<p>May i also ask, What college did you go to?</p>
<p>saadtherock96, I would recommend really approaching paired passages with a minimalist view, only underlining/focusing on the parts of the passages mentioned in the questions before diving into answering them. Try not to spend so much time on finding every detail right now, but focus on the general places in the passages that are useful for answering the questions.</p>
<p>Olaniy96, are you an International student? If so, you may be able to take the TOEFL instead because you may not have the proper background for excelling on the SAT critical reading at the moment. If not, I would recommend on redoing some old critical reading passages and focusing during the test to practice time management.</p>
<p>Needprep, I currently attend Vanderbilt University.</p>
<p>Holy crap. This method really works. I’m bumping this thread for all of those students that are taking the SAT in March. It bumped my score from a 580 to a 700. Thanks for those people that took the time to write these techniques out for our benefit. God bless you. O:-) </p>
<p>Now, my goal is to get a 800. I’m feeling excited. </p>
<p>I’m very happy that this guide helped you significantly improve your score, Hawkace! Keep on prepping and I’m sure you’ll be able to earn that 800 in Critical Reading and more! Good luck, everyone!</p>
<p>thanks very helpfull 
</p>
<p>Good luck on the March 8th SAT, all!</p>
<p>Nice to know :)</p>
<p>Hey Apoc,</p>
<p>Thanks so much for this wonderful guide. I’m currently a sophomore and my CR is around the 460 to 570 range.</p>
<p>Is it possible to get this to a 700+ by next year when I actually take it?</p>
<p>Also, on another topic, what’s your major? And what strong points in your application guaranteed your acceptance into Vanderbilt? </p>
<p>If you start preparing now with practice tests then you may be able to increase your score by 200+ points! My critical reading score was a 60 on the PSAT during my sophomore year and I was able to boost it up to 800 for the real SAT my junior year. I would also use Kaplan, Princeton Review, and other practice material along with the Official SAT Study Guide for practice tests to get an overall feel for the critical reading section in your case since you have a year to prepare. </p>
<p>I am currently majoring in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Vanderbilt. I feel that my strong points were my dedication to my math and science extracurriculars in high school, the state/national awards I was able to win, and some diversity in extracurriculars (music, volunteer work, etc.). I also feel that I worked a lot on my essays to really portray who I am in a narrative setting. I wouldn’t say these guaranteed my acceptance, but definitely strengthened my chances when I applied. If you have specific questions, you can send me a PM!</p>
<p>Good luck with preparing for the SAT! </p>
<p>Bringing this back! I was bummed when I received my Critical Reading score for a recent practice test, so I decided to look for new methods to try. I stumbled across this a few hours ago and decided to work with it. It really helped me speed up (I had 5-8 minutes left after each section, as opposed to having to leave 3-4 questions blank because of time constraints) AND, after taking another Critical Reading practice test, my score jumped 90 points!! Very excited to keep working with this method in preparation for the SATs next week - thanks @Apoc314!!! </p>
<p>@hqureshi11
Are you doing the Blue Book practice tests?
Just be mindful that the difficulty of the questions in the Blue Book is inconsistent.
Your CR score jumped 90 points might be just because it’s an easier test.</p>
<p>@StevenToCollege really? that’s unfortunate. i’ll redo with a different test tomorrow to see where I land. thanks!</p>
<p>@hqureshi11
Sorry I didn’t mean to frighten you.
But that’s exactly what happened to my son practicing with the Blue Book tests.
We didn’t realize this until I got him a tutor who started giving him the past real SAT tests to practice.</p>
<p>I believe that the Official SAT Study Guide (Blue Book) is still very helpful in practicing for critical reading and the other sections. By the nature of critical reading, the questions won’t be perfectly consistent in difficulty because you might be more familiar with certain types of questions/passages in one section versus another one. @hqureshi11, if you continue to use this method and practice hard and review what you missed and what you got right, I believe you will do great on the SAT! If you have any more questions, feel free to ask me. Good luck!</p>
<p>I think it’s close to 4 years, if not more than the original post and Apoc is still replying. Quite a testament to really considerate people like Apoc. This world is quite “dog eat dog”, but seeing this type of attitude still prevail is amazing. </p>
<p>The thread is definitely a great one and I landed on it because it showed up on the first page of Google when searching “SAT Reading” doing my regular check on different resources online. I’m glad to see that good content like this shows up next to even the College Board’s resources and it shows when you show a little care, it can go a long way (up). </p>
<p>hey apoc,</p>
<p>I currently in Australia taking the SAT, and I’m wondering if what is the best way to improve my CR. I am not very good on my practice CR with about 490 or so, as i don’t have the best vocabulary. Would it be better to just focus on the vocabulary section or keep doing CR practice tests and just look up the dictionaries of the words that i get wrong??
Thanks</p>
<p>great!!!</p>
<p>Hi joltings,</p>
<p>I think it would be better for now for you to focus on the vocabulary section of the CR right now with flash cards and other SAT vocabulary prep books if that is the hardest part of CR for you at the moment. Once you start improving your score with the vocabulary, then you can focus on the overall CR section and hopefully improve that with the techniques in this guide. Good luck!</p>
<p>How about continuing to take CR practice tests, just doing it open book with both direct hits or some other list?</p>