How do you time yourself on the ACT?

Test Preparation ACT Preparation
1

<p>Timing is a big issue for me on this test.
I take all honors and AP courses yet I cannot get past a 24 (E-26, M-26, R-24, S-21) on this test; I desperately want a 28 (preferably a 29 or 30) </p>

<p>The highest any of my subject scores have gone to is a 26.
I run out of time on every section-except sometimes English. On math, I struggle to answer the last 5-10 questions. Reading- I cannot get to 1 or 2 of the passages. And science is horrible..I have not scored above a 21 on that section and I think I have to guess on nearly half of the questions maybe.</p>

<p>So could you please help..what's your strategy to finish on time? How can I improve my score? Do you think I can reach my goal of getting at least a 28 by the Feb. 12 test? It's in just a little over a month. I have the Red Book and the PR Crash Course; also I read through the entire Cracking the ACT Princeton Review last October; I can borrow the Barrons from my school if I need to.</p>

2

<p>Sorry but your school must just be REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY easy.</p>

3

<p>Trust me its not, it’s a pretty competitive HS</p>

4

<p>Can you guys please share your timing strategies?</p>

5

<p>Quite honestly, practicing is your best bet to improve your timing issues. Try to stay focused on working quickly and reference the clock periodically.</p>

<p>I think a jump to a 28 is very plausible if you work at it.</p>

6

<p>Thank you so much!</p>

7

<p>I always bring a watch and time myself throughout every section of the test. You don’t need to do this, but keep this data in mind. On the English section, you have 45 minutes to do 75 problems. The questions are separated into 5 passages of 15 questions each. This means that in order to complete the test, you have an average of 9 minutes to do a single passage. If you find yourself at question 13 when you’re 9 minutes into it, then you need to work faster.</p>

<p>The math section is simply to time yourself on. You have 60 questions to do in 60 minutes; this means that you have one minute per question. The questions are arranged in order of difficulty, so try to do the first 35 or so questions in 30-40 seconds each and give yourself extra time to do the final third of the test.</p>

<p>The reading section will kill you for time. It is 40 questions to do in 35 minutes. You have less than a minute to do each question. The test is categorized into four sections, always in the same order: prose fiction, social science, humanities, science. Each section has 10 questions. I try to give me self 35/4 (8:45) minutes to do each section of the test. Depending on how fast of a reader you are, make sure that each passage is somewhere around this time frame. I give myself 4 minutes to read and mark the passage, and then the remainder of the time to answer questions. This is entirely adjustable according to your reading speed. I do the reading section in this order: science, prose fiction, social science, humanities - as those are in order of my strengths. </p>

<p>The science test is categorized into seven sections. You have 40 questions to do in 35 minutes. This test is likely to have a great time limitation as well. There’s not much to say for a universal template for the science section, except to work efficiently and leave the conflicting viewpoints passage for last. Also, don’t get caught up in the unnecessary jargon of the test, for this reason many people recommend to not even read the passages but rather to go straight to the questions. If this works for you, then by all means do it. Also, note that each passage will have a different number of questions associated with it. This makes it hard to time yourself on. Also note that you’re free to skip around, just make sure that you mark appropriately on the answer sheet! I do the passages that look like they pertain to physics first, then chemistry, then biology. (A quick glance of course! I shouldn’t take you more than 15-30 seconds to flip pages/skip passages and save them for later.)</p>

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<p>Remember that your goal (right now) is to get as high of a score as possible, not a perfect score. If you know that a question will take you a long time (longer than the suggested time frame from above) then skip it. For example, if you’re on a reading passage and it asks you to identify who of the following did not contribute to whatever cause the chapter was about, and you don’t remember or you didn’t mark it in the passage, then skip it. You’ll lose one question, but you’ll be able to move on to the next, which you might know. (Note to always guess, as there is no penalty for wrong answers. Also, don’t come back to previous passages. Once you’ve finished the prose fiction passage, even if you left one question blank, you’re done with the passage. Guess on it then move on.)</p>

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<p>What are your subscores? The English mechanical section is, in my opinion, the easiest to improve on. You can easily go from a low score to a high score (most people could achieve a 16) by simply reading through the mechanical section a few times in a preparation book. The rhetorical subsection requires a bit more practice tests to master, but it is equally improvable. </p>

<p>Math has a lot to it, but just remember that the questions are generally in order of difficulty. Do the first questions quickly and don’t check your answers unless you finish the test early. (They’re normally easy enough to assume that you got them right.) Also, educated guesses are your friend. If you don’t know the answer, take the most feasible answer. Check your subscores and then work on whatever your lowest score the most. It is easier to improve by bringing up your lowest score than it is to improve by working on your best category. </p>

<p>Reading is quite hard to improve on. You need to do practice tests until you can get the timing down. Just remember to forsake a question and guess than stay on it forever.</p>

<p>Science should be improved by practice tests. I would also recommend to skip an entire section (and save it for last) if you don’t know what the first question is. Normally, the first question is a general overview question. </p>

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<p>You can definitely improve from a 24-28 in a month, so long as you put enough time and effort into it.</p>

8

<p>Oregon Senior–
Thank you so much, that is really helpful! Here are my subscores: English-26, Math-26, Reading-24, Science-21
Also what book do you recommend using other than the Red Book, Barrons or PR(if PR which one-cracking the ACT or crash course?) ?</p>

9

<p>Alright, you look in good shape for improvement. I remember being where you are now. If you put in enough time and effort, you can be guaranteed improvement - far beyond going from a 24 to a 28 if you’re dedicated enough. What grade are you in? </p>

<p>English: Make sure that you go over the grammatical section in whatever practice book that you use multiple times. This alone can boost your English score to about a 28-30. If you can improve to an 18/18 on grammatical, which is definitely inside the parameters of feasibility, then your score should jump by several points already. Grammar is extremely easy to improve on, especially for the ACT questions. (I only say this because I was able to improve dramatically on the mechanical section of the English test in about 2 weeks.) For the rhetoric, do many practice tests. Eventually, you’ll learn what ACT is “looking for” in each of their questions. </p>

<p>Math: This one is unlike English, because you can’t possibly cover everything that the ACT would test you on in a month. Odds are, you’ll spend a minimum of one week solely on the English test, so you need to see where your weak points on math are and then work on those first. If you have time, work on other things.</p>

<p>Reading: Go to your library and rent “A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens. This is, in my opinion, the best novel for practicing reading comprehension. Read a single chapter at a time, more if you desire as they are quite short. Read at least one chapter a day, and try to understand as much as you can. Don’t let your mind wander while reading, and try to gather every bit of information as you can. This is only part of it though, you’ll need to do passage based reading on actual practice tests as well!</p>

<p>Science: This one is fairly tough, I recommend to do a bunch of exercises in your practice books. Try to get in at least 7 practice science tests, and if necessary, do the first one or two without a time limit. (Make sure that you always do the practice tests near the actual ACT within proper time restrictions!) The more sections you do, the faster you’ll become and the more you’ll get right. Obviously, you should review every question, especially on the science section (regardless of whether you got it right or not. It takes a while, but it’s worth it to do this on your lowest scoring area.)</p>

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<p>Here are the books that I bought/borrowed when I was prepping for the ACT: Barron’s, Barron’s 36, Sparknote’s guide to English and Reading, Princeton Review’s 1,296 questions, and the Red Book. I personally did most of the review in Barron’s, and found that Barron’s 36 wasn’t too much different than the actual one. Sparknote’s guide wasn’t terribly helpful, but it was good for the English section. (I did both Barron’s and Sparknote’s for the English section; Barron’s has wacky questions that will never appear on the ACT, but I wanted to learn whatever I could about grammar, as that was my weakest area anyways.) I used PR for the practice tests, they were extremely helpful and are close to the difficulty of the actual ACT. I recommend the last three practice tests that you do to be the three ones in the Red Book, as those are previously administered tests. I haven’t used Cracking the ACT or Crash Course, only the 1,296 questions. </p>

<p>Good luck, and study hard!</p>

10

<p>Thank you so much!</p>

<p>I am a senior, and I’m pretty sure this will be the last time I can take the test, so I’m going to study as much as I possibly can for this one. I need a good score to send to colleges for my application.</p>

11

<p>The best way to keep track of time is not to look at the clock at all. Checking time is a waste of time and makes you more fidgety than you should be. This doesn’t mean that you should just disregard it totally though if you know your out of your normal cycle (from prior testing). If you’re spending the right amount of time on everything, you should feel naturally confident and certain about your answers.</p>

12

<p>Thanks…now that I think about it I do tend to look at the clock every 5 minutes-i guess that’s not a good thing. I guess practicing will help speed me up and manage time better</p>

13

<p>Oregon Senior-which section do you recommend I start with…and in which order should I study them? Right now I’m just jumping all over the place, mainly in English and Math.</p>

14

<p>bump…</p>

15

<p>I studied in this order: English, reading, science, then math. I studied math last because that was my most comfortable area to begin with. </p>

<p>I recommend studying English first, as that’s the section that’s easiest to improve on. If you read through the English section of a practice book a few times and also do a few English practice tests, you should be set for English. (I read through Barron’s book several times and Sparknote’s English section several times. My score improved from a 12 on grammar to an 18. Rhetoric is hard to improve on without doing practice tests. It’s mainly logic and adhering to ACT’s desires.) </p>

<p>Reading is hard to study, I only improved 1 point since studying (albeit, I could have studied reading more). I did score consistently higher on all of my practice tests than I did on the actual ACT though. I recommend that you just buy a challenging book (I.E. A Tale of Two Cities) and read a few chapters a night; do it quickly and try to retain as much information as possible. Then, do several practice tests and make sure that you consistently finish within the time frame. Also, learn through practice tests what to underline in passages. </p>

<p>I’m not sure if there’s even a way to improve the science section besides by doing practice tests. You could try to study the information, but that’s absurd and will hardly prove useful. The best approach to improving in the science section is by doing many, many practice tests. (Especially since it’s your lowest subject.) While doing the practice test, don’t time yourself on the first few. You want to focus on how to answer the questions properly while practicing. Learn what different questions are asking, become more familiar with the strange graphs, identify what the meaningless jargon is, and become more familiar with the logic that some questions require. </p>

<p>Math: Math is very hard to study, not because the content is difficult- it is actually fairly easy- but rather because there’s so much that the ACT can pick from to put on the test. You can expect ANYTHING from a geometry, algebra I or II, or trigonometry class to be on the test. For this reason, and also because I was already comfortable in the math section, I studied it last. Here’s how I approached it: look at your subscores (algebra, coordinate geometry, geometry/trig) and see what’s currently the lowest. Start there. Go through the practice book and try to find anything that you don’t know or aren’t sure of and then do it. The most important thing is the fundamentals; when you’re taking practice tests, never try to “plug it in” to find the answer. By all means, you can do this on the actual ACT, but not while practicing. Doing things the algebraic way will help tremendously. </p>

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<p>I got my scores back on the fourth, a day after my last post on this thread. My English score improved from a 25-28-31 (I took the test three times in total, but only studied the month prior to the latest one.) My math improved from a 28-29-32. My reading went from a 28-26-29. My science went from a 30-26*-36. My composite went from a 27.75-27.25-32.00. It’s definitely possible to improve substantially if you put enough time into it.</p>

<p>*somehow my score went from a 30 to a 26 to a 36. Here’s the reason: while I was still fairly ignorant to the test format, I got stuck on the conflicting viewpoints passage (which was the first passage on the test). It was regarding conflicting opinions about dominant vs. recessive traits throughout three generations. Biology is definitely my weakest subject in science, so I took far longer than I should have on that passage and ended up guessing on the last two sections or so. Had I learned the simply strategy of skipping the conflicting viewpoints for last/skipping the passage if you don’t know the first question, I’m sure that I’d have done much better.</p>

16

<p>Thanks for the advice! And congratulations on that score-its really good!!</p>