<p>Hi, I have a serious critical reading problem. I've done a lot of practice tests, but i dont see any major improvements. I'm using the line reference method where you bracket all the lines and answer the questions as you go. I've been using this method since last summer. Sometimes I have a really hard time understanding what a paragraph means and sometimes I dont understand anything when I approach a line reference. I usually reread the area the line reference is in 2-3 times. I usually never get it on my first read. Do you guys have any suggestions what i should do? Should i start writing paragraph summaries and the question purpose on the margin. Thanks</p>
<p>should i use process of elimination or just choose the answer?</p>
<p>here’s what I do: read the entire passage, take tiny notes in the margins, and predicting an answer for the question before looking at the choices. However, my worst subject is CR lol. I’m like ~700</p>
<p>I recommend skimming the whole passage first (read the italics at the beginning, the first sentence of each paragraph, and the last couple of sentences in the last paragraph) You’re looking to get a sense of the main idea of the passage.</p>
<p>Then go to question 1, read the question, go back to the passage and, starting at the beginning, read through (and a little past) the line references in the question. Answer question 1. </p>
<p>Go to question 2. Pick up where you left off reading the passage, read a little past the line reference give in question 2, answer question 2.</p>
<p>Skip the global questions until the end. Most of the questions will line up around the main idea of the passage.</p>
<p>And there is nothing wrong with re-reading a couple of sentence several times to pull out the meaning. I have a 800 CR score and I re-read the passage multiple times.</p>
<p>Honestly, for the critical portion of the SAT, though some people claim that there’s tips and techniques to grind through it, if you wanna get a top score, there’s no way to get around this: You need to understand the passage completely and entirely and get that feeling that you know exactly what you’re reading and that you understand each and every sentence and how they contribute to the overall idea. Only way to do this is to exercise elite concentration.</p>
<p>Snappy’s right. You need to understand pretty much everything. I recommend reading a lot because that will help you with understanding long passages. Specifically all of those boring books that people hate reading…classics!</p>
<p>I underline any important phrases/sentences/words while I read so I can quickly look back to them in case a question or two asks about it. </p>
<p>Make sure any answer you pick can be backed up by information in the passage. </p>
<p>Process of elimination REALLY helps!</p>
<p>And yeah, understanding a hard passage gets very time consuming. I suggest just practicing over and over again, and if you are in an AP English or honors English class at school, it really helps because you’ll get used to reading difficult texts and eventually you’ll be used to the style/vocab used in difficult passages.</p>
<p>Try reading the entire passage first and then answering the questions.</p>
<p>Snappy, I agree with your point, but the question is HOW can you understand a passage efficiently and quickly? I read these passages (especially science. o_O) and I’m completely lost. I tried to understand it with a dictionary and it works… somewhat</p>
<p>He’s already answered the question…</p>
<p>You have to just concentrate really well and keep the ideas that the passage gives you in your head. You can use all the tricks you want, but in the end, if you want to get a 700+ consistently you have to just concentrate on what the passage is trying to emphasize, if it is, or, if it’s an argument, understand where both sides stand and why.</p>
<p>To make it easier to understand…on the Math section, you can learn all the types of questions they might ask you and you’ll end up having a really easy time. For the CR section, you have to practice attention, memory, and comprehension. Attention and memory go hand-in-hand; you can’t retain the information when you’re distracted in even very subtle ways. Comprehension, obviously, gives meaning to what you retained.</p>
<p>Of course, it’s important to have a decent vocabulary to comprehend and retain; it’s been studied that people who don’t know a certain word in a sentence end up forgetting more of the general idea of that sentence, even if it was just 1 word out of 20.</p>
<p>If you want to practice attention, memory, and comprehension, simply read some books that seem interesting to you (it’s important that they’re interesting, or else you will easily be distracted due to boredom).</p>