<p>I just started practicing for ACT. The free tests are in march and April. I bought a book and I took my first practice test and I scored a awfully embarrassing low 21. I don't really want to get personal but freshman and sophomore year I did bad I have a GPA of 2.8 right now. I'm almost done with my first semester of junior year and I have a 3.1 GPA so far. Still not the best but I'm doing a lot better then I have ever done. So I really need a ACT of 31 or higher. It's very important for me because I really want to get into a good school. My dream university of Northwestern isn't going to happen. So Hopefully I can get in U of I. But even for that I don't have a high enough GPA. So do you think it is possible to raise my GPA to 3.4 or 3.5 by the end of my senior year? And for the actually question do you think I can raise my ACT by 10 points. I willing to study everyday for 4 hours straight I have been for about 4 days now. I take an ACT in 2 weeks. It's more of a get used to the environment of the ACT more than a I must get a 36 ACT If that makes sense.</p>
<p>English:20
Math:22
Reading:18
Science:23</p>
<p>On the Math, Reading, and Science I ran out of time by the end and guessed on like the last 5 problems. I'm Really bad at reading and English because I get distracted easily and have to read it twice which waste's time. So any tips? And Can I get a 31 or higher in 3-4 months?</p>
<p>Correciton My current GPA(for the year not the average of all my years) is 3.6 not 3.2. My Actualy GPA right now which is the average of 9th and 10th grade is 2.8 and this year so far I have a 3.6 GPA so I improved quite a bit.</p>
<p>Well I’d have to say it’s going to take a lot of work, but its completely doable. In my opinion the ACT is more about the pacing that the actual difficulty of the problems, though everyone is different and it may be different for you. While its good to get used to taking the ACT and sitting through the four hours of testing, I wouldn’t recommend just constantly taking tests. Try to take a test once or twice a week and in between focus on one or two sections at a time. If you’re not very confident about a section its easier to lose focus than if you actually knew what you were doing. I think the Math and English parts would be easier to improve since they are mostly based on set rules that you just need to know. What do you usually do when you get to the reading part? Sometimes it depends on how you are going at it. Also, are you taking the ACT plus writing? I would definitely recommend doing that.</p>
<p>From my experience, that’s what works best for me. To help you focus, you could try placing your pencil underneath the line that you’re reading. I had the same problem as you and I found that I was able to focus better when i was pointing to it. It also helped my reading speed so maybe that will help too…</p>
<p>Good for you for getting started now—time is on your side. @unikorny has given you excellent advice. Take the test twice a week, and then work on sections. Do you have a choice of taking SAT/ACT? Some students find one easier than the other; the test styles are different.</p>
<p>If you don’t find your score going steadily up with practice, then consider finding a friend or professional tutor to help you with test-taking techniques specific to ACT. In my town there are test prep companies, and you can pay by the hour if that works best. My daughter was able to practice with a book, but benefited from the test-taking techniques she had learned the year before in a PSAT prep course. She is a slow reader, but managed to raise her score a couple points in one month (she took it last year in April, then in May). </p>
<p>Thank’s a lot. How many hours should I study per day for the upcoming ACT and how many hours do you think I should study after that test to get ready for the March ACT?</p>
<p>So I took my second ACT Test. I thought I bombed the Science part. I knew probably 1 out of every 10 questions but some home that manged to be my best score lol. Reading is still my worst and time on reading and mathematics was better but I still didn’t finish on time.I finished Science on time and English on-time</p>
<p>ACT: 24.75</p>
<p>English:22
Math:27
Reading:23
Science:27</p>
<p>I really need to improve my English and reading. I knew those would be my worst subjects and I wasn’t wrong.</p>
<p>I did pretty well on the ACT (35). I’ll tell you what worked for me:</p>
<p>English: Grammar was never my strong suit; I also made a lot of mistakes in the beginning. What I did to improve my score was to keep doing practice questions and analyzing every single mistake. I would document the mistake in a word file and then write a paragraph explanation as to why I got this wrong. Eventually you start seeing many patterns and realize that questions are not all that different. I recommend you also read up the important grammar rules as well.</p>
<p>Math: Practice, practice, practice. Read the Barron’s Math and Science book. It’s very useful in regards to math. </p>
<p>Reading: I read the passage first, and then answer the questions. One problem I found was that I sometimes let my own opinions influence my answers. Don’t do that. Always find your answers in the passage. Look only at the passage. </p>
<p>Science: It’s mostly just graph analysis. Once again, I stress that you take more practice tests to analyze your mistakes.</p>
<p>The best way to improve your score is to analyze your mistakes and see what you could do better next time. If possible, I recommend doing: </p>
<p>50 English Question
30 Math Questions
20 Reading Questions
20 Science questions</p>
<p>per day so that you can get a lot of practice.</p>
<p>I agree with @drcharisma. Just practicing is not going to help. A lot of times if you actually analyze your mistakes you’ll realize that you are missing about the same things. Once you get the hang of it or get comfortable with it, it’s a lot easier to see the mistakes (in the English portion) and how to solve the problem (in the Math portion). I actually took the SAT first and did a summer boot camp. I didn’t do as well as I wanted to so I decided to take the ACT and I ended up scoring much better relative to the SAT. The things I learned at the boot camp, however, definitely helped me in my preparation for the ACT because I learned the grammar rules, math patterns, and how to do the critical reading part, but that was mostly because of constant practice and analysis of my mistakes rather than the actual teachers at the boot camp (no offense to them).</p>
<p>Just a footnote: the ACT rounds to the nearest whole number.</p>
<p>Ya After my tests I go back and I see what I got wrong and read the explanations and stuff. It helped me a lot the second time I took the test. Science one I came in confident but I try reading extremely fast so I basically skim but I still don’t finish in time. Same with the reading portion. I read at a very fast rate I even skip paragraphs that I think are unimportant. Yet I still don’t finish in time.</p>
<p>Also i’m still a bit confused on when to use commas, semi-colons, and colons.That most of my questions wrong on the English portion. I’ve learned that most of the time the shorter answer is better and not to choose answers that sound like they are repeating the same word twice </p>
<p>I think pace-wise what would help you the most is just doing more of it. But don’t overdo it because it would just be overkill. Its good to read fast but the point is to read the passage fast and understand it at the same time so you don’t have to constantly go back and forth in the passage which would just take a lot of time.</p>
<p>As for commas, semi-colons and colons, do ACT practice specifically geared towards those errors so that you get the hang of recognizing them.</p>
<p>For books, the best one would be the official ACT prep book, but that’s just my personal opinion. It doesn’t have everything, but it’s definitely the most helpful.</p>
<p>@FootballndSchool
Buy Barron’s ACT 36. It has key easy to understand points. Before I read it, my practice english score was a 27. After reading it I’ve scored numerous 36s and have never dropped below a 34. Combine it with practice and you should be good for English. </p>
<p>I definitely think you can do it. You seem very motivated and determined. People raise their ACT by a couple points each time they take the test (usually), so I would study for about 2 hours every day and schedule a practice test for yourself every other weekend. They have free online practice ACT and SAT’s on Princeton Review’s website. Also, I found this awesome website called Grockit that has helped me tremendously. They find your strengths and weaknesses and create your own study plan based on that. I would definitely check that out if I were you. Just remember, you can do anything that you set your mind to. You’ve got this.</p>
<p>Yes! I am also currently studying for the ACT, My first practice was a 29.75. I recommend using youtube(yes youtube) as a source, there are a lot of helpful videos there, and try to take a practice test every 1-2 weeks to see what you need to improve on. I havent bought any books yet and ive learned a lot from online sources. Also use flash cards to quiz your self; for example; any math formulas you dont know, or comma/semi colon rules. Try not to overkill your study time because eventually you might dread it(believe me). I hope we can both accomplish our goals by April. Good luck! Dont give up.</p>