Hello Everyone,
It’s been 3 months now that I’ve started preparing for the SAT and I’m going to be taking it in May. The CR is the section where I scored least after taking a timed practice test. My weakest area is SC and that’s because of vocabulary. Since I still have about 4 months to prepare, I wanted to know if memorizing words is the best way to improve on the CR. If so, how many word should I memorize? Is there a really good list online? I’m kind of lost between Princeton review’s list and Barron’s!
I don’t want to waste my time memorizing words that won’t show up on the SAT I’m taking. Which is the most effective list?
Any help will sure be appreciated!
Memorizing words is helpful; however its very inefficient. Search this site for xiggi’s method and you can find suggestions for improving much more effectively. Also, try Erica Meltzer’s book and/or website - The Critical Reader.
Honestly, taking practice tests is what helped raise my score. Get the Princeton Review vocab cards and study them, but my main focus would just be practicing.Really get down what they’re looking for at CB!
How does just memorizing them help?
I got an 800 cr without memorizing any words
The best way to learn SAT words is to learn roots of words and the general connotations and denotations of different words. The vocabulary portion of the test isn’t meant to be a memorization test. It’s meant to assess your ability to understand how a word can be used in different contexts.
This is especially helpful to practice when you’re faced with two word answer choices. When approaching these, cover up the second blank and just solve for the first one with feasible words that could work in the first blank. If the word doesn’t make sense in the first blank, you can quickly eliminate that choice. Good luck!
Are there any helpful lists of roots online? HastyCentaur?
That would be a waste of time. For every 1000 words you memorize, there are 1000 more. You could memorize all those words and not have any of them appear on your exam. My CR score increased by over 100 points in a day because of a few tips from one of my teachers. Imagine what you could accomplish if you spend a few weeks doing prep? Don’t waste your time.
How did you do it? hasstudent?
I honestly didn’t prep for the SAT, but I read a lot online and look up definitions of any words I don’t know as I go along. For actual reading comprehension passages, I basically skim them and get the main idea to save time to focus on the questions
My son swears he got his 800 on CR by studying Greek and Latin word roots.
Too many of my own students memorize words out of context. They can spit out one-word synonyms but really do not understand the nuances between one word and another, not to mention the contrasts and equivalencies that are set up in the Sentence Completion questions. Most of the vocabulary tested on the SAT is contextual, not isolated, and most of the CR score consists in just that: reading critically, recognizing what the words are meant to convey within the structure of specific sentences and paragraphs. It’s most important to be able to recognize connections within a passage (one word, one concept to another word/concept), and often when a student can do that, a reasonable guess at an unknown word has more chance of being accurate in the M/C options.
I did twice without memorizing any vocab words. It’s all about context and process of elimination