Orgo destroyer first time help

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flossit

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Hi, please advise me! I'm going through orgo destroyer for the first time and I'm getting half of the problems wrong :/ It seems I just guess a lot and eliminate. I'm devastated. Please let me know how I can improve. I watched chad already.
 
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The vast majority of people get far more than 50% wrong their first time around; go through them once, then review the solutions, then go through them again.
 
One third of them right the first time around, 25 on OC section on the real thing. Keep grinding, stay off SDN until the test is over, and you'll do just fine. Good luck!
So how did you study? Did you continue destroyer only or used other sources?
 
If you've already watched Chad's, you can re-watch each section, but after that it all comes down to practice problems. Make flashcards of every single reaction that is on Chad's sheet, and memorize every single last one of them. Memorize all the different reagents (what they will and won't do, i.e. PCC won't do ratchet aldehydes, or at least I think that's correct, it's been since 2014 the last time I needed to remember any of this), and know the reactions from reactants--> products as well as products --> reactants. Go through the stack everyday and mark which ones you get right, with no cheating and no "close enough", only stone cold correct. Put those at the bottom of the stack, so that the ones you aren't remembering are on the top and you go over more them often.

This should be done in conjunction with the roadmaps. Roadmaps are a must, I don't care what anyone says. It's better to be over-prepared than under-prepared.

Let me know if you have any more questions. Good luck!
Thanks a lot for the advise!
 
The first time I went through it, I had watched all of Chad's videos and I was still guessing on most of them . I had a notebook where I rewrote every problem I got wrong or wasn't 100% sure of (which was almost all of them) and wrote down the answer and why it was correct. If it was something like a ranking problem (ex. which is the most acidic proton), I would rewrite the chart of trends each time I came across a problem like that. Also like the person above said, flashcards! I made one for every single rxn I came across and tested myself on the whole stack each time I studied OC and it seemed helpful.

Also when I first started doing destroyer, I was timing myself doing the problem in blocks of 30. Yeah bad idea, I was so rushed and stressed that I didn't really learn anything until I sat down and spent time on the problems. When I started I was getting about 14/30 correct, so I went through a second time and it went way smoother. On the real DAT I got a 29 OC.
 
I second @oo.liv , very similar to what I did. The first time I went thought it I was also struggling. I too had a notebook where I rewrote every problem I got wrong. I folded my page down the middle: question on the left. Answer on the right. I did not do them timed. Destroyer will destroy you, but if you learn from your mistakes it will cash out on test day.
 
I second @oo.liv , very similar to what I did. The first time I went thought it I was also struggling. I too had a notebook where I rewrote every problem I got wrong. I folded my page down the middle: question on the left. Answer on the right. I did not do them timed. Destroyer will destroy you, but if you learn from your mistakes it will cash out on test day.

Destroyer will destroy you, but if you learn from your mistakes it will cash out on test day.~Graffix

I agree!

Nancy
 
Guys, you all are so great for taking your precious time and answering my question! Thank you very much!
 
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