<p>Take a lot of practice tests from wherever you can find them. That way you can get the timing and format of the questions down.
It’ll be a lot of work for you, but I improved my score by 250 with basically no extra effort, just because I had experience the second time I took it. I went from a 2120 to a 2370, so needless to say there was no real need to try again after that…
So by just taking it again, you can tend to improve your score, even if it won’t be by 800 points the first time around. Especially for math, the very best thing you can do is just do a lot of practice problems/tests. Getting really good at taking the test is the best way to do well on it.
I had friends who spent a lot of time studying for the SATs and stuff without really doing many practice tests, and they tended to not improve their scores by much.</p>
<p>Direct Hits and just looking up difficult words that I noticed were used often in articles and essays helped raise my reading score from low 500s to 700. All vocab questions right except one, so I would definitely recommend Direct Hits.</p>
<p>Might also try taking the ACT instead since some tend to do better on that then the SAT. Not sure what you can possibly study for ‘hours and hours’ that will yield better scores on tests such as these that measure basic skills you have learned thoughout high school, mostly in Math and English. While it is good to know the type of questions used on the test, books/study guides…etc. that imply great results using their ‘methods’ are mostly advertising hype to sell their product.</p>
<p>Some students tend to naturally do better on standardized tests then others. If you aren’t particularly good in Math or English going into these tests, no amount of last minute ‘studying’ will change that.</p>
<p>Pleas, what does BB stand for?</p>
<p>Can you tell me what BB stands for in the previous post? Thanks</p>
<p>Blue Book. It’s the official book released by College Board. The most recent addition has 10 practice tests in the back (the rest of it isn’t too useful). The first 3 practice tests are the most useful ones out there since they’re released tests with usable curves.</p>
<p>alot can change from sophomore year to senior year. I got a 1750 sophomore year and a 2300 end of junior year. that is a 550 point increase. I’m not sure about 1000 points but all i really did for practice was take alot of those free practice SAT tests</p>
<p>every single high scorer I know is an avid reader. Start reading adult-level books in topics you’re interested in. As a sophomore, you still have the time to build up a sense of good writing and vocab bank, natural things you pick up from reading.</p>
<p>BB - Blue Book (College Board’s SAT book).</p>
<p>I got ~145 on PSAT sophomore year I think. I’m hitting 200-220 now (Junior, took PSAT today). A lot of it is time, and practice.</p>
<p>[Study</a> Hacks Blog Archive How to Ace the SAT: A No-Nonsense System for Students Looking to Score High](<a href=“http://calnewport.com/blog/2008/07/11/how-to-ace-the-sat-a-no-nonsense-system-for-students-looking-to-score-high/]Study”>How to Ace the SAT: A No-Nonsense System for Students Looking to Score High - Cal Newport)</p>
<p>Ditto that. read everything you can get your hands on including the newspaper, the Economist or Time magazine. Watch public television shows, listen to and the sophisticated arguments that show up on shows like the PBS news hour. Look up words you don’t know. Thats how the people who get top scores in CR do it- they’ve mostly been doing those things since they were kids but its not too late.</p>
<p>i just took it as a freshmen on collegeboard under normal circumstances and got a 1390. any cheap books i should get?</p>
<p>my score was without the essay for the writing though. m-530, cr-510, w-350 [should be higher next time]</p>
<p>I suggest you guys try sparknotes; its quite good and focus on getting down the basics (grammar, math skills etc, use the site its very very good). Once you get to a certain point (around 1800) and you feel like you know everything, its just a matter of practising the actual questions, so try to get as many test sets as you can and focus on one section that you’re having the most difficulty with (ie reading, writing, math), then UNDERSTANDING the questions and why you got it wrong/right. Practice makes perfect!</p>
<p>This is an old post but my son recently took the SAT. He was able to raise his scores from 1500 to 2150 so for all the students out there, hope exists. One great way you can improve your scores is by doing practice tests online. There are a lot of tests that come at a minimal charge to help you improve on the [URL=<a href=“http://www.shmoop.com/sat/test-prep.html]SAT[/URL”>SAT Test Prep | Diagnostics and Personalized Prep | Shmoop]SAT[/URL</a>]. 800-1000 is a really steep increase in your score and its always advisable to start preparing early, even a year early if you really want to get into a great college.</p>
<p>something that helped me in the CR section was memorizing word roots. You don’t exactly need to memorize words, just look at the latin roots and other roots and know their meanings. For example, you might not know the meaning of the word antebellum, but by studying roots you know that ante means before, and bellum means war. Thus, you can figure out that the meaning of antebellum is ‘before the war’.</p>
<p>Hi … I’m an international student . I’ve been studying English for only 3 years ; This October I did SAT and got 1410 . CR is very hard for me and I don’t really know how to improve my scores in CR . Writing and Math are easy for me but I have time issues on real test…do have any tips for me? how to improve CR or how to solve time issue ?</p>
<p>anuki92: read this thread from the beginning–that issue has already been addressed by some posters in addition to myself.</p>
<p>And I’m going to reiterate this point out there for anyone who’s planning to take/retake the SAT–because this is so important: the SAT is in NO WAY a measure of your real intelligence. It’s just to measure how well you can answer certain types of problems. The test is designed so that on every version of the test, no matter what month, year, etc, the same TYPE of questions are used over and over again. Just practice as well as you can, and remember that the significance of the SAT score is lessening and lessening each year as admission’s officers also realize the tests’ impotence.</p>
<p>with that said, Good Luck!</p>
<p>just took a practice sat again as freshmen 260 point increase amen</p>
<p>i wouldn’t go by the princeton review test. </p>
<p>take a test from the BB and see how you do. or if you’re too lazy to grade your sections, go on the CB website and take a free online practice test.</p>
<p>I would take a test prep class. You CAN increase that much if you practice a lot. I get so tired of reading these negative and arrogant posts that exhibit a lack of hope! Don’t listen to these people. Thomas Edison said, “My success has come from many failed attempts.” If you can figure out a pattern to your mistakes, then you can master this test! Remember, it is possible to increase your score by a large margin!</p>