how to ace Critical Reading section of the SAT?

Test Preparation
1

<p>How do you ace the critical reading section?</p>

<p>I'm so horrible, that even 500 SAT on Critical Reading, is acing for me.</p>

<p>550, is A++ for me. That's how low my score is right now.
So far, I've memorized 2700 + words, and I've taken tons of real SAT tests, and I'm not improving at all. Is there a book or anything that can help me comprehend the passages well, and get the answers right?</p>

<p>I sometimes feel confident on CR, and I get all the questions wrong....
EXCEPT the first 5-7 questions, that ask for vocabulary words, obviously, because I memorized too many words.</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

2

<p>Have you read silverturtle’s guide to the SAT? I did so and got a 730 on my CR section and I had never broken 700 on the PSATs/practices. </p>

<p>One of the things that I did was skim the questions looking for anything that indicated specific lines of text (ie. “Lines 34-36”) and then I’d go into the passage and mark those lines. Then, when I read I knew to pay more attention to those parts because there would be questions that referred to them. Of course, you have to do the skimming/marking pretty quickly, but I thought it really helped me. I’m hoping for a 750+ when I retake.</p>

3

<p>For some reason, Critical Reading has always been my strongest subject, even though in school I’m a science and math nerd. At any rate, the best advice I can give is:

  1. Study that vocab! The Princeton Review’s Cracking the SAT has a “Hit Parade” that includes all the most commonly used words. (I’m pretty sure every vocab word on my March SAT came from this list)
  2. College Board firmly believes in what they call the “finger rule”. This applies to both SAT and AP. If you can’t put your finger on the answer in the passage, that’s not the answer. The answer to every comprehension question is in the passage if you take the time to look (that being said, you want to make sure you’re pacing yourself so that you can finish the section).</p>

<p>If you follow these two pearls of wisdom, I think you can get the majority of the CR taken care of. There are still those tricky tone questions, but do the best you can on those and you should be fine. </p>

<p>I hope this advice was good. To tell the truth, it’s always been the Writing that I’ve had to focus more on, so I’ve never given a lot of thought to how exactly I managed my 780 on the CR.</p>