Taking notes from Kaplan and Cliffs

[Tooth Worthy]

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Hi,

I have started studying for the DAT and my questions is: in your experience what was the best way to take notes for biology section from Cliffs and KBB. I am following the 8-week plan and it seems to me that rewriting/annotating/highlighting both books is useless?

P.S. I have Barron's AP Bio and MCAT flashcards and would not want to do the Anke compilation from scratch, for this is too time consuming in my opinion.

Any suggestions are welcomed. Thanks. 🙂

 

[tandem7]

I literally took detailed notes from Cliff's and KBB. Yes, my hand hurt, but I think taking copious notes by hand is the best way to really pay attention to what you are reading. I also hand made flashcards out of key concepts/words and made drawings/diagrams of different concepts. With bio, the more visuals and active learning, the better. Also, when you are reviewing things, you should supplement it by looking at Wikipedia, Craig Savage videos and other videos on youtube, etc. and take notes there too. I know it sounds tedious, but it is the only way. I had a very weak bio background going into the DAT and took no A&P at all and still got a 24 just by doing this.

 

[Glimmer1991]

I just highlighted and wrote out key concepts in the margins. It worked for me! 🙂

 

[Tooth Worthy]

Thank you for your replies. I decided to read both, but take extensive notes on Cliffs, while supplementing those with the info from the KBB book...so far so good.

 

[xatlasb]

I made flashcards from Cliff's Bio as well as read it 3x and highlighted.

I also went through DAT Destroyer and made a long study sheet (by hand) of all the facts from questions that I got wrong. This includes the answers that are true for the questions that ask which is false, etc. Basically I got all the information I possibly could out of Destroyer.

Also went through Alan's notes as well as youtube videos (crash course) and added to my study sheet all the facts that I didn't have perfectly memorized. I color coded things (green for anything plant related... haha) and constantly looked over them. I didn't start studying hard-core for biology until basically the week before the exam. Looking back, I don't know if that was a mistake or not, since it was definitely more stressful, but I also wasn't too worried about forgetting the things I was learning since it was the week before.

But if you found a system that is working well for you, then stick with it. 🙂

 

[shulace]

I was just about to make a post about this until I saw this one. I've found the KBB to be pretty vague (currently on chapter 2, reproduction) and incomplete. On the other hand, I think that Cliff is a far superior book. After seeing these posts, I feel reassured that highlighting KBB and taking notes on Cliff is the way to go.