bigpsammy
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- Jan 13, 2022
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DAT Breakdown: 22 AA
Start date of studying: May 23
Test Date: June 25
I started studying a week after graduating from college. I studied full time until the exam with some weekends off. I tried to do 10 hours a day, but it was more like 5 hours a day because I was too burnt out. Pomodoro Technique was effective for me when I stayed disciplined enough to do it but I got distracted frequently. I used datbooster exclusively for the exam. I did have a copy of dat destroyer but I didn’t have time to open it.
I started with learning all the material, I followed dat boosters 8 week plan by doing 2 days into 1 day to fit it into a month, but I got behind really soon and was 20 days behind according to the dat booster schedule after 2 weeks. So, I scrapped the plan and I tried to finish the review as quickly as possible and I took practice exams (sometimes two) everyday for the last week before the exam. I crammed until the morning of the exam, had to wait almost 2 hours to take the exam so I studied some more but I don’t think it helped because I was just a bundle of nerves and I could not concentrate. The waiting time really messed me up because I could not sleep at all the night before so I was even more tired by the time I could start the exam.
Biology 22: I utilized all of boosters condensed notes, did about a quarter of the studying following booster’s schedule for two weeks and the rest I crammed/ skimmed in a week. On 6/03 I took one booster test just to see where I was at and I did way worse than I thought I would so it was a huge motivation boost. On 6/19 I started doing practice tests everyday sometimes two a day and learned the most from these because I would review as I went over my wrong answers. I spent the most time on this section studying. The exam was very broad and not much depth to the questions unlike boosters questions. I saw a lot of people saying to review with Anki, if you have the time it would be beneficial, but I don’t think its effective if you’re short on time.
Gchem 20: I followed boosters plan for two weeks and then just finished the rest of the material in a day just looking at the notes especially formulas and didn’t look at anymore videos or supplementals. I also started practice tests 6/19 and reviewed as I checked my wrong answers. I spent the least time on this section studying out of the sciences.
Ochem 20: I followed boosters plan for two weeks but got so behind but I still watched most of the videos because visual conceptualization is pretty important for this section. This section I worried the most about because I didn’t have time to memorize the reactions/ mechanisms but the exam didn’t go into it in depth. I also started practice tests 6/19 and reviewed as I checked my wrong answers. I wish I spent more time on ochem if I had been more disciplined.
PAT: 18 By far my worst one on the exam. I only took 3 practice tests during the week before the exam because of time constraints but I did well on them and was not worried for the exam. The exam was a lot harder than the practice questions I had. I usually aced the angle and folding, but on the exam I had a whole bunch of questions that I’ve never experienced. It took me a couple seconds for angle ranking on booster, but on the exam I was taking 30 seconds plus. Folding also took me close to a minute on the exam, but only 30 seconds on booster. Blocks were the same, and tfe was a little harder. Almost the whole keyhole section I just made educated guesses between two choices because I had only 8 minutes left by the time I got to it.
Reading: 26 I only took one practice test before the exam. I used to just read the whole passage and then just go into the questions, but I saw some advice online that said to write a summary of each paragraph as you read. I don’t know if it helped or not. Reading was always my strong suit, so I did not prepare for it. The exam article was a little harder than the booster article. The exam did have some ambiguous questions that were really irking.
QR: 24 I just went through the cheat sheets and did 4 practice tests the week before the exam. I struggled a little timing at first, but I eventually got a hang of it. The practice questions helped a lot and I used that mainly for my review.
Conclusion: The real exam is a lot easier so if you’re doing bad on the practice exams don’t sweat it. Datbooster covers all the bases really well, but I would recommend dat destroyer too if you really want a top notch score.
Start date of studying: May 23
Test Date: June 25
I started studying a week after graduating from college. I studied full time until the exam with some weekends off. I tried to do 10 hours a day, but it was more like 5 hours a day because I was too burnt out. Pomodoro Technique was effective for me when I stayed disciplined enough to do it but I got distracted frequently. I used datbooster exclusively for the exam. I did have a copy of dat destroyer but I didn’t have time to open it.
I started with learning all the material, I followed dat boosters 8 week plan by doing 2 days into 1 day to fit it into a month, but I got behind really soon and was 20 days behind according to the dat booster schedule after 2 weeks. So, I scrapped the plan and I tried to finish the review as quickly as possible and I took practice exams (sometimes two) everyday for the last week before the exam. I crammed until the morning of the exam, had to wait almost 2 hours to take the exam so I studied some more but I don’t think it helped because I was just a bundle of nerves and I could not concentrate. The waiting time really messed me up because I could not sleep at all the night before so I was even more tired by the time I could start the exam.
Biology 22: I utilized all of boosters condensed notes, did about a quarter of the studying following booster’s schedule for two weeks and the rest I crammed/ skimmed in a week. On 6/03 I took one booster test just to see where I was at and I did way worse than I thought I would so it was a huge motivation boost. On 6/19 I started doing practice tests everyday sometimes two a day and learned the most from these because I would review as I went over my wrong answers. I spent the most time on this section studying. The exam was very broad and not much depth to the questions unlike boosters questions. I saw a lot of people saying to review with Anki, if you have the time it would be beneficial, but I don’t think its effective if you’re short on time.
Gchem 20: I followed boosters plan for two weeks and then just finished the rest of the material in a day just looking at the notes especially formulas and didn’t look at anymore videos or supplementals. I also started practice tests 6/19 and reviewed as I checked my wrong answers. I spent the least time on this section studying out of the sciences.
Ochem 20: I followed boosters plan for two weeks but got so behind but I still watched most of the videos because visual conceptualization is pretty important for this section. This section I worried the most about because I didn’t have time to memorize the reactions/ mechanisms but the exam didn’t go into it in depth. I also started practice tests 6/19 and reviewed as I checked my wrong answers. I wish I spent more time on ochem if I had been more disciplined.
PAT: 18 By far my worst one on the exam. I only took 3 practice tests during the week before the exam because of time constraints but I did well on them and was not worried for the exam. The exam was a lot harder than the practice questions I had. I usually aced the angle and folding, but on the exam I had a whole bunch of questions that I’ve never experienced. It took me a couple seconds for angle ranking on booster, but on the exam I was taking 30 seconds plus. Folding also took me close to a minute on the exam, but only 30 seconds on booster. Blocks were the same, and tfe was a little harder. Almost the whole keyhole section I just made educated guesses between two choices because I had only 8 minutes left by the time I got to it.
Reading: 26 I only took one practice test before the exam. I used to just read the whole passage and then just go into the questions, but I saw some advice online that said to write a summary of each paragraph as you read. I don’t know if it helped or not. Reading was always my strong suit, so I did not prepare for it. The exam article was a little harder than the booster article. The exam did have some ambiguous questions that were really irking.
QR: 24 I just went through the cheat sheets and did 4 practice tests the week before the exam. I struggled a little timing at first, but I eventually got a hang of it. The practice questions helped a lot and I used that mainly for my review.
Conclusion: The real exam is a lot easier so if you’re doing bad on the practice exams don’t sweat it. Datbooster covers all the bases really well, but I would recommend dat destroyer too if you really want a top notch score.