<p>I know many people say that reading will not improve your reading score but I believe in the fact that reading-SAT type passages(other than the ones in the practice tests) will help in one way or another. </p>
<p>I know many people recommend The New York Times and The Economist but are these any good? Are there any others that someone would like to recommend?</p>
<p>Anyone with ideas? Also how can I improve reading speed and still understand the minor details of the passage?</p>
<p>I read the Economist frequently, and it’s great in my opinion. The only way you can get your score up and better your analysis of passages is by practicing.</p>
<p>Yea I’ve realized that I need some help in that area. There are some passages where I need read more carefully and others where I completely confused about what the passage is about. On the recent SATs, it seems that the last 20-minute section has the hardest passage which most of my errors come from.</p>
<p>Read news articles from reputable websites (CNN, The Hufffington Post, etc). They’re about as long and challenging as CR passages, and are great sources for examples you can use on the SAT essay.</p>
<p>Read TIME. There is a variety of styles and the vocabulary and syntax are complicated enough to prepare for SAT reading. Be reminded to read actively and to not be a Zombie</p>
<p>When you mean “actively” does that mean that I ask questions and take side notes?</p>
<p>Listen, I think the most effective articles to read are the ones you’re REALLY interested in. The New York Times and other newspapers offer news and articles about a variety of subjects. Subjects that you don’t even care about, especially if you’re not living in the country where is newspaper is published. I, for example, like to read about professional wrestling, so I read daily articles and rumors about that. I found them interesting and fun; reading them doesn’t feel like doing a homework or like studying. Rather, I’m interested and entertained by what I’m reading and that helps me absorb the full meaning of the article or blog I’m reading. That’s what, in my opinion, reading actively means. Reading and understanding any piece of information is of course going to help too, but reading something that you REALLY care about knowing is what you’re looking for.</p>
<p>Sorry, but reading random articles from third-party sources will probably not help you in the slightest. I think that’s one of the most pervasive myths on this site.</p>
<p>Read passages from the CollegeBoard and develop the correct thought process. You should buy the Blue Book and the Online Course. Also, if you’re short on cash and/or feel so obliged, you might consider searching Google for some extra study material PDFs (if you know what I mean).</p>
<p>read literary smut… worked for me :D</p>
<p>edit: oops i didn’t really read your question. go for economist, nytimes and scientific american.</p>
<p>@DumbAndLethal </p>
<p>Reading is a skill that you develop during your whole life time. Thus, reading anything, improves you’re reading skills, which consequently of course increases your reading score. The passages that the SAT includes ARE “random articles from third-party”. They might be edited and selected according to certain measures, but in the end, they are just normal articles that you might find in newspapers or online. So yeah, reading anything helps.</p>
<p>well, from personal experience, I say most people who are struggling with CR are those who read slowly. CR section is a place where to answer a question, someone needs to read at a fast rate with comprehension.</p>
<p>when someone get through the text once, one will definitely cross of two choices. after second reading, one can cross of 1 and after final reading of specific area, the answer become obvious. so, what to do? just read a lot. if someone practices 1 hour daily, one’s reading speed will surely increase. it will be like 400 wpm-450 wpm even with CR passages. CR passages will be a piece of cake then. there is one thing in CR “reading” reding like a monster. NYT, economist will suffice. they are very useful to get used to hard words of SAT passages…</p>
<p>I don’t read. Period.</p>
<p>And yet, I get 800 on CR the majority of the time. I don’t read the Economist or the New York Times. I read Sparknotes.</p>
<p>It’s not about reading a random article. It’s merely about honing the specific analysis skills that CollegeBoard has deemed applicable.</p>
<p>The only distinct benefits that you will get from reading the Economist is that you will increase your breadth of knowledge and you could perhaps increase your vocabulary. That being said, the knowledge you will gain won’t help you on the SAT, and you will only fortify your vocabulary if you compulsively look up words.</p>
<p>If your only goal is to become better at CR, then don’t waste your time reading any miscellaneous material you can find. You would be better served to scrounge the 40+ official tests that are lying around out there and then decipher each answer. Admittedly, I’m a bad reader. But I’m good at CR. There’s a difference.</p>
<p>I would agree that practice and vocabulary are more of a priority if you’re taking the SAT soon.</p>
<p>For the long term, however, digesting college-level passages is a great way to build some critical thinking muscle.</p>
<p>aldaily.com is a great source of SAT-level articles.</p>
<p>There is no question that reading is a skill that can be practiced. And nothing is better for than your reading ability than a life-long habit of reading, including challenging material. But if you are in 11th grade, time is now of the essence. I would not bother with the Times or the Economist. At this point, you are better off taking that same half hour and using it to read one real passage from a college-board test and then thoroughly digesting the questions and answers, untimed. And stay far away from any non-college-board practice.</p>
<p>I wrote a thread on this. I seem to be in the same situation as most of you for cr yet I raised it to a 770.<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/1507941-how-i-raised-cr-some-tips.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/1507941-how-i-raised-cr-some-tips.html</a></p>
<p>Dumbandlethal</p>
<p>That method may have worked for you but my problem relies in reading comprehension and speed. I read whole passages without understanding it. On the other hand if I really understand the passage, I rarely get any wrong. I need to be able to read large chunks of information and process it in an efficient way while answering the questions correctly.</p>
<p>To those who have tried this method of reading, can you vouch that it will help to strengthen reading comprehension skills?</p>
<p>EDIT: My problem is not answering the questions. If I understand the passage, I can answer the questions with ease.</p>
<p>I understand that. The point is that reading these magazines/newspapers won’t help you much or at all. Your time would be better spent going through all the 45+ official SATs you can find and analyzing ever answer and timing yourself. Focus on honing the thought process.</p>
<p>Remember. No one will explain those articles to you. No one will ask you questions related to the article. And therefore, no one will give you answer explanations. Contending that these articles are even mildly relevant to someone trying to prepare themselves for an upcoming SAT is a tenuous argument at best.</p>
<p>Also, I’ve read tons of posts about CR that have touched on this issue, and there is no consensus. About half the people say that it is bogus, while the other half think it’s worthwhile. What this actually indicates is that this method only works when it is in conjunction with all the other intensive study methods, not coincidentally. People that support this have placebo’d themselves into a correlation-causation fallacy.</p>
<p>Also, suppose you pick up Time magazine to read an article for practice, thinking that it’s the kind of source that the SAT sometimes gets their passages from. But how do you know whether some particular article is appropriate practice? After all, the SAT has their secret standards for what makes a good passage to include. Wouldn’t it be helpful if there were some collection of articles that had already been pre-designated as particularly SAT-relevant? Someone should make a collection of them…maybe gather them into one fat blue book…Then students could stop wasting their time on irrelevant practice.</p>