<p>i just read somewhere online that in the math grid in section, you don't lose .25 of a mark for each wrong question! is this true?</p>
<p>No they are not penalized. This mean that if you don’t know the answer it is just best to use an educated guess.</p>
<p>Yep, dashahman is correct. No penalization.</p>
<p>This is true. Plus its not like a multiple choice question where you have at least a 20 percent chance of getting it right. Most likely it is either you know it, or you don’t know it.</p>
<p>This is part of an article I wrote giving an overview of the math sections of the SAT. Read this to make sure that you don’t accidently mess up grid-in questions:</p>
<p>The symbols that you can grid in are the digits 0 through 9, a decimal point, and a division symbol for fractions.</p>
<p>Note that there is no negative symbol. So answers to grid-ins cannot be negative.</p>
<p>There are only four slots, so you can’t get an answer such as 52,326.</p>
<p>Sometimes there is more than one correct answer to a grid-in question. Simply choose one of them to grid-in. Never try to fit more than one answer into the grid.</p>
<p>If your answer is a whole number such as 2451 or a decimal that only requires four or less slots such as 2.36, then simply enter the number starting at any column. The two examples just written must be started in the first column, but the number 16 can be entered starting in column 1, 2 or 3.</p>
<p>There is no zero in column 1, so if your answer is 0 it must be gridded into column 2, 3 or 4.</p>
<p>Fractions can be gridded in any form as long as there are enough slots. The fraction 2/100 must be reduced to 1/50 simply because the first representation won’t fit in the grid.</p>
<p>Fractions can be converted to decimals before being gridded in.</p>
<p>If a decimal cannot fit in the grid, then you can simply truncate it to fit. To truncate is to simply remove any numbers after the four slots have been filled. But you must use every slot in this case. For example, the decimal .167777777… can be gridded as .167, but .16 or .17 would both be marked wrong.</p>
<p>Instead of truncating decimals you can also round them. For example, the decimal .167777777… can be gridded as .168.</p>
<p>I like truncating better than rounding because there is no thinking involved and you are less likely to make a careless error.</p>
<p>Never grid-in mixed numerals. If your answer is 2 ¼, and you grid in the mixed numeral 2 ¼, then this will be read as 21/4 and will be marked wrong. You must either grid in the decimal 2.25 or the improper fraction 9/4.</p>
<p>There is no guessing penalty for grid-ins, so you shouldn’t ever leave these blank.</p>
<p>The reason there is no penalty for wrong grid-in answers is that you’ll pretty much never guess it right.</p>
<p>The reason there IS a penalty for multiple choice is that they want to eliminate completely random guessing.</p>
<p>If the test were only 5 questions long (wouldn’t that be nice?), each with 5 answer choices…and you knew none of them and couldn’t eliminate any choices, then statistically, you’d guess 1 right and get 4 wrong.</p>
<p>+1 for the right answer
-1 (1/4 x 4) for the wrong answers
= 0 (cancels out)</p>
<p>Since you’re guessing out of way too many possibilities for a grid-in, they just assume you won’t guess it right, and hence, no penalty.</p>