<p>Currently i have 570 for math, 580 for writing (10 essay), 490 critical reading.
I was wondering how i could raise that up in a month (I'm taking the Jan. test)</p>
<p>Is it helpful to take a test everyday (blue book)?
Is it not really helpful to study if i want my score to drastically improve from 1620 to 1800?
How severely do i have to study? Is there a way to raise my CR score?? If so, how (according to your experience)?</p>
<p>Thanks.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Do not take a test everyday. You will quick tire yourself out. Even though it’s winter break right now, 4 hours of testing every day will bore you. If your goal is to raise your goal by January, take an SAT every three days or so.
Day 1 - Test (but do not correct answers)
Day 2 - Change any answers you think you might’ve gotten wrong, then grade your test
Day 3 - Review your mistakes and read sections of a prep book relating to the errors you made.</p></li>
<li><p>Studying does wonders, but a crash course the week before won’t. It’s great that you’ve decided to study, but the clock is ticking.</p></li>
<li><p>Don’t study longer than you would per day than you would for a test in any other subject. ~1-2 hours (except on test day) is the time when most people get the most out of studying.</p></li>
<li><p>CR is best raised through practice by reading through practice test passages and finding the patterns of responses the test makers want. However, if you’re struggling with Vocab, Direct Hits memorization and reading complex literature is your best bet. If you’re REALLY looking to get into CR, I hesitantly recommend practice AP English MC tests.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>For math I suggest getting Gruber’s SAT study guide or the Gruber’s Math Workbook. It is a wonderful tool for you if you are getting lower than a 600 on math. If you studied well and begin to consistently score above a 650-700 on your practice tests, then it would be time to move on to Dr. Chung’s, but for now stick with Gruber’s. </p>
<p>Also, like thesmiter, I also do not recommend taking a test everyday. However, I’ve been taught by an exceptionally gifted SAT math tutor, who’s also a tutor in calculus, physics, chemisty, and statistics, that if you take one section of the SAT math portion every other night, your grade will improve dramatically. Why? Because a large portion of solving the SAT math is understanding what the question is asking. By taking a section everyother night, you will be more comfortable to the structure of the SAT math questions and you will also gain knowledge on how to solve example type problems. </p>
<p>For CR, I also suggest you reading some classical books. Others recommend you reading anything you want (comics, fictional, etc) and I agree with that too. However, if you focus on reading the classics or any other difficult books, you would be most effectively preparing yourself for the CR section. Reading difficult books is the expedient to improving your grade 
When you read difficult books, and you annotate (yes the dreaded word; but annotate only the summaries of each chapter and any vocab you don’t know). When you do so, you will be conditioning your brain to deal with complex and difficult passages such as given by the SAT test and you will be able to most effectively process the information from the process to answer the passage based questions. I did this and it improved my CR score by almost 100 points. </p>
<p>And yes it is very helpful for you to study to improve your grade by 200 points. I’ve discovered that on CC, on average, it takes an average person about 1 month to raise his or her score by a 100 or so points. For me, I improved my score by 400-500 points in 3 months so it’s about the same. Also, try annotating on the passages given on the SAT. Take several practice tests and annotate it (circling difficult words, summarizing a paragraph, or answering the who, what, where, when, how questions, etc). Try this for like 3-5 tests and if your score hasn’t improved BY THEN, then stop. But don’t let your first test bum you down or give you false hope so continue to annotate. Finish the entire passage before answering the questions.
There are 3 methods to answering passage based questions. The first one (slow poke method) is what I explained and which I am most accustomed to. The second one is the QPQ question: Question, Passage, Question (basically you skip the passage, read the question first, find the answer in the passage, and answer the question). This is the fastest way but reserved for only those who can quickly process in depth the message of the passage just by skimming. Then there’s the final method, which I forgot its name, but basically you read a paragraph, answer the questions pertaining to that paragraph, and move on. There are more methods than this but I forgot them heh-heh.</p>
<p>Summary:
Math: Gruber’s (take a section every other day, correct, and review until you know it by heart) Then every other week take all 3 math sections at one time. Grade the next day and review the following.</p>
<p>CR: Annotate difficult books (literary, historical, scientific) for difficult vocab (and try using the words several times a day to stick it into your brain) and quickly summarize what the chapter was about. You don’t really need to work on your essay but if you want to improve that, post that on the CC and ask for advice on how to raise your score)</p>
<p>Writing: Learn grammar tips. I learned the grammar tips from Elite SAT prep academy. Very helpful teacher. His teaching allowed me to reduce my writing mistakes from like 6 to 2 (usually those 2 mistakes are easy or medium questions… so stupid)</p>