The DAT : Taking the Test

Went into the test with a lot of confidence the day before but by the time I got to the testing center I was shaking. The science portion was calm, cool and collected for me, but the 2nd half was nasty. Here are my scores:

Bio - 23
GC - 22
OC - 21
TS - 22
RC - 21
QR - 16
AA - 21
PA - 19

vs. TopScore a few days before :

Bio - 19
GC - 18
OC - 19
TS - 19
RC - 22
PA - 23

~Breakdown~
Biology - Kaplan BB, CliffsNotes AP Bio, old bio notes from Freeman text - Wow. I was mentally not prepared to look at my report and see a 23 there. I was constantly getting 18s and 19s on both TopScore and Kaplan. The questions were so out there, too. It really covered a broad range of topics and was much harder than practice tests. Still, it had WAY less classification questions than in TopScore. It would give a specific feature that was pretty obscure and expect you to know the exact family of organisms it belonged to. This was not as prevalent as I thought it would be. Overall, I was pretty satisfied with how this section turned out.

General Chemistry - Overall, I was pretty happy with how this went for me. Believe it or not, this was my worst subject a week ago before I went on a study blitz with MCAT ExamKrackers, which is an AMAZING study tool as previously mentioned.

Organic Chemistry - Thought I might even do better than this in orgo, since I felt most confident with this subject. I read through my old Carey textbook, MCAT ExamKrackers section and flashcards of all the reactions I made a year ago. The questions were very straightforward.

Reading Comprehension - one really tough passage and two easy ones that were near and dear to my heart. LOTS of search and destroy. Thankfully not too many tone problems IMO. By this point in the exam I was starting to feel nausious from all the tension and sweating. Weird I know, but I've never been this nervous about a test in my life.

Quantitative Reasoning - Not very proud about this one. By this point in the exam, I felt terrible and I couldn't think straight. Not to say that I was going to get any higher than an 18 here anyways. Besides, it didnt bring my AA down too much. All I can say is be ready for word problems and to work at breakneck speed. Practice lots!

PAT - So I was cruising along and I got to cube counting. BOTH my dry erase pens decide to stop working, so I spend 17 minutes on cubes crying as I had to scratch in tally marks for cubes, lol. Other than that, it was pretty fair overall. Angle ranking on the real thing is SO much harded than Kaplan and TopScore led me to believe. Seriously, these things were like a 1 degree difference in all of them. Beware, Crack the DAT PAT is almost required to get that 20+ score here and I really wish I went out an bought it.

Study materials used :
- old textbooks
- Cliffsnotes AP Biology
- Kaplan DAT Blue Book
- TopScore Pro
- Endless flashcards
- MCAT ExamKrackers audio osmosis tapes
- MCAT ExamKrackers books