentalWorks]

About how long did it take you to get through it all studying that way, Dentalworks?

Well I didn't push all my effort into my studies. I used to aveage about 2-3 hours a day. Did this form mid July alll the way till the day I took the DAT. Some days I did my 15 GC / 15 OC / 20 bio on destroyer and called it a day lol. So overall, my study time was about 3 months (but very unproductive 3 months, I should have done it all in 6 weeks)

After Ochem did you do Destroyer math as well?

Destroyer math, I only did it one time, took me about 2-3 days, I think 50 questions per day. I didn't like it. however, About 2 months before my DAT date, I started working on MATH destoyer (this is a different book). I did the first 6 tests. I would do (for example) test #1 today, and review all my mistakes the next day. I would wait 2-3 days then do Test #2, and the next day review my mistakes and learn from them.... Stupidly I only did the first 6 tests and got really good at the MATH and towards the end of september, I stopped doing any more math cause I thought "hey Im all set"... BAD MISTAKE, when I took the DAT, I was about 1 month out of practice for the QR and I ended up with an 18.... If I had treated this section with more respect and spend about 30 minutes every day just doing some QR problems here and there until my test date I woulda EASILY gotten 22+.

It took you about an hour to get through 10 Bio questions, towards the end of your study (with all the subjects combined), how much time were you putting in a day? About how long did you do this before you took the DAT? (Sorry for the onslaught of questions!)

as I said before, I made alot of mistakes in my DAT preparations. I should have devoted 7-8 hours a day for 6 weeks. Not 2-3 hours a day for 3 months. The bio section of the destroyer, I know the first time ever I did it, I scored about 72%, because I had a strong biology background before buying the destroyer. I relied heavily on my background in biology which is why I used to do about 20 problems every day for about 1 hour. Most problems I didn't spend much time on cause I just knew why the answer was wrong / right, but some problems, I did spend about 15 minutes researching in my biology text for more information.

I've been doing PAT stuff about 30 minutes a day for the past month and have seen some steady improvement. Just this week I added math to my schedule. I started going over Barons SAT mathbook in preparation to going over destroyer about an hour a day for the next while.

In my opinion, I have developed the best PAT improvement method, I wrote it in this thread:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=675995&highlight=PAT+for+beginners