RC Break Down - literally.

[Dentalkid434]

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Hello SDN again,

I was suppose to take the DAT yesterday and was looking forward to posting a detailed breakdown of my experience. But instead, I rescheduled my exam to Monday...and it is the first day of classes and I submitted my application already! I am just so sad now. I did a practice RC just now on achiever and got a 12 without getting to the third passage. I am very sad now. I am having a hard time digesting the passages, retaining the information, and then being pressured to answer questions when timed. I tried everything! Reading and taking notes then answering, reading two paragraphs at a time and slowly going through the questions, strictly S&D.....I feel like my desire to gain admission to dental school is meaningless and I will not amount to anything in life and that I am just doomed to fail. I had nightmares of this exam last night and am forgetting things. I am very much depressed and do not know what to do or who to turn to. All the effort I put into the other sections is meaningless because I can not achieve at least a 16 on the RC.

...and no, I am not international, just am multilingual and speak english fluently - no accent at all with a varied vocabulary and implementation of esoteric words at times....

 

[foreveros]

Hello SDN again,

I was suppose to take the DAT yesterday and was looking forward to posting a detailed breakdown of my experience. But instead, I literally had a BREAK DOWN and spent two hours crying the night before because of the RC section and rescheduled my exam to Monday...and it is the first day of classes and I submitted my application already! I am just so sad and depressed now. I did a practice RC just now on achiever and got a 12 without getting to the third passage. I am literally crying as I am writing this and feel hopeless. I am having a hard time digesting the passages, retaining the information, and then being pressured to answer questions when timed. I tried everything! Reading and taking notes then answering, reading two paragraphs at a time and slowly going through the questions, strictly S&D.....I feel like my desire to gain admission to dental school is meaningless and I will not amount to anything in life and that I am just doomed to fail. I had nightmares of this exam last night and am forgetting things. I am very much depressed and do not know what to do or who to turn to. All the effort I put into the other sections is meaningless because I can not achieve at least a 16 on the RC. I am crying.

...and no, I am not international, just am multilingual and speak english fluently - no accent at all with a varied vocabulary and implementation of esoteric words at times....

stop yourself right there. First achiver RC is very hard than real dat and its not really same as the real dat. What ever you get on achiver you will day way better. Trust me I was scoring lower than you on RC in achiver but on the real thing i saw like good 7 points improvement. Read dat is diffrent than achiver. so dont be discoraged and depressed for no reason. In life even in dental school you have to put your self together and get the courage and just go in and take the exam. Even in dental school you will feel like you will never be prepared for any exam but on the exam you will do good.

 

[Swoops]

stop yourself right there. First achiver RC is very hard than real dat and its not really same as the real dat. What ever you get on achiver you will day way better. Trust me I was scoring lower than you on RC in achiver but on the real thing i saw like good 7 points improvement. Read dat is diffrent than achiver. so dont be discoraged and depressed for no reason. In life even in dental school you have to put your self together and get the courage and just go in and take the exam. Even in dental school you will feel like you will never be prepared for any exam but on the exam you will do good.

Agree with this sort of. I think the real RC was hard. But you need to calm down! Freaking out and stressing about it will only hurt you in the end. You will be defeated before the RC section even starts. I promise you that things will work out for you. All you need is a 19 or above and your golden. Just take a deep breath and rehearse that you are ok. Don't let it break you, just trust yourself and if there is adversity... Overcome it. Good luck!

 

[NhuPT]

I feel your stress and discouragement. I am also struggling with RC, however I am determined to overcome this challenge. I scored 13 on the first achiever, 14, 15 on Crack Reading. I tried a couple of methods and this is what works for me:
1. Quickly skim the passage - read the first and the last sentence fast for each paragraph, skim fast whats in the middle, if you see some name, date, disease, quote, make a mental note or write it down ( takes less than 5mins)
2. Start answering q's, read 5 questions at a time (15mins)
Then go to the next....make sure to not go over 20mins for each passage
I started getting higher scores ( 17, 19..) But you need to practice, try 1 hr in the morning and 1 hr in the afternoon practicing until Monday.

I speak like 6 languages and learned English 8 years ago. So you can do it if I can!!!!!!

 

[shayanH]

I was in your situation too. I sucked at RC when I did achiever. I think I got like 14 in all the tests, but on the real one I got 20. Don't give up hope!!! you can do this!!!