Yeah. I agree completely. And even if we did remember the material perfectly from our honors courses, there’s no way that it would be in-depth or extensive enough for the SAT subject test.
I don’t understand why you guys are complaining. I’m an international student. I self studied Math lvl 2, physics and chemistry in 3 weeks and scored 800,780 and 750. It isn’t that hard.
@RF6698 What did you use to learn the material?
Princeton review physics, Kaplan chemistry and Barron’s math. Personally, though, I would suggest you buy Barron’s for all 3. I found a couple of factual and mathematical errors in all 3 books, most in Princeton review and the least in Barron’s. But that isn’t why you should use Barron’s. 1st Barron’s has way more practice tests. And 2nd its much harder than the actual exam. So if you can score even 750-760 on a Barron’s test you can expect 800 in the actual thing. This helps becuase you don’t become overconfident and the fear of low marks will make you study more. Plus the Barron’s book was way more comprehensive.
Thanks, my sister is homeschooled and she’s trying to figure out the best way to study.
You commented about it not being that hard, you still must have learned some math, chemistry, and physics at some point during your schooling. Your classes may have been much more comprehensive than the classes some of the students in the US have taken. In the US, there can be extreme differences in quality between schools.
Yeah well there’s that too. I covered all the portions that was there in the test in school, so that did help a bit. Tell your sister to buy Barron’s and Kaplan for all 3(m2,p,c). Also I managed to find pdf copies of McGraw-hill for all as well, so that’ll save you some money. Tell her to keep doing practice tests under realistic conditions(with a timer and all). That way she’ll know how to pace herself during the exam. Trust me practice tests are just as, if not more, important than studying.
I don’t understand why more schools aren’t abandoning the SAT subject tests. If you can memorize a Barron’s book and achieve a 750+ in a few days it really tells nothing about your skill level in science but a lot about your ability to study. For students that have a verified AP Calc+ AP Bio, Chem, or Phys they should allow you to use that score instead of taking the SAT2. Less than 5% of the country got a 5 on AP Physics 1 last year so my kids 5 on that should mean a lot more than his fine but ehh in comparison to the rest of his stats SAT2 score on Physics. My other kid is taking AP Chem +AP Phys this year to be able to take the SAT2 for Chem without wasting time memorizing trivia for the college board.
It is a different set of knowledge. AP is not substitute for SAT, and for good students, they can all get a score in any of these tests over one weekend’s study. I watched my son preparing for AP Physics C EM literately one weekend to score a 5, because a 35% score or something like that gives you a 5. For SAT subject Physics, you need 80% to get 800. I don’t care how you do it, if you can’t have good results in these tests, you will not be able to do 8.01 and 8.02 in MIT in your freshmen years. On the other hand, if you scored 5 in both AP Physics C and a 800 in subject test, still no guarantee that you can do those two classes in your first year, but at least you have something to build on.
“For SAT subject Physics, you need 80% to get 800.”
I might be wrong, and I apologize in advance if I am, but I think that you might be confusing percentage with percentile. According to this table (https://■■■■■■/EVs4rb) a SAT 2 Physics score of 800 equals approximately the 88th percentile-but that doesn’t translate to having answered 88% or more of the questions correctly.
If you take the Math 2 for example, a score of 800 is equal to about the 81st percentile, but if you look at this conversion table from Kaplan (http://postimg.org/image/9iclexdf1/) you will notice that you have to answer at least 45 (of 50 questions) or more correctly in order to score 800. And that doesn’t take into account incorrect answers for each of which you have to subtract 0.25 points.
It also depends on the subject of course. Biology M for example is even more difficult to get a perfect 800 on. If you look at this conversion table from The Princeton Review (http://postimg.org/image/fobzcfhrz/) you will see that a score of 800 is equal to having answered correctly on 78 (of 80 questions) or more. This doesn’t take into account incorrect answers. If you answer 78 questions correctly, but 2 questions wrong, you will have a raw score of 77.5. I am not sure if 77.5 would round up to 78 and give you a score of 800 (it could depend on the curve), or if it would “only” amount to 790.
If fractions of a point do not round up that could mean that you would either have to answer at least 78 questions correctly and leave the remaining two questions unanswered, or that you would have to answer 79 questions correctly in order to get a 800. Again, this also depends on the curve for each particular test.
I am not familiar with Biology, but in math II and physics, based on my kids and their friends that I helped in the past 8 years or so, I have a good ballpark number.
For Math II, the magic raw score for 800 is 44, which means 45 correct, and subtract 1 for the 5 wrongs. So a 800 line is at 90%;
For Physics, the magic raw score is 60 out of 75. Maybe 80% would not do it if you get 20% wrong, but 85%, i.e. 64 out of 75 will do. It is not at all difficult, but one needs to know a fair amount of physic to get 64 correct answers in 60 minutes, not something you can really do just memorizing answers from a test prep book.
Thank you for your reply. I double-checked using the conversion tables found in “The Official Study Guide for all SAT Subject Tests” (and the Study Guide for Mathematics Levels 1 & 2) that’s sold by The College Board and you are correct. The 800 lines for Math 2, Physics, and Biology M (E seems to be slightly more difficult) are approximately 90%, 85%, and 97% respectively.