How did YOU pass Natural Sciences?

[sgloer]

If you've taken and passed the Natural Sciences exam within the last 6 months or so, how did you do it? What resources did you use, how well did you do, and do you have any study tips?

If we can boil it down to a couple of main resources, then we may be able to develop materials for Natural Sciences. A lot of members want it, but we haven't figured out an easy way to do it without needing thousands of questions...

[Nytwolf]

Okay, I haven't taken that CLEP, but I gave my friend copies of two cd's, uh, I mean let him borrow my cd's and he passed with a 68.

The cd's were from two study guides, one was Barron's and the other was Clep Success. They both have multiple practice tests.

If you don't want to waste $50 per book, I highly suggest checking your local library or school library. You'd be surprised what resources you have for free.

With that being said, I can honestly say that without InstantCert I wouldn't have had a study guide for the DSST/Dantes tests I passed. If the CLEP subject matter is as good as the DSST here, I'm sure I'll pass the two CLEP's I'll be taking in the next week or so.

[anar579]

I took this exam in Nov. 2005, and I admit it was nerve-racking studying for it. First off I used Princeton Review's CLEP book, which contains a thorough outline of just what to study, topics that can be expected in the exam. I created a study guide of my own with this outline by gathering information from Encarta and Wikipedia on each topic. The entire outline turned out to be over 200 pages in font size 9, a monster. I certainly made it way too long, but since this is such a broad exam I didn't want to "miss" anything.

I then came across a PDF copy of Peterson's CLEP Success book, which I think they became wise to and is no longer available (it was on a military website). This book had concise but adequate outline/guide in each area of the exam; the mock exams, however, I found to be way off the mark when I took the real exam. I don't think Peterson’s outline was sufficient on its own, but combined with taking mock exams from the Princeton Review guide (which has 2 full length exams) and filling in the gaps where I felt unsure by doing extra encyclopedia look-ups, I managed to get a 60. It's not a very high score, but it's a pass/fail so a 50 would've been good enough.

EDIT: I just found a posting on the degreeinfo.com forum that has a link to the Peterson's CLEP Success book and 18 CLEP subject exams: http://www.petersons.com/airforce/cl...asp?sponsor=8.

[sgloer]

I just found a posting on the degreeinfo.com forum that has a link

Nice! It might not be a bad idea for you to start a new thread specifically with that link in it, so that everyone can easily find it.

[sgloer]

Originally Posted by Nytwolf

The cd's were from two study guides, one was Barron's and the other was Clep Success. They both have multiple practice tests.

This information will prove useful for other members who want to know what to study... Unfortunately for us, we're not going to be able to use someone else's practice tests to develop comprehensive materials.

If there's anyone that's passed Natural Sciences using study resources other than practice exams from competitors, put it up here!

[RBOWMAN]

Didn't instantcer at one time offer a natural science test prep course? What happened ? I desperately need to pass this course and I have no science background. Can you spell high anxiety? Help!

[sgloer]

We've never offered Natural Sciences. Biology is the only science we ever put up. We did have Natural Sciences in development at one point, but then learned that Collegeboard had just revised the test (this was around a year ago). Since then, we haven't touched it.

[jumahn]

I like thousands of questions! Thousands of questions are good! Bring them on!

Seriously, I'd love to see this study material put up and would help if possible, but all I really have to go off of is other sites/books. I'm sure you know of the material freeuniv.com offers, so barring that, what else can we give you that would aid in this being put up?

[sgloer]

Originally Posted by jumahn

what else can we give you that would aid in this being put up?

I'll have to take a closer look at freeuniv.com, but what we need is to be able to narrow down our sources. Typically, we like to boil it down to two textbooks or references, and use the content outline to develop the brunt of the content from that. By doing it this way, even when Collegeboard changes the tests on us, our materials stay pretty reliable (as long as they don't change the content outline).

The point is--if we hear of half a different study sources, including other people's sample tests, it's not really feasible for us to develop a course from that. And unfortunately, most customers would not be happy with a 1500 question database for one test.

[ShotoJuku]

I passed today. I will list my study materials, however I SUGGEST taking the BIOLOGY CLEP FIRST before sitting the NS exam. I say this as the NS exam is made up of 50% of biology and the balance of chemistry, geology, physics, and astronomy. If you can pass biology first then the NS exam isn't so bad. I studied for biology for 3 weeks took the exam and passed. Then I added another 2 weeks of study for the NS exam and passed it too.

Here is my list:

INSTANTCERT - Biology
REA Biology
Standard Deviants - Biology
www.DavidandLaurie.com - NS exam study guide.

BTW: InstantCert does have 123 science questions listed in the GED Science section that can be somewhat helpful.

GOOD LUCK!!!!!