<p>I like your approach gibby but the thing is i can BARELY finish the reading/science sections with the 35 minutes given, i couldn’t imagine how horrible it would be if i had 5 minutes less. I know it’s practice but I don’t have enough practice tests to experiment with the “5 minute less” technique because no one has really given me a solid choice of which books i should buy AFTER i do all the red book tests.</p>
<p>I wish i had one of their scores, they’re awesome.</p>
<p>For reading, i think half the struggle is getting your head into the right mindset, it might seem silly, but it’s important to fool yourself into thinking that you’re thoroughly intrigued by the written piece.
For science, my friend suggested the approach of reading questions first and then going back to the data. I would practice with reading data first, and then doing questions, but for some reason, I went and followed the question first method… a risky move on my part i guess, but i got a pretty good score on the last ACTs (35)
And also, remember to not get discouraged if you felt like you did bad on the section before. For example, I thought I did bad on the math section, going into the reading section, and all I could think about was how poorly I had done. Turns out my math wasnt too bad (32) and the anxiety probably hurt me from getting a higher score on the reading section afer the math</p>
<p>gibby, that’s awesome advice: exactly what my dad used to coach me… and i got a 34. =)</p>
<p>sparknotes practice tests
a few questions a day for 6 weeks
31</p>
<p>About the reading q’s first and then going back to the passage…I found this approach discouraging. Instead, I take 2-3 minutes to read and UNDERSTAND the science passage (which I was scoring in the low 20’s) and THEN answer the q’s. This way I got a 28. Not 30, though, but better than before! You just have to find out if you are better at reading then answering or just browsing it after looking at the q’s. This also brought up my reading from 26 to 32.</p>
<p>get timing down! but not sure about the above mentioned “boot camp” approach lol.
I already took SAT in march (was not too satisfied with score), and decided to take ACT to see what I could get. All the studying I did for SAT definitely helped. Ended up with 35 composite on the real thing. ACT questions are not hard; you’re just required to work and bubble like crazy! (especially on reading and science)</p>
<p>@hudablossom, actually the most efficient way imo is the looking at questions then going back, since you can answer the ones that require very little reading then answer the questions that may require some analyzing: i got 35 in science</p>
<p>Well I messed up and got a 31 because I studied the day before, but if you want a good score just do 3 practice exams. I didn’t even know what was on the exam until the night before.</p>
<p>Gibby’s advice is golden. That practice strategy has gotten success for a lot of people I know</p>