Low SAT Math - how to overcome/address it

Test Preparation
1

<p>Hi, I am posting on behalf of my DS who is a junior this year. Long story short, he had to overcome a lot of developmental delays and intellectual hurdles in younger years to get where he is today, which is near the top of his HS class. He has a 4.0 average, is a gifted musician, and is involved with plenty of ECs and volunteer work. He works really hard, takes extra classes outside of school to supplement his curriculum, and wants to go to a competitive LAC - first choice right now is Oberlin. </p>

<p>The problem is standardized test scores in math. I think he may have some sort of residual learning disability such as dyscalculia that is holding him back. He hasn't taken SAT or ACT yet, but has been prepping both with Kaplan and a private tutor for months now. He took the PSAT in 10th grade and his math store was an abysmal 43. One year later, he has taken several PSAT practice tests, getting ready to take the PSAT next month, and his math score hasn't BUDGED - it is still a 43. His verbal scores in the meantime, keep rising higher and higher, close to 70 on each. He works and works on the math over an hour every single day on top of his other work, and thinks he is understanding it and improving, and that 43 keeps showing up.</p>

<p>He goes to a mediocre high school, taking as many honors and AP classes as he can (AP extremely limited in his school, only 4 classes). He is in honors Algebra II right now, got high A's in Honors Geometry and Algebra I. Part of the problem is the teachers are so awful that they don't cover everything - for example they never even got to circles in Honors Geometry. But I think he has a real problem with math.</p>

<p>I thought about getting him tested and seeing about extra time on the tests, but (a) I have been told it may be too late since it would be a first diagnosis on this and he hasn't sought special accommodations in school. He gets great grades, but this is more a reflection of his school's truly awful math department. And (b) I am not sure the extra time would even help him.</p>

<p>So I don't know what to do. Any advice? I just don't think his math skills are going to improve much between now and next spring. Hopefully eventually they will budge upward but they will be hugely disproportionate from his Verbal test scores and other academic stats.</p>

<p>Should he address this on his application? Should he discuss it with admissions reps at the schools he is interested in? What can he say without sounding like he is making excuses? He has no interest in studying math, and many of the schools he is applying to have broad definitions of what distributive requirements satisfy the math-like areas such as analytical reasoning.</p>

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<p>Yes you should address it on your application and discuss it with your admission reps. You can’t really make it sound “not like and excuse” because it is an excuse.</p>

<p>His math score won’t just improve by waiting and doing nothing.</p>

<p>Math is widely considered the easiest part of the SAT to improve. The SAT tests a very limited amount of math concepts. All he has to do is absorb all those concepts so he doesn’t “not know” how to do a problem. After that, he should simply practice and try to speed up his approach to level 4/5 problems. If he can do that, then he will have time to check over his answers for careless mistakes. </p>

<p>Though it sounds pretty simple, he will still need to motivated/dedicated to do well. To get into top colleges one has to be “interested” in everything. He can’t just “neglect” math. Doing so will come back to bite him.</p>

<p>Have him go though the Blue Book/McGruber maths sections to start off. After that, if he is shooting for an 800, have him go through Dr. Chung’s SAT Math.</p>

<p>Good Luck!</p>

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<p>Thanks, but it’s not that simple. Maybe I didn’t explain it. It appears to be a learning disability. He can’t just study it and learn it - he’s been doing that for a year, studying, being tutored, taking test after test. He’s trying his hardest. There is something preventing him from “getting” it. In fact he thinks he is getting it, then the tests prove otherwise. He’s not shooting for an 800, he’s shooting for 600 but it might not be achievable using the usual methods.</p>

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<p>Try the ACT. SAT-M has a lot of built-in reasoning required, i.e, you have to reason how to setup the medium and difficult problems to solve them. The ACT-M is more straightforward, albeit more time intensive. Speed is of the essence on the ACT.</p>

<p>However, neither will be easy if one skipped major parts of Geom, such as circles. SAT math is a handful of Alg II problems; the rest is half Alg I and half Geom. A weak background in Alg I or Geom will make the test extremely difficult. (Note, however, that the ACT includes 4 trig problems.) </p>

<p>I disagree with Kiernan. Without an actual, professional diagnosis, any explanation is just an excuse: ‘I can’t do math’. There is no way for your S to address it, but his GC can try.</p>