<p>After studying the SAT relentlessly for some time, there are just some tricks you’ve just got to get the hang of searching for when you’re doing the Writing. I’ll try to compile some for you:</p>
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<li><p>Subject verb agreement. This is the first thing I look for and it’s easy to spot. Make sure single -> single verb, and plurals -> plural verb. This seems like most of the test and can save you time when you’re examining the harder Qs.</p></li>
<li><p>Active voice. It’s not true that all the right answers are the shortest ones, but the answer is the one that makes the simplest, basic sentence. This one is kind of tricky because passive voice is grammatically correct. You just need to make sure the sentence is basic: Subject, Subject does the verb, Object.</p></li>
<li><p>Eliminate prepositions when they’re too wordy. You may have heard this one but it’s super helpful; back when I first started SATs, after I learned this trick, my score bumped up nearly 100 points.</p></li>
<li><p>And…lastly, and to not make this the longest post…is Modifiers. The worst, I hate these and they trip me up, but this should also be a BIG thing to look out for. If you don’t know what a modifier is, here is a very simple explanation:
<a href=“Purdue OWL® - Purdue OWL® - Purdue University”>Purdue OWL® - Purdue OWL® - Purdue University;
</ul>
<p>If you get down these, then you can get nickpicky and learn idioms and present perfect and such. This goes on with the Sentence Errors section as well (since I’m assuming you’re getting shot up on this one):</p>
<p>“When a government agency encouraged the use of (blah blah), they helped…”</p>
<p>“THEY” is wrong, because government agency is singular. So yeah, that just getting the major fixes down will improve that score tremendously, like it did to mine.</p>
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<p>For math…it depends, I’m just a math person in general, so I don’t know exactly what the tricks are or what to look for.</p>
<p>I guess the key is just to practice as much as you can. I’m just doing problems out of the blue book and doing that ~5 days straight with Reading boosted my score 100 points. I like Princeton’s book too. I don’t know the books you’re using but if they have those intro-walkthrough problems, do them and let it guide you and read the explanations. It’s surprising how the math problems can all be done in as little as 1-3 steps sometimes, and the books tell you all about it. The only thing I can think to memorize is your theorems and the area/volume formulas that are at the beginning of the math sections. If you’re looking back at the formulas, don’t…</p>
<p>Also, are you writing out every step to every math problem? That may be why you’re not finishing. That is the issue with a lot of my friends. Do what you can in your head, use the calc. if you can’t, and only write stuff out when you’re desperate and can’t figure it out immediately. The most important thing for me about math is finishing with time to spare…I rush through, then go back at the end and fix my errors. I circle any that I felt like I did too quickly (lightly on the answer key) then run back to those first. Once done I check the whole thing over. I feel like the hardest thing about the math section is how a question is weighed more than those in the other sections, but y’know, CollegeBoard. :P</p>
<p>I’m taking it again on Dec 7 so let’s hope for the best!</p>