ACT Reading: Desperately Need Help!!

<p>I'm a senior this year and I'm taking the ACT for the last time next weekend (September 13th). I have great scores on all of my subjects except for reading. I cannot for the life of me find a way to score well on this test. </p>

<p>I've tried a bunch of different techniques: </p>

<p>speed reading (that doesn't work because I don't actually absorb/understand most of what I read)
reading first and last sentences of each paragraph (doesn't work because I miss things and end up re-reading anyway)
reading the questions first (works for the questions that refer to specific lines, but not for general passage questions)</p>

<p>Is there something I'm missing? My highest reading score was 25, and I honestly only need one more point higher. My ideal score would be in the 30's though. I still have one more practice test (for reading) to try out a technique. What has worked for everyone? I'm really desperate at this point, because I need a higher score. I practiced this morning and dropped my score to a 22. So I'm pretty frustrated now. Advice?</p>

<p>It seems like you are reading too fast. I recommend slowing down a bit. </p>

<p>Try to hit a pace of about 3-4 minutes to read a passage. This is longer than it takes to do the techniques you’ve described, but still fast reading. After this you should be familiar with the general points of the passage and how it is structured.</p>

<p>Next read the questions. You will know some of the answers right away. For others you will have to consult the text again. Since you already know how it is structured, you should be able to jump to the relevant part quickly. Re-read it carefully in order to understand exactly what the author is saying.</p>

<p>I hope that helps. Lots of students recommend underlining key terms too. I don’t do that myself, but you could look into their techniques.</p>

<p>That sounds like what is happening. I’ll give it a try.</p>

<p>Honestly, on the test I took this morning, I didn’t realize miss that many on three of the four passages, but for whatever, I missed almost every single one on the social science passage, and only missed one (maybe two) on the others. I probably read that one too fast and didn’t understand it. Thanks for the advice!</p>

<p>I also just figured out that I scored my test wrong…I thought the test was out of 35 questions, not 40 (I have must have been thinking of the 35 minutes that the test is). Anyways, I didn’t get a 22, I got a 25. So I actually stayed the same as my actual test from April. At least I didn’t go down! But again, I need at least a 26 next Saturday.</p>

<p>yeah, all the ‘speed reading tips’ don’t really work short-term (at least they didn’t for me)
I got a 34 with my strategy, but it’s kinda risky. I read through the passage in 3:30 minutes, circling all the keywords (names, locations, events, dates, transition words, etc.) Then I just answer the questions mostly based off on my memory. I do refer back if I really can’t recall or if it’s a fact question, but I realized that actually going through the passage and finding the part where the question refers to really takes up time.
Anyways good luck! I’m taking it this 13th as well!</p>

<p>I got a 35 on the reading section on the June ACT with zero preparation and my main tip would be this: Get used to reading quickly and trying to get the main idea of what’s going on in each section. I notoriously “skim” passages (I read most things in depth but I will skip over things that don’t really matter. If there’s dialogue there’s almost no reason to read the part where the author is describing how someone said something. This shaves precious time off reading.) and then on the test I will go back and find the evidence to support each one of my answers.</p>

<p>Basically, try to find things that you don’t need to read and get used to just skipping over those parts. Try to read to familiarize yourself with the passage and when you’re answering the questions make sure you’re reading each question in depth and know what it’s asking and what section of the passage the answer is in. If you read quickly enough, you basically guarantee that you will get to find the exact answer for each question. Almost none of the questions require you to infer the answer unlike the SAT (and the SAT does this poorly, at that), so if you finish the passage quickly enough and understand what’s going on you can just literally go back into the passage and find the exact sentence with the answer.</p>

<p>For this, you need to be able to basically place what is going on in each paragraph. Try to have an image of the passage in your head when you’re answering the question and then try to recall where each piece of information is in the passage. Just try to break it up into various categories. All of the passages the ACT uses are pretty formulaic and all are well structured. This means that if you know what the passage talked about and can basically remember the chronology of it, you just need to go to the general region of where that information should be and you can just skim for that sentence.</p>

<p>Unlike the SAT’s reading section, the ACT’s reading section is about reading quickly and being able to get the information out of the passage. If you can’t read quickly, try to just know the basic gist of where the information is and then try to pinpoint specific facts after you’ve read the article. Memorizing facts during the section is pointless, in my honest opinion. Remember the very significant facts (important events, the main idea of the story, etc.), but if it’s a science article or some kind of history article you’re allowed to refer to the article, and that’s what you should do. Good luck on your next ACT!</p>

<p>I went from 22 to 33 in reading by figuring out my best reading speed. You have to dial in your speed, and trust yourself and your practice.</p>