Took DAT today, my thoughts

[Joeybag]

I took the DAT today and here are my scores:
18 Bio (Dang sea urchin question, plenty other curveballs)
25 G Chem
29 Orgo
20 Read
23 QR
18 PAT
21 TS
23 AA

Oh yeah I got 2 hrs of sleep b/c I was super nervous, so try not to do this, go out drinking the night before if you have to, I wish I had. This mainly hurt my PAT (my eyes are blood shot) and reading-I was just slower w/ the lack of sleep.
On Topscore I had been getting ~18/19 Bio, Chem, and O CHem-so like everyone says the Chemistries are mucho easy on the real deal.
However my 23s on the Topscore PAT became a 18 (Dang!!-though I did have to just fill in about 10 answers as time expires). I like to skip the first 30 of the PAT and go back at the end, however its kinda slow to do this on the real thing so beware. My reading and QR were about the same for Topscore and the real deal
Basically try to get get super fast w/ the PAT, as well as the math. As for reading, I dont recommend doing the scan for words method rather than just reading the entire passage, I had been doing this, but the real DAT had more things that you had to actually understand (like what does this imply etc.) or were difficult to find in the passage-so I guessed on the last 5 or so.
Another tip, if you're good at math, PRACTICE the math, and mainly just get comfortable with working fast and knowing when to abort a question, I found Baron's to be more helpful w/ the specific types of questions, whereas Kaplan was more conceptual. Math I feel can be an easy way to really boost your AA. Im really good at math yet only made a 19 the first time around, and that was b/c I didnt finish, not to mention I had to leave the room to get paper and sign out and whatnot w/ time running, so try no to let that happen to you.

I took the DAT last year and got 17Bio 21OChem 23Genchem 21Read 23QR 17PAT 20TS 20AA. Seeing how I am reappying i tried to improve on my scores, mainly in terms of Bio and PAT. However this time around I managed to get lower percentiles on both yet 1 pt higher(which i guess is all that matters), in each which I guess is OK. Memorizing the Kaplan BLue book will only get you 17-18, even this time w/ a lot of Schaums practiceI still struggled; just expect super random questions, mixed in w/ really easy ones. Just know that the real PAT is harder than even Barons. Biology is most similar to all the practice tests (TS, Baron, Kaplan) TS, Baron's is the most similar in terms of G CHEM and OCHEM difficulty, but still harder than the real deal.

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[SunnyD0119]

those are some really solid scores man congrats on the gen chem and the ochem scores...
you got any sample questions for the bio section?

 

[Joeybag]

those are some really solid scores man congrats on the gen chem and the ochem scores...
you got any sample questions for the bio section?

know that mitochond and chloroplasts could exist on theire own b/c they produce E, some random stuff about what form is CO2 in the blood, dont waste too much time w/ plants i had 0 plant questions and maybe 1 or 2 the first time I took the DAT, some easy genetics problems Hardy weinberg, testcross type stuff, sex linked disorders, actually 1 or 2 biochem type problems, kind of a lot of genetic drift/speciation type problems (those all soudn the same to me after a while), I wouldnt worry too much about characterisics of porifera, cnidarians---chordates, there were only about 2 of those types of qustions but they were so specific what I studied didnt really help. I just thought some of the questions were overly specific, like what would happen IMMEDIATELY after this or this DIRECTLY causes this whereas kaplan and schaums sorta gave me more of general overview.

 

[Comet208]

good job on great scores.

this time around I managed to get lower percentiles on both yet 1 pt higher.

this is kinda scary.. it means more and more people are getting higher scores recently.

 

[SunnyD0119]

i see, you did really good though... that chem score is amazing...i find that shaums is kinda crazy in depth but in a short way you know....im takin the test in a week and am just doing practice tests until i take it....1 test in the morning and going over it in the night and studying anything that i can here and there but overall i've been getting 19/20's on my topscore tests but really gettin killed the dat achiever tests. well see what happens....it must feel really good to have it over w/
thanks again

 

[jaerob]

Dude, congratulations those are seriously awesome scores! I'm sure you're happy with them. Why the heck did you need to retake with a 20/20 previous DAT score, though?!? That's scary that things didn't work out last year with a 20/20 DAT.. Best of luck this time around; I'm sure things will work out smoothly

 

[dWiz]

did u find kaplan sufficient for o.chem, and gen. chem? or did u use other sources...btw scores are great

 

[vikings022000]

hey sunny, how are u hanging in with the dat achiever pat? i'm getting drilled on that thing!! i wasn't able to get over a 17 on it, which sucks.

dat achiever is a lot harder, but study it and go over it. if you go in ready for this, the real thing will be a breeze (hopefully). i wouldn't suggest studying the day before the real thing though!

 

[cowsgomoo]

Congratulations!!
Those are some awesome scores.

 

[SunnyD0119]

vikings sorry i couldnt get back to you sooner i was doing some studying but anyways
dat achiever is kicking my a** everything about that test was hard (except gen chem and reading) anyways im getting 16's on the pat and i hope to got that the real thing is easier because otherwise im screwed....alot of people have told me that topscore's bio is alot like the real dat...i thought topscore bio was a breeze but who knows dat achiever was mad hard but anyways let me know you are doing too...
take care

 

[ysk]

I took the DAT today and here are my scores:
I like to skip the first 30 of the PAT and go back at the end, however its kinda slow to do this on the real thing so beware.

I like to skip the early questions and go back to them for pat too. can you elaborate a little more on what u mean by "slower on the real thing"? i thought just like in topscore and dat achiever, after you finish the section, u can just use the 'go to question' option to go to question that u wanna look over again, no?

 

[gatszu]

on real dat, you have to mark what question you wanna go back when you're at that question. if not, you can't go back. this is why it's time consuming.

 

[vikings022000]

hey sunny,

yeah my 3 pat scores for the 3 dat achiever tests were 16, 17, and 15. it's very disappointing. the only section that i broke a 20 was on rc. i got close with a 19 on qr. i'm hoping the real thing isn't like this because ppl posting on here with 23 aa's are freakin me out, lol.

 

[Joeybag]

I like to skip the early questions and go back to them for pat too. can you elaborate a little more on what u mean by "slower on the real thing"? i thought just like in topscore and dat achiever, after you finish the section, u can just use the 'go to question' option to go to question that u wanna look over again, no?

Basically you can skip questions fairly quickly by just clicking next, I suppose you could also click mark on each one but that would take more time I think. However, once I finished the last 60 of the PAT and returned to the original 30 it didnt really let me go back and forth b/t questions, I just answered and to the next. When I say it's slow its about a second or so for the next page to reload (if you want to skip a question, or go back one, etc), but if your like me and youre pressed for time, or trying just to answer as many of the easy ones correctly first and saving the hard ones for later, it can be a little frustrating. Not a big deal, just at the very end if youre in a mad rush like i was to just bubble in c on the last few, you may run out of time. Its a good feeling to think maybe you got a few right just by bubbling something in.

 

[I AM SARA]

know that mitochond and chloroplasts could exist on theire own b/c they produce E, some random stuff about what form is CO2 in the blood, dont waste too much time w/ plants i had 0 plant questions and maybe 1 or 2 the first time I took the DAT, some easy genetics problems Hardy weinberg, testcross type stuff, sex linked disorders, actually 1 or 2 biochem type problems, kind of a lot of genetic drift/speciation type problems (those all soudn the same to me after a while), I wouldnt worry too much about characterisics of porifera, cnidarians---chordates, there were only about 2 of those types of qustions but they were so specific what I studied didnt really help. I just thought some of the questions were overly specific, like what would happen IMMEDIATELY after this or this DIRECTLY causes this whereas kaplan and schaums sorta gave me more of general overview.

I honestly dont believe this person b/c I took the DAT yesterday and saw none of these questions. I had an enormous amount of phylum and classification questions in bio so I would recommend to everyone here that this is a public forum and that people arent always truthful.

Course, maybe we had different tests which isnt fair because mine obviously was harder and how can they compare me to this person?

Oh well, guess life is unfair.

 

[Joeybag]

Don't worry too much w/ the Kaplan's and Topscore tests, Kaplan's is too time consuming for g. chem, and TS was just way more difficult than what is actually asked. That said they probably do that to cover there asses, so people arent bitchin about doing worse on the real deal.
Not to make you all slack, but the ADA sample test is the most similar in difficulty in terms of chem/ochem (and yes they do sometimes have answers in the 30/80*273/298 format on the real DAT)
For the Organic Chem, I found that knowing the o,m,p activators and deactivators was super helpful. Also don't stress out about knowing the names of reactions like claissen condensation or some b.s. like that. I basically used my notes/flash cards I made in my O.Chem I and II classes, but if I had to pick a book I'd say Kaplan DAT Blue book. I also took 2 sems of biochem, but didn't really find this applicable to the o chem, though I did have one pretty specific question on the bio about naming an intermediate of glyolysis I believe. Also it seems they like to stick you w/ a few hard questions initially on each section but don't get intimidated.
For the G. chem,Baron's was pretty good, but a little brief. I picked up this random book at a used store called "The MCAT Chemistry Book" published by Noah's, which covered g. chem and o. chem (i only used it for g chem), it was actually really good b/c there were lots of problems/examples w/ solutions in the chapters as well as questions at the end. I know the MCAT is a "reading" test, but a majority of the questions were straight up DAT style rather than in a passage. Basically test prep for the dat sucks, while there's boat loads of mcat stuff, but i found that this mcat stuff can be quite useful, so dont overlook it. Best of luck everybody.

 

[Joeybag]

I honestly dont believe this person b/c I took the DAT yesterday and saw none of these questions. I had an enormous amount of phylum and classification questions in bio so I would recommend to everyone here that this is a public forum and that people arent always truthful.

Course, maybe we had different tests which isnt fair because mine obviously was harder and how can they compare me to this person?

Oh well, guess life is unfair.

Yes I am being truthful, however, since I took the DAT last year they probably didnt give the same test. Last year I had like 5 very difficult questions on enzymes, and there was a reading passage about the stock market w/ calculating P/E ratios and whatnot. It sounds like lots of people have mentioned both of these things on other threads. I do believe ADA is pretty lazy if an almost identical test from last year is released this year, but I think it does happen. THat said they do probably have at least 2 versions that are currently being used, I mean what are the chances that so many people would get a question about damn sea urchin fertilization, that just tells you that questions are reused if not entire sections identical for many people. I would not purposely misinform people, Im just sayin what I had, so dont be surprised if that stuff comes up, which can definitely be helpful ( i think i maybe got the sea urchin ? right b/c of this).

 

[Blackstars]

Yes I am being truthful, however, since I took the DAT last year they probably didnt give the same test. Last year I had like 5 very difficult questions on enzymes, and there was a reading passage about the stock market w/ calculating P/E ratios and whatnot. It sounds like lots of people have mentioned both of these things on other threads. I do believe ADA is pretty lazy if an almost identical test from last year is released this year, but I think it does happen. THat said they do probably have at least 2 versions that are currently being used, I mean what are the chances that so many people would get a question about damn sea urchin fertilization, that just tells you that questions are reused if not entire sections identical for many people. I would not purposely misinform people, Im just sayin what I had, so dont be surprised if that stuff comes up, which can definitely be helpful ( i think i maybe got the sea urchin ? right b/c of this).

Thanks a lot Joey. on the math section how many questions did you have that dealt with TRIG

 

[elz787]

sorry to bother you guys, but what specifically is the "sea urchin question" ??

 

[I AM SARA]

Yes I am being truthful, however, since I took the DAT last year they probably didnt give the same test. Last year I had like 5 very difficult questions on enzymes, and there was a reading passage about the stock market w/ calculating P/E ratios and whatnot. It sounds like lots of people have mentioned both of these things on other threads. I do believe ADA is pretty lazy if an almost identical test from last year is released this year, but I think it does happen. THat said they do probably have at least 2 versions that are currently being used, I mean what are the chances that so many people would get a question about damn sea urchin fertilization, that just tells you that questions are reused if not entire sections identical for many people. I would not purposely misinform people, Im just sayin what I had, so dont be surprised if that stuff comes up, which can definitely be helpful ( i think i maybe got the sea urchin ? right b/c of this).

I didnt have the sea urchin Q.

 

[Joeybag]

Thanks a lot Joey. on the math section how many questions did you have that dealt with TRIG

Maybe 2-4, im not real sure. I know one just was kind of being able to understand the conversions between like secant and cosine~sorta conceptual, just know how like opp/hyp=sin and all those types of relationships. I didn't really have stuff like cos^2x + sin^2x=1 but its definitely possible, that said i only remember there being like 3 of these types of relationsships you would have to remember in the barons book. If you understand these concepts, they may expect you to know therefore what the tan 225 degrees or cos pi/4 radians, so be comfortable w/ both those units. It helps me to draw the triangle w/in the circle, where the hypotenuse of the triangle is the radius of the circle. From there you can use like the 30/60/90 or 45/45/90 relationships rt triangle relationships, which are helful in coming up w/ something like tan 225. Also be able to figure out what angles would have a positive or negative values for cos, sin, tan, (basically draw the circle w/ the origiin at 0 on an x/y axis) -so cos will be positive on the rt side of the y axis while sin will be pos on the top side of the x-axis, etc. Sorry if i'm not very eloquent in describing my math procedures, but i hope this is at least helpful in the types of questions. I'm not sure if this is in baron's but I do recall barons being pretty on point w/ the math as well as trig.