<p>LOL, Longhaul. Y’all are making me feel like ds is an overachiever by doing the practice test this weekend. But if you saw his report card last week, you’d know that’s NOT the case.</p>
<p>My S is on the last day of a 4 day weekend today and has done nothing except play World of Warcraft and go to the State Fair. Before I left for work today I nagged once more about starting a AP World History project and practicing for All Region Choir tryouts on Sat. I didn’t bother mentioning the PSAT tomorrow. At least he’ll be well-rested for it.</p>
<p>I have no idea if D looked at the PSAT practice book yet. I know that she remembers she has to take it tomorrow (along with the PLAN on Thursday) 'cause she gave me a heavy sigh when I mentioned it 
1st marking period ends today…</p>
<p>DD takes the PSATs tomorrow. They prepped a bit in school, but that is about it. I’m looking to see if she can finish the test and if she does well. She is a very smart girl. She also has a 504 that allows her to take extra time on tests. She usually only needs extra time for Honors Math and complicated science tests. I think it is difficult to get extra time on the SATs, so I am using this test to determine if it is something she needs or not. If she doesn’t need extra time, then why fight for it? If, however, she really struggles with the time, then we will start the process and have it in place by next year when it really matters. Does anyone have experience with this? Thanks!</p>
<p>geo, I’ve seen this talked about on cc so I know there are threads out there. Though, truthfully, I remember some of them degenerating into arguments about wealthy families who get their kids diagnosed with an issue so that they can scam the system and get extra time. Just wanted to warn you …</p>
<p>My S never finished the math sections of the PSAT yet managed to score pretty well. However, he realized that he needed to speed up to maximise for the SAT so he took a prep course. He found that the tips they gave really helped him improve his efficiency on the test. He never had special accomodations but in HS a couple of math teachers actually gave him extra time because they observed that if a kid doesn’t know the material…no amount of time helps them but some students spend a substantial amount of time pondering a math question and exploring various methods to reach the solution. While this definitely cemented my son’s love of math (despite being an art student, math was his next favorite subject), sometimes there are occasions where you can’t have the luxury of extra time. You may want to have her take a prep class even if she does get accomodation.</p>
<p>Thank you for the heads up Youdon’tsay and FAMM. Didn’t mean to start a ruckuss. My DD has a real condition along with very slow processing. She is very smart and able to do the work; her brain just takes longer to do each step. An assignment that takes a “regular” honors student 1/2 an hour takes her 50 minutes. She puts in the time, has the drive and does very well. It’s real and I’m not interested in arguing about it. A prep course will help her know the material better, but it won’t make her brain work faster or allow her to complete the test (or complete whatever is “normal”). She will take a SAT prep class or a tutor, but this is not a case of us making this up so she can score higher.</p>
<p>How’d the PSAT go for the kids? Ds thought that, once again, CR would be his worst category.</p>
<p>Funny, D said she thought it was pretty easy; she got close to running out of time at the end of one of the math sections so she had to guess on the last 3 but she said she didn’t know how to do them anyway. And apparently the reading sections mirrored a couple of topics that they have worked on in history and science so she felt really comfortable there. The proctor was one of her current teachers and kept them well informed about the time they had left to finish so D was happy with that. She had a bad testing situation last year where the teachers lost track of time and were like “oops! forgot to tell you! you’re done right now!” </p>
<p>PLAN tomorrow. Then probably no testing until the end of the year if she decides to take the SAT II for world history (whichever one matches up with AP Euro.)</p>
<p>Ended up chatting a little more tonight about IB. I think she’s leaning back towards continuing.</p>
<p>YDS, my D felt the second CR section was much easier than the first and she had to omit a couple on the M that she didn’t have time to solve. She actually took a practice test over the weekend and the W was her weakest area, but today she felt she did a lot better on that section.:)</p>
<p>My S (a sophomore) thought the M section was much easier now that he has had geometry. He is always a “half-full” type of guy. He took the test in 8th grade and said it was “easy”, then, when my older son (who was a junior), who also took the test, asked him what he got on certain problems that he thought were hard, he said “oh, I skipped that one”.</p>
<p>Son said PSATs were easier than he expected, but he did skip a few questions. He thought the Math was most difficult because he “forgot” all his geometry. Hmmm, maybe Mom’s suggestion to take SAT II Math this spring has a basis in reality? Better to take at the end of Pre-Calc than after he “forgets” everything the test covers.</p>
<p>I’m anxiously awaiting December and the results. If he scores near where I hope, then I’m going to encourage him to tag along with his cousin on some college tours in the spring. Due to our financial situation (not a good one) and son’s general personality, I anticipate his college list to be all over the board (geographically and tier), so I’d like him to at least have “soft” visits where he can get a feel of different size schools. And his cousin is more fun than going with parents junior year.</p>
<p>Also, I’m just plain curious to see how accurate SSAT predictions and CTY assumptions are for his scoring. I think CTY has an expectation of 50 pts each SAT section per grade level.</p>
<p>wow! 50 pts per level per grade? that seems high.would that translate into 5 pts per section on the PSAT? If I recall correctly, D’10 got a 183 or 189 as a sophomore and then got a 221 as a junior. I think primarily because of the higher level math she did in the meantime. Guess I should pull those out and look. I’m pretty sure that D’13 did have an answer for every question.</p>
<p>Wow RobD-- Your D10 had a great increase!</p>
<p>Yes - translates to 5 pts each PSAT section.</p>
<p>It basically puts all kids who test into CTY in 7th/8th grade on track for 700+ per SAT section as juniors/seniors. </p>
<p>Would be nice if my kid could meet those predictions as it would open up college choices due to merit. We have no hopes for National Merit score range next year (kid goes to school in NJ where the cut-off has been 221 for the last 3 years).</p>
<p>I think I’ll keep track of that stuff with ds2 as I didn’t really with ds1. We do Duke Talent Search here, so we have an SAT score from 7th grade and then PSAT from freshman year. There was quite a bit of improvement (the equivalent of 13 points, I think). If he could make that much improvement each year, he’d easily make NMSF here, where the cutoff is 216. We’ll see. Truthfully, I’m kind of counting on it as he just won’t have the grades/rank to get a lot of merit aid, I’m afraid.</p>
<p>RobD- Just curious, what level math did your D10 take between the freshman and Sophomore years? That was a great increase! My D took the SAT as a 7th grader so we have no idea how she will score on the PSAT.</p>
<p>D2 thought the PSAT went pretty well, said the math was “easy and fun” but the first CR section was harder than she expected and harder than any of the practice tests. She took the SAT last spring “just for practice” and got a 690 CR / 600 M but there was a lot of math that she hadn’t had yet, so she was pleased that the PSAT math was all stuff that she’s seen before. We’re feeling optimistic that she’ll eventually be well into the 700 range on both CR and M, but before we get ahead of ourselves let’s see how her PSAT comes out.</p>
<p>When I asked my son what he thought of the PSAT, he said he had anticipated struggling and was surprised that he didn’t. I asked him why he thought that because he didn’t struggle last year (even though he did rather poorly) and he said he just figured with it being 10th grade and all that the test would be harder. Can ya tell he has aboslutely no interest in standardized tests?</p>
<p>How does CB split the the testing centers between the two PSAT test dates? Is a Wednesday school always a Wednesday school?</p>
<p>D2 said, re: PSAT, it was LONG, I didnt know I could lose points for guessing, the reading was boring and too much of it and it was too early in the morning but I think I did fine.</p>
<p>I told her that any SAT will also be too early in the morning (this is not a morning kid) but she said now she knows what to expect and will adjust as needed. I think though she was really happy to have it as a practice run through and Im curious to see how she does.</p>