Customer Reviews

Barron's DAT: Dental Admissions Test

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

The practice exams in this book are horribly filled with errors. It seems like nobody bothered to check the answers before they went to publishing and just left them in there leaving exam prepping students scratching their heads wondering if they're wrong or if it's the book. The two exams on the CD are just as bad or even worse. In the PAT sections, my initial scored had me scoring around a 17. After double and triple checking the answers, my score jumped up to a 25 after I added wrongfully graded questions back onto my raw score.

For what it's worth though, at least the PAT strategy tips were sparingly helpful. Also, the biology science review is brief, but it does include a lot of the most important information that, if memorized, would benefit your score greatly.

I heard about the bad reputation that this book had before I bought it but I am very glad I bought it! It has errors, but I feel as though the perceptual ability is amazing in this book! I thought this book was better than Kaplan's and it prepared me better, giving me word problem examples for the math section compared to a bunch of nonsense that Kaplan has in their book. I used Kaplan and Barrons study books, and I also reviewed internet material for biology and my textbook for chemistry. Kaplan is average for biology, chem and ochem but their perceptual ability is way too easy and the math section of the dat is primarily word problems and Kaplan I remember didn't even have 1 of them in there! I think Barrons is a great investment, especially since it is so cheap, it does give you some great questions to think about and prepare you for the actual test. Kaplan is just too broad and I almost thought it was useless besides the study questions that they give. I thought Barrons was a great piece of study material. I got a 21 AA and 21 PAT. No Kaplan class, just studied on my own for two full summers. Good luck to all of you!

Barron's DAT review could be decent if it wasn't full of typos and incorrect answers.

It is handy to have all the information in one place but it is the wrong stuff! It is more than typos it is just plain bad writing and science. It really is an embarrassment for those who claim to be the authors.

As many before me have written, this book contains MANY appalling errors. If they were all corrected, I would have given the book 4.5 stars! They are not simply typos but errors in regards to actual content and answers/explanations for the questions. It seems as though the publishers just didn't bother to edit the material at all. Although there are numerous mistakes in the text, in all fairness, it's a great practice source for potential DAT takers and there are some good stragey tips for the PAT section and on how to maximize your time and be more efficient. Timing is the key to any stadardized test. You may know everything but if you can't apply it within the time frame given, it's absolutely useless.

I'm not taking a prep course, just doing self-study using Barron's and Kaplan materials. I find the Kaplan book is much more thorough with the Natural Sciences whereas Barron's doesn't really elaborate on the need-to-know topics, especially in the biology portion. However, Barron's does provide a fairly nice straight-forward overview of the main ideas of each topic, sort of like a quick reference guide. Kaplan can be somewhat overwhelming in the sense that they cover too much stuff. In addition, Kaplan doesn't give many strategy tips, in my opinion, none at all. Kaplan just gives you the facts and leaves you to figure it out on your own. Even though there are plenty of mistakes in Barron's, it is a nice challenge to be able to pick up on them and learn from it, but yes, BEWARE...it is misleading and confusing if you're using this book as your only tool for studying and have nothing to compare it to. Overall, this text is good for practice and picking up some stategies when used as an adjunct with other study materials such as Kaplan and/or your own college texts.

If you want more practice before test day, it's cheap and has four practice tests. However, make sure you go over your tests thoroughly because there's a lot of errors in the answers. Kaplan is MUCH better but if you've run out of tests, it's okay to practice with I suppose. Barron's needs better authors, it's pretty bad when so many of the answers they give are just simply wrong.

I borrowed the book from a friend and he and I both found so many errors!!! The CD that comes with it is full of errors and typos. This can really affect your judgement on test day. I do not recommend this book at all.

This book is an embarrassment to the authors. Full of typos and incorrect reactions. Answers are also incorrect in the practice section. I've looked through Kaplan, Barrons,and Cliffnotes. Cliff notes, in my opinion, is also a complete waste of money. Do yourself a favor and spend a couple extra dollars to get the Kaplan book. Barron's is a waste of money...

This book is full of typos. The review sections are okay but I might as well have just studied my own notes and books. The sample tests are full of typos so it is hard to tell if I really got something wrong or if it's just a typo (some of the questions are even unanswerable because they don't make sense due to typos -- ex: one question asked about a bag of blue and green balls but the answer choices referred to red balls???). Due to this, I question the review sections and wonder if there are random typos/mistakes in there too. I bought it because it is cheap... but apparently that shows up in the bad editing of the book.

Fine book if you just want to see what type of info is on the DAT. But waste of money if you are really trying to study and take practice tests. I'd rather get something a little more expensive that will actually help me, especially considering the time/cost of everything else to get into dental school.

Save your money. Don't buy this book! It's full of errors and typos, especially in the math sections.