Thoughts On The November 2016 Dat Exam

[Dentistry101]

BIO - more like ecology. I skipped over ecology thinking why the **** would dental schools test us on that? and there you go! DAT SNS was like 70% ecology. 

Chem - grade 2 chemistry, with grade 3 if they wanna trick you. If you're in the sciences, please don't study for this section... go memorize some plant sh** instead.

PAT - No boulder keyhole crazy questions like people anticipated, it was a LOTTTT more straight forward than any PAT exam I've ever done. Like keyholes was really obvious, TFE was also very easy to visualize, felt like first time I actually didn't guess a couple on these 2 sections. Angles were tough, rotated and in diff lengths with very minimal angle differences.  

RCT - It was the most stressful section, it was so goddamn stressful man. I look around me and everyone looks depressed, I finish the exam and everyone's face looks like they lost a loved one... With so much stress, it was hard to comprehend anything.. RIP! 

 

Overall, I noticed that a test on paper will never be representative of a test online. There are waaaaaaay too many tricks you can do on paper that you cannot possibly do online.. Well atleast for the PAT and RCT.

[lividtea]

Invigilators can give time warnings whenever they want actually. I've invigilated the DAT twice already and in my room me and my fellow invigilators stuck to 30mins, 15mins, and 5mins.

 

They have a total of 15 "test questions" (for lack of a better term). If enough people get these right, then they'll appear on the DAT some other year but that time, they will actually count towards your score.

 

Thank you for the information! I had the impression that they only gave two warnings because it seemed like my invigilator read it off from his instructions and CDA wants to simulate similar testing conditions for everyone. 

 

 

BIO - more like ecology. I skipped over ecology thinking why the **** would dental schools test us on that? and there you go! DAT SNS was like 70% ecology. 

Chem - grade 2 chemistry, with grade 3 if they wanna trick you. If you're in the sciences, please don't study for this section... go memorize some plant sh** instead.

PAT - No boulder keyhole crazy questions like people anticipated, it was a LOTTTT more straight forward than any PAT exam I've ever done. Like keyholes was really obvious, TFE was also very easy to visualize, felt like first time I actually didn't guess a couple on these 2 sections. Angles were tough, rotated and in diff lengths with very minimal angle differences.  

RCT - It was the most stressful section, it was so goddamn stressful man. I look around me and everyone looks depressed, I finish the exam and everyone's face looks like they lost a loved one... With so much stress, it was hard to comprehend anything.. RIP! 

 

Overall, I noticed that a test on paper will never be representative of a test online. There are waaaaaaay too many tricks you can do on paper that you cannot possibly do online.. Well atleast for the PAT and RCT.

 

Sooo many tricks you can do!! Super easy to eliminate questions and especially helpful for angle rankings (those annoying ~180 degree angles  ), counting cubes, hole punching, and a bit for pattern folding. 

[BScDMD]

No problem!

Hope it went well for everyone here

[Winnipeg9416]

Bio: General consensus seems to be that it was really hard...I found it "kind of" hard, but I studied an awful lot for it. Came prepared to answer plant/microorganism/taxonomy questions and definitely answered some questions that I wouldn't have been able to answer on previous written DATs. However there was ONE section that I really didn't go over and it was evolution...there were about 4-5 questions on evolution so kinda bummed and had to take my best guess on those.

 

Chem: pretty standard, not much to say. 2-3 tricky questions midway through from what I remember. 

 

PAT: My best section. Was going fantastic until I ran out of time and had to blindly guess last 6-7 questions on pattern folding. Overall, went well.

 

RC: Glad to hear so many other people found it hard! I don't use search and destroy, I read each passage 3-4 paragraphs at a time. First 2 passages went very well but with only 15 min left for the last (and longest!) passage, lost focus and only answered half the questions well, had to blindly guess on 8-9 questions of last passage. 

 

Felt great about it until the very end!

[member_225]

Invigilators can give time warnings whenever they want actually. I've invigilated the DAT twice already and in my room me and my fellow invigilators stuck to 30mins, 15mins, and 5mins.

 

They have a total of 15 "test questions" (for lack of a better term). If enough people get these right, then they'll appear on the DAT some other year but that time, they will actually count towards your score.

 

Does that mean the 15 questions are still counted towards our score even though they are "test questions" ? 

[BScDMD]

Does that mean the 15 questions are still counted towards our score even though they are "test questions" ?

Nope! It means that if the questions are successful they will count once they officially use them (ie not this last DAT)

[member_225]

Nope! It means that if the questions are successful they will count once they officially use them (ie not this last DAT)

 

I see, thanks!!

 

Hopefully there's like 3 test questions in the angle ranking section haha, they were really hard! 

[BScDMD]

Haha yea, I flipped through the exam during the test and the angle ranking seemed a little rough, same with pattern folding 

[Waves]

As someone who's taken the DAT before and can objectively compare yesterday's and previous ones, I find it puzzling how different the tests are.

Both biology and chemistry were much harder this year.

PAT was extremely easy compared to last year. There were very simple apertures, TFE, and pattern folding (relatively). No rock keyholes for some reason.

RC was extremely hard compared to last year. Last year's RC consisted of:
1. questions completely in order, so you didn't have to scan the entire passage since the next question would be in the next paragraph
2. no tone/inference questions at all, along with no "first statement true, second statement false"-type questions
3. literally ALL retrieval questions, with no re-wording at all
This year they made it similar to the American DAT RC which is a lot more difficult. This was such a drastic change. It really surprised me since it was such a straightforward section last year. 

[pleasehelpme]

Invigilators can give time warnings whenever they want actually. I've invigilated the DAT twice already and in my room me and my fellow invigilators stuck to 30mins, 15mins, and 5mins.

 

They have a total of 15 "test questions" (for lack of a better term). If enough people get these right, then they'll appear on the DAT some other year but that time, they will actually count towards your score.

 

 

 

can you please explain this better?

 

nvm. got it

[pleasehelpme]

i don't get why everyone is saying RC was hard. this is scaring me now because i thought it was easy. is it because i've done the verbal reasoning section of the mcat twice- which is hell, so i'm thinking relatively?

[DentHope2021]

i don't get why everyone is saying RC was hard. this is scaring me now because i thought it was easy. is it because i've done the verbal reasoning section of the mcat twice- which is hell, so i'm thinking relatively?

Mainly since people might have went in thinking search and destroy and questions would be in order. With only 50 min, people could be thrown off by seeing it not in order and having inference questions. Also, seeing that you did the mcat verbal section, this must have been easy

[221bakerst]

Bio: so annoyed with considering they put like 10 questions on taxonomy and what not....90% of everything studied not even on it 

Chem: reasonable, but yeah way more acid/bases questions than previous years

 

PAT: was reasonable, so many cube figures tho which ate up some time and felt rushed for the last section. angles was a bitch, guessed on a few

RCT: search and destroy def did NOT WORK. prob worst section. was nothing like previous tests and had a lot of comprehend and apply q's

[member_225]

Bio: so annoyed with considering they put like 10 questions on taxonomy and what not....90% of everything studied not even on it 

Chem: reasonable, but yeah way more acid/bases questions than previous years

 

PAT: was reasonable, so many cube figures tho which ate up some time and felt rushed for the last section. angles was a bitch, guessed on a few

 

RCT: search and destroy def did NOT WORK. prob worst section. was nothing like previous tests and had a lot of comprehend and apply q's

 

 

I agree, when I was doing the cube counting section, I thought I was re-doing some questions because of how many there were....page after page I thought it would never end lol. I think each structure had 2 questions...maybe 6 or 7 figures total? 

[dental2016]

BIO: definitely a lot more random questions than I anticipated
CHEM: was okay, some tricky questions 

PAT: easier than I expected, except for angles but I was never super good at this section 

RC: finished the first two passages but had to rush the third one and ended up guessing on a few of the last questions
 

[adam4343]

First time taking the DAT.

 

Bio: I expected this to be my best section, but I honestly didn't know over 10 questions. Very random questions, and I'm pretty upset about it.

 

Chem: Very easy. I did do a couple stupid mistakes, but overall I found it very very easy.

 

PAT: Practiced on Bootcamp, so this was a breeze for me. I did run out of time by the end, so i speed through the last 5 pattern folding questions. However, every section was easier than bootcamp, ESPECIALLY keyholes.

 

RC: THIS killed me. I was so stressed out from the first second to the last. I spent waaaay too long on the first passage, which made me panic and rush through the second and third passage. When the proctor announced 5 minutes left, i still did not answer about 13 questions and completely guessed them. 

 

I will most likely have to do the test again because of RC, which really bums me out. I wish there was a timer on the board or a bigger clock because i could not keep track of my time. At least now I know to bring a watch for next time.

[kingfletch]

Bio with all the memorizing of minute facts killed me

[Dentalofficer]

Bio- easy except a few random questions

Chem- very easy except some theory questions

PAT- Ridiculously easy

MDT- CDA pattern but I scooped my saddle so didn't go well

RC- Ridiculous because previous RC u could use search n destroy but on this one u couldn't.

[hopeful42]

Reading comp was the killer this time round (at least on my version)

[dent995]

Bio had some random biodiversity, ecology evolution questions

 

RC was a killer! it was tough to complete all three passages in 50 min ! The stress you get of not being able to finish, sorta ruins your performance on other questions too.

might have to rewrite cause of RC 

 

PAT, chem were good!

[member_225]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who found PAT to be easy....I thought I just didn't understand anything...

[pleasehelpme]

why does it take them so long to get the scores back to us

 

mcat only takes a month

 

and the american dat i think they get their scores back like the day of

[Fakedoctor]

why does it take them so long to get the scores back to us

 

mcat only takes a month

 

and the american dat i think they get their scores back like the day of

 

I think it has something to do with the fact that the american dat and mcat don't require someone to individually look at every soap and grade them (you can thank Alberta for that) also those 2 test are computer based so all the grades and stats are computed pretty much automatically and instantly

 

only hard part was RC, but everyone seems to think it was hard so pray for the curve 

[pleasehelpme]

i want my score back now

[MT_93]

i don't get why everyone is saying RC was hard. this is scaring me now because i thought it was easy. is it because i've done the verbal reasoning section of the mcat twice- which is hell, so i'm thinking relatively?

 

I found it easy as well, and I too think it was becuase I've written the MCAT so many time and have practived VR (or CARS) more than I'd like even though i was never good at it, just decent.

 

I think it went excellent becuase I combined strategies that worked for me in particular. Only time will tell...

 

P.S. Studying and writing the DAT, no matter if i did good or bad on it, is a walk in the park compared to the new MCAT