<p>I got a 20 on my ACT and 1350 on the SAT. I'm really bummed about and want at least a 25 or higher. Any really good resources to boast that score? Also I'm very poor so I can't enroll in classes that are expensive. I guess I have a 50 dollar budget.</p>
<p>You should get The Real ACT for practicing with genuine ACT exams, Barron’s ACT 36 for strategies you can use to obtain a high score, and Princeton Review’s Cracking the ACT for a few tests and strategies. If you still need more practice exams, then you should purchase Princeton Review’s 1296 questions, which contains the equivalent of six practice exams. </p>
<p>BTW, you may be able to obtain some of these books at your local library.</p>
<p>Really, the key to success on the ACT is practice practice practice. Assess your strengths and weaknesses by taking a practice test (or evaluating the one you took) and focusing on improving in weak spots while paying less attention to strong spots. If you review your basic grammar (comma rules, parallel structure, etc.) and math (geometry, basic algebra, trigonometry, etc.), you can easily get above a 30 on those respective sections.</p>
<p>I know this is probably not what you want to hear, but the best way to prepare for the science and reading sections is to read more books and take genuine science classes. Not because the ACT science requires foreknowledge necessarily (although it is hard to dispute foreknowledge does not help), but because analyzing scientific and literary material effectively only comes with long-term practice. In the short-term, all you can do is practice these sections often until you are comfortable with the timing and rhythm. Finally, always skip to passages that seem the easiest in these last two sections; don’t run out of time on easy passages because you spent too much time on difficult ones.</p>
<p>Talk to you guidance counselor, they may have some study guides or books available for student use. Look at the library, both school and town ones.</p>