<p>I was wondering if anyone here had any reference books, methods etc for preparing for the math section of the SAT. I've heard that of the 3, the math is known as the "easiest" because it can be "taught", and whether or not this is true is unknown to me. I have taken the test twice so far and my highest is a 610, and as i plan to apply to some demanding institutions, this seems very low at the moment. If it helps, I feel like my problem lies with cracking all of the medium difficulty questions, i usually get all the easy, half the medium, and rarely any hard ones. I am really looking for some methods or review books that have worked for anyone here, and I greatly appreciate any responses.</p>
<p>Take that test 10 more times. You just need practice to improve.
If you need a book, DON’T USE KAPLAN! get PR or blue book or something.
the key part is since all questions in all books are similar to real SAT, to start cracking them you just need to do problems and spend the same amount of time getting problems wrong as you do going over the detailed answers in the back of the book. Teach yourself what you need to do for a question you missed, then work the method over once you learn it. Other things you need to memorize like distance formula, special right triangles, special cases like (a+b)(a-b). The key is application-- knowing how to attack a problem when you see it. Trust me, do the 10 tests if you want demanding institution. </p>
<p>CR: hang in there, keep doing questions. The key is to realize what your doing wrong. Takes a little longer than math to improve, but yeah, do the problems. </p>
<p>writing: DO TEH PROBLEMS, learn from mistakes
To answer your Q’s:
1.math/writing should be easier than CR, because CR has complicated inference questions and crazy curve balls.
2.if you work at it, a relatively great score 700+ should be achievable. I don’t know about 800 though. That depends on total mastery and luck on testing day.
3.as you get more and more questions right, make sure you don’t let any easy questions slip. It feels HORRIBLE when you can get hard ones right but easy ones wrong. </p>
<p>Work hard, I’m sure good score is in reach. I don’t know of holy grails/or I’m too lazy to learn them. Which means holy grails are hard anyway.</p>
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<p>No.</p>
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<p>Also no.</p>
<p>The rest of your advice was decent.</p>
<p>Thank you both for responding to this, and I have the blue book with about ~5 tests I haven’t touched yet, so what else would be a good resource? I’ve heard good things about the McGraw Hill math books as well.</p>
<p>Also, I appreciate the holistic advice, but I really just need help exclusively with the math. my reading and writing sections are both 740, so the 610 in math is what’s really holding me down.</p>
<p>Use Gruber’s to learn the concepts and only do BB problems.</p>