<p>So I've been practicing the ACT and my scores have improved dramatically since I've started practicing. However, my reading score is just killing me. No matter how much I practice, I can never manage to even get to the fourth passage; forcing me to guess randomly on all of them. And to make matters worse, I miss a ton of questions on the passages that I do take my time on. I've tried to read the passage really quickly and answer the questions; I've tried to look at the answers and search the passage for the answer, but no technique has really been working. So how can I improve my time? If I could have some time to answer the last passage, my score would dramatically increase.</p>
<p>Any help at all would be gladly appreciated.</p>
<p>So i’m just going to bump this…</p>
<p>On both practices, and my real ACT, I have never gotten lower than a 34 on reading. I’ll share my strategy with you, that may or may not work.</p>
<p>Personally, I am a really quick reader. Without annotating, I typically get through a passage in about 2 minutes. With annotating, that number is about 3.5. That is sort of a natural thing, but you can work on reading speed. Read on your own time, to improve the quality and speed of your reading skills. It has also worked to do the passages in order of how much you enjoy them. Read the first sentence of two, and do the ones that you enjoy, or find easier, first. That means do the ones you would normally get a higher score on first, to avoid mistakes, and the harder ones last, so that if you do have to guess, you are guessing on something you may not have gotten in the first place.</p>
<p>Some people will advise you to read the questions before hand; I never have. For me, reading the questions beforehand gives me a bias when reading the passage, as I may be looking for incorrect answers. I would therefore advise to read the passage first, and do the answers second. Also, answer all questions before you bubble in your answers. If you do not know a question, and won’t be able to answer it in 20 or so seconds, skip it, and go back to it. Do the quick questions first, then go back to the harder ones. Try as hard as you can to answer all questions to a passage before moving on. That means do the all the questions in a passage, even those you have struggled in, before going to the next passage. Only if you genuinely cannot think of an answer, should you start reading another passage. </p>
<p>What I have to say last is less objective, but try thinking of the passage as super interesting. Getting into the mindset that what you are reading is interesting, can make it go quicker, and seem easier. </p>
<p>Hope that helped!</p>