<p>I've asked this in the SAT section but no one has replied in a couple days.</p>
<p>I was thinking of buying it. I'm only a sophomore so I don't know if I should wait a while or start now.</p>
<p>Is this the book everyone uses? How would you rate this book? Any book better then this?</p>
<p>The</a> Official SAT Study Guide (TM)</p>
<p>I guess posting this on HSL could help others prepare =D</p>
<p>You not only “should” buy it, you NEED to buy it. Every person who wants to take the SAT must use this book before they take the SAT. It’s actually the only book you should use. Don’t listen to the advice they give you, but use it for the tests. It’s the only book out there with real, authentic SAT tests made by the actual test maker, so it’s great practice.</p>
<p>I’m a sophomore too, by the way. I bought it my freshman year, so it’s not too early for you.</p>
<p>you should def get it if u wanna prep for the SAT</p>
<p>I went through it and raised my score from a 2010 to a 2200 in a single sitting…i felt comfortable when i took the SAT again because I was so familiar with the questions since the blue book is the closest thing to the SAT there is…I felt I could have done better (prob around 2270) but I thought about the questions a bit too much and made a few silly errors lol…anyway, definitely get it</p>
<p>about when to start…if you’ve finished algebra II and you’re good at it, you’re ready for math, idk how sharp your reading skills are…I would wait until toward the end of junior year to take it and then retake it beginning of senior year if you have to…</p>
<p>Did this help anyone else a lot? I’m about to order it and I’d be studying for about a year until i take my first SAT test.</p>
<p>The Blue Book should be more or less standard issue for SAT studying. The actual study material is terrible, but everyone uses it for the practice tests anyway so there’s no problem. You should buy another book to complement it, though.</p>
<p>It helped me a lot. But I personally found the Red Book (10 real SATs) to be more helpful. </p>
<p>Like AeroEngineer said, the study material’s pretty bad… but the tests are amazing.</p>
<p>The advice is useless. But it’s the only book you should use for practice tests (except perhaps 10RS) because it’s the only book that was made by the same people who make the test. Therefore they were created using the same guidelines as the real questions, and if you can beat those questions you can beat the real ones.</p>
<p>I’m already getting collegeboard’s official guide but like you guys said, it doesn’t give any explanations.</p>
<p>I need another book to go along with collegeboard’s one.</p>
<p>Kaplan, Barons, etc…</p>
<p>^Princeton Review is probably your second-best bet.</p>
<p>I’ve heard one book is best for CR another for M, and Writing you can find good tips online, true?</p>
<p>Gruber’s (sp?) is the best for math.</p>
<p>I would say Mystery Tutor(the website but it has shut down now), because I only used his advice + the blue book and raised my score tremendously. But, personally I don’t think it’s worth it to get any book at all.
Just practice a lot and find patterns with questions/answers because that’s a lot more useful than useless advice in some of those books like Kaplan, Princeton Review, Barron’s, etc.</p>
<p>First of all, I agree with everyone: if you want to do well on the SAT, you have to get this book.</p>
<p>However, I disagree with the fact that the parts other than the tests are useless. While they may be obvious or simple, and in some cases something you learned 5 years ago, still if you wanna do really well on the SAT, you have to read the whole thing. The reason for this is that all of the questions come from what they “teach” you. While taking the SAT, I sometimes recognized almost exactly the same questions from the book, the same vocabulary for sure, the same formats, etc. Read the advice and I guarantee you’ll do better. For example, while some of the writing section stuff seems obvious just because you speak english and it seems easy, they always try to “trick you” with the same stuff. For example, there is always dangling modifier things, and such. To do well on the SAT, you need to take as many tests from the actual test maker as you possibly can. Buy the online course, get the blue book, etc.</p>
<p>Like any other skill, one’s performance on standardized tests is generally improved through practice. In my opinion, the best way to prepare for these tests, other than by being a good student in general, is to go through practice tests on your own time. You do not need to time yourself, use non-mechanical pencils, and print off a replica answer sheet if you do not want to go to the trouble (I didn’t), just so long as you are familiar with the environment for these tests in general and know what you are getting into (e.g. from taking the PSAT, PLAN, etc.). As such, get the book that has the most practice tests. Personally, I just checked one out from the local library for about a month prior to the last time I took the SAT – you don’t even have to buy it yourself if you don’t want to.</p>
<p>I also recommend taking the ACT and possibly the SAT for practice sometime before junior year (if you have gotten through trigonometry by then, anyway), after reading through a practice test to familiarize yourself with the basics. Taking them early will make you more comfortable with the tests when the time comes to take them “for real,” and if you do really well this time, you’ll have less pressure later. I recommend this for the ACT more than the SAT, though, because ACT (the company) does not force you to send all of your scores, whereas the College Board does. As such, if you totally bomb it the first time, nobody has to know (just make sure the score from this first time doesn’t get stuck on your official high school transcript – omit your high school from the registration form or something if you have to and then show the counseling office your official score report afterward if it turned out well). Since the two tests are fairly similar, starting with just the ACT at first should be alright. Once you have some actual results to work with, take practice tests in the subjects that you particularly want to improve. On a sidenote, if your school has an AP U.S. History course, your writing score will likely improve after taking it.</p>
<p>Anyway, I don’t know how well the above applies to everyone, but it worked for me.</p>