Question for those who have Conquered!

[jwnichols21]

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To everyone who has already successfully finished the DAT,

My test is a little under 3 weeks away and I am having a hard time gauging if that is enough time to finish all that I need to get done. I have two simple questions, which I'm sure would benefit a lot of people on here as well:

1) How many weeks before did you begin Destroyer? How long did it take you to get through each subject (please mention if you did them more than once)?

2) How many weeks before did you begin doing practice tests? How many & which did you find to be most helpful (i.e. Kaplan, TopScore, ADA 2009)?

Any and all feedback would be appreciated; these are some damn stressful times! Thanks guys

 

[FROGGBUSTER]

To everyone who has already successfully finished the DAT,

My test is a little under 3 weeks away and I am having a hard time gauging if that is enough time to finish all that I need to get done. I have two simple questions, which I'm sure would benefit a lot of people on here as well:

1) How many weeks before did you begin Destroyer? How long did it take you to get through each subject (please mention if you did them more than once)?

2) How many weeks before did you begin doing practice tests? How many & which did you find to be most helpful (i.e. Kaplan, TopScore, ADA 2009)?

Any and all feedback would be appreciated; these are some damn stressful times! Thanks guys

1. You should go thru them as early as possible. I did Destroyer bio once, GC twice, and orgo twice. The first time I followed dentalwork's plan:

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=719365

The second time I only did GC and OC, so I did 100 problems each day and it took me like 5-6 days to finish iirc.

Make sure to write down the problem #s of the ones you don't feel comfortable with and go over them.

2. I did the 3 TopScore practice tests right before my test. You could probably benefit from doing them earlier. Check my breakdown (sig) for my comments regarding Topscore, Kaplan, and ADA practice tests.

 

[BayAreaDDS]

To everyone who has already successfully finished the DAT,

My test is a little under 3 weeks away and I am having a hard time gauging if that is enough time to finish all that I need to get done. I have two simple questions, which I'm sure would benefit a lot of people on here as well:

1) How many weeks before did you begin Destroyer? How long did it take you to get through each subject (please mention if you did them more than once)?

2) How many weeks before did you begin doing practice tests? How many & which did you find to be most helpful (i.e. Kaplan, TopScore, ADA 2009)?

Any and all feedback would be appreciated; these are some damn stressful times! Thanks guys

1) I agree with Froggbuster. Jump on Destroyer ASAP. I started it about a month before my test. I did bio once, QR once, OC and GC three times. The first time took me a while (a couple of days per section) because I was flipping back and forth through the problems and solutions really trying to understand how to do the problems. The second and third times were a lot easier and the material stuck.

2) My only source for practice tests was Kaplan, so unfortunately I can't say much for Achiever and TopScore. I took the 1st full-length test a week and a half before my test and saw where my weaknesses were and worked on them for the next few days. The week before my test I took the Final, 2nd and 3rd full-length tests with a day in between. This got me really comfortable with the timing of the test. The night before the test I took the science portion of the ADA 2007 test, and it helped my confidence a lot. The Kaplan practice tests were pretty representative of the real thing. OC and GC are easier on the real test.

I hope this helps. Best advice I can give is too stay relaxed when test day comes around. If you work hard and stay focused it will pay off. You got this!

 

[lol105]

To everyone who has already successfully finished the DAT,

My test is a little under 3 weeks away and I am having a hard time gauging if that is enough time to finish all that I need to get done. I have two simple questions, which I'm sure would benefit a lot of people on here as well:

1) How many weeks before did you begin Destroyer? How long did it take you to get through each subject (please mention if you did them more than once)?

2) How many weeks before did you begin doing practice tests? How many & which did you find to be most helpful (i.e. Kaplan, TopScore, ADA 2009)?

Any and all feedback would be appreciated; these are some damn stressful times! Thanks guys

I'll answer except RC.

1) I actually started Destroyer about 3-4 weeks prior to my test date. It took me about 2 hours to go through 100 ochem questions + going through the wrong answers. So for OC, took me about 4-5 hours to go through the whole thing.

For GC, I did 50-70 questions per day, along with 100 questions of bio (140 on the last day). Took me 3-4 days to fully go through destroyer 1x total. Then I studied the weak areas and concepts from other sources. Came back to Destroyer about 5-7days later, went though it again.

2) I took the kaplan course, so I took midterm/final about 6-8weeks before my testdate. After the course, which was about 2-3 weeks before the test date, I started taking the practice tests. I took 10 tests over 21days. I took 2 tests within the last 7 days, since the last week should be more of reviewing + relaxing time. I personally did not take ADA series. I took achiever, topscore and Kap tests (1,2,3), and I found Achiever and Kaplan tests most useful. Many people find Topscore as an accurate test, but did not for me some reason. Kaplan Test 1 is really close to the actual test (minus the QR). Also, Achiever Test 1 is similar in RC difficulty. If you decide to take the Achiever tests (1,2,3 version), do not take the PAT scores from those tests to the heart. Achiever PAT is really really really hard.
I found bio sections in practice tests harder. I advice you to understand the concepts and details instead of simply memorizing them, since many practice tests just simply ask you recall questions instead of broad application questions that the real DAT asks you. Good Luck!

 

[Demps]

Everyone above pretty much said what you wanna hear

I did the destroyer right away actually - got my butt kicked bad so I went to review all BIO/GC/OC to come back for the second run - my 2nd run was about 5-6 weeks before my test.

I recommend doing practice tests such as Topscore about 10-14 days before your d-day. This is just me, but nothing came into my head like a week before test. I think it is better to do them around ~10 days before the test date, and review what you got wrong till then.

 

[GenieG]

I had 5 weeks total to study everything, I did destroyer once. I highlighted the answers for the questions I got wrong, and then read the ones I got right and if there was anything new I didn't know, I highlighted it in a different color. Since I didn't have time to do any section twice, i read over everything I highlighted in the answer section rather than going through the questions again. I also did Kaplan science questions but I didn't spend any time going over them again, I just looked at the ones I got wrong immediately after doing them.

For practice tests, I did three full ones from Kaplan. It was kind of unnerving. sometimes I would do amazingly well in one section but terrible on the same section the next time. I jumped from a 29 to a 19 in bio between two tests. I think the benefit of full tests is practicing sitting for a long period of time, though on the actual day it goes by way faster!
good luck!

 

[jbop]

My text is in green. I also want to let you know that 3 weeks is a very long time, and you will get a HUGE amount of studying done!

To everyone who has already successfully finished the DAT,

My test is a little under 3 weeks away and I am having a hard time gauging if that is enough time to finish all that I need to get done. I have two simple questions, which I'm sure would benefit a lot of people on here as well:

1) How many weeks before did you begin Destroyer? How long did it take you to get through each subject (please mention if you did them more than once)?

2 weeks. Crazy. If I had gotten the Destroyer before, I would have started it earlier. Going through the chemistries and biology took all of the first week to finish. In the second week, I was able to finish going through the chemistries another time, in about 5 days. In the last three days before the test (with one day of rest the day before), I went through the chemistries a third time. I attempted 50 questions at a time in the third run.

2) How many weeks before did you begin doing practice tests? How many & which did you find to be most helpful (i.e. Kaplan, TopScore, ADA 2009)?

Three weeks before, right around where you are at in your studies. I took the Kaplan tests as a diagnostic tool, to see which sections I needed the most help with. I didn't get ADA 2009, so I can't comment on that. Topscore was great. It was a good gauge of my progress. I took those in the last 2.5 weeks. Once every 5 days-ish. I took the last one well about 5 days before the real test. That way I had time to go over what I got wrong. So I used Topscore as a study aid rather than a diagnostic tool, although all three tests were good approximations of what I would end up getting.

Any and all feedback would be appreciated; these are some damn stressful times!

We're here for you! Stress out a little, but don't be too hard on yourself!

Thanks guys