Since school is starting back soon and DD won’t have as much time to prep, I am thinking of having her stop the guided program and just go through the 4 practice tests.
Does anyone know if the questions on the guided prep are the same as the questions on the practice tests? If so, it probably won’t matter much which approach she takes. Thanks.
I certainly hope they are different! How far into into the Khan program has she gotten? Can she do both while she still has the time? How do you plan on using the practice tests? Section by section or timed all at once like the actual test?
My boys say they are almost finished with the guided practice. They’ve been doing about a half hour a day when not away at camp. Their goal is to be done by next Wednesday we’ll see if they make it:-) Wednesday they start a PSAT prep class which they probably don’t need but are taking to humor me. As part of the class they will be taking the one released PSAT practice test in a timed, proctored, testing environment. I’m saving the SAT practice test for later, maybe winter break? We don’t plan to do much test prep during the school year but I’m sure ds can carve out enough time to do four practice tests by March.
I am not sure how far she is, is there a progress bar or something? She has been doing it off and on this summer.
If she switches to practice tests, it would not be timed. She would do a section then go over the answers with DH and I available to help.
She takes the test this October, so we don’t have as much time as your boys.
Kaplan and PR are offering prep sessions for the October PSAT, but they are pricey and she is pretty busy with school, sports, and ECs so we’d rather not. Especially since most people here on CC say going through the practice tests is a more effective strategy.
I wish Khan had a progress bar! We keep track by how many sections they have completed. Math has 42 sections with 5 questions each and Reading and Writing has 7 sections with 11 questions each.
The College Board has released one practice PSAT perhaps you could use that as timed test after you go through the 4 practice SAT tests just to get a feel for the timing of the test?
Thanks. The information about the number of questions and sections is helpful. Although, the program is supposed to adapt to each student. So, I imagine that means that some students will have to do every section and some won’t. Also, some students will need to repeat sections until they master them.
Of course the amount of time will vary will from student to student. When you log into the account there is a little blue four section arch to the left of each section, when the arch is complete the student has completed that section. If a student does well on that section on the diagnostic quiz then it will automatically fill in the arch sections for the skills that the student has mastered so yes the program adapts to each student and it’s not the same amount of time/work involved for all. I wish there was a real progress bar that you could look at all at once that gave detailed information for each section like the pie charts on Aleks.com 's math program but the way they have it set up you just have to scrolled down through all through all the sections.
My point is, since you have limited time, it might be best to see where your D is on Khan and go from there. I’d make sure she’s at least taken all the quizzes that way you can see the areas that she’s mastered and which areas she needs to work on. When people made the the recommendation to go through practice tests and make sure you understand why you got a question right or wrong Khan’s new SAT prep didn’t exist. The Khan program does this for you, it actually explains why each of the multiple choice questions is right or wrong. It’s very possible that the student is skipping this and not reading it but the explanation is there. You also know your D best, some kids work great on their own and others really need more parental involvement just like some kids do better in a test prep class and others just need a book from the library.
If I were in your situation, if my kids where 3/4 of the way through Khan I’d have them finish it and then do timed practice tests and then go over the questions. If my kids had been working on Khan for almost almost two months and weren’t more than half way done then I’d say it wasn’t working for them and take a different route.
Thanks for pointing out the arches. It doesn’t seem quite as endless now. She should be able to finish up the arches and the 4 practices tests by October.
@nw2this I’m so glad your d will be able to complete both the guided practice and the practice tests I’m sure she will be ahead of many of her peers. I predict many in the class of 2017 won’t have had the forethought to prep in the summer. I have a friend with a S17 and she said their GC never said anything about the new PSAT or Khan prep. I’m guessing there are many kids who won’t find out about this until the Fall. I hope Khan’s servers are up for all those kids trying to log on in September!