<p>I am seriously considering having D take the ACT in April before the SAT in May - based on her PSAT I have a feeling that ACT will be better for her. Does anyone see any advantages/disadvantages of doing this? Also - is the score reporting turnaround quick enough that she could even delay SAT until the fall or not even take it at all if the ACT score is high enough? June's date will not work due to SAT II subject tests....thanks for any input on this!</p>
<p>I would recommend that you do some ACT prep work before she takes it. My daughter went in cold and had no info at all about the test. ( we live in SAT country ) She did not do as well as she did on the SAT. She should be familiar with the format and timing ( my daughter ran out of time on the ACT and is usually a very fast reader so IDK what happened. ) The science format confused her as well ( she loves science but it was apparently heavy on graphs and charts which she's not great with).
I foolishly had her scores sent to 4 schools and wish we had waited to get the results first. We would not have sent them at all and only sent the SAT scores.
OTOH, she scored very high on the english sections LOL ( just not well on math and science which killed her composite).
Good luck!</p>
<p>I would recommend Princeton Review's Crash Course to the ACT (the title is something like that). Most people think they have to know science for the ACT, when in fact, you can actually disregard all the infomation printed about the various experiments mentioned, etc. You just have to be able to read graphs, not understand the information contained in them. This book was very helpful in making that distinction and it is a good, quick read (it's very short) and a good intro if you are going to go into in-depth prep.</p>
<p>This was exactly what my D did. She did not do great on the PSAT, it was allright but not in line with her grades. She prepped for the ACT, she bought the book from the ACT company and did the practice tests, not a ton of practice, just enough so that she could be comfortable with the test. The ACT test was, I think when compared to the SAT, 150 points higher. </p>
<p>She decided that there was no reason to prep for the SAT since we figured that she was more geared to the ACT. She's more of a math and science person and works pretty fast. </p>
<p>This way she just prepped for SAT II's and had a very stress-free end to her junior year.</p>
<p>I do have to say that with score choice, I only sent one ACT because it would have cost me double to send another and I had to send the SAT II's also. It doesn't seem like a lot of money but it adds up!</p>
<p>I think most of the parents whose kid have taken ACT will agree with me on this one - you got to do a few practice tests to get familiar with the format. This is specially ture for the science part. My DD is a very good student and went to take ACT w/o any study. She got an o.k. composite score but relatively poor on that science session (30). Next round, she did about two hours worth of reading on the science part and got a 32 as a result.</p>
<p>rachacha - I completely agree with all posts above. I had D take the ACT before SAT because she gets tired after four or five hours of testing, and I felt she might refuse to sit for a second test if she took the SAT first. And I was right about that part, as she REFUSED to sit for the SAT a second time. But she did agree to sit for the ACT a second time. That gave her a chance to prep for the ACT "science" section, which apparently focuses on chart interpretation at expense of scientific facts and scientific reasoning.</p>
<p>My S is current junior. Due to his activities and 3 AP tests in the spring, I had him take the ACT last October. I gave him a reasonable score he had to attain to be "one and done" with all standardized tests for college. Gave him his brother's old ACT prep book and asked him to prepare. Did he study/prepare? I don't really think so, but he exceeded my minimum score significantly, so was done by early Nov of his junior year. </p>
<p>Colleges will accept ACT or SAT these days. Based on my S's PSAT as a soph, I figured he would do better on the ACT. He did more than fine. Go w/your students strengths, not whatever the norm is in your area.</p>
<p>cj_svu6 is exactly right about that book. it was REALLY helpful, especially on the science part. </p>
<p>I took the ACT in April before the SAT, and I knew my score before the May SAT. then again, we paid some $$$ on the ACT website, which I think is a fine investment in peace of mind.</p>