<p>Asleep, how did your S say it went? My S said the math was very easy, he felt like he missed two, but did not finish the last 5 questions. I don’t know how that affects his score (I’ll have to ask on another thread). The World History he said was hard and he thinks he bombed it.</p>
<p>The good thing about my daughter is that she is now an EMT and works in an emergency room. I just wish she would get the rest of her education done quicker.</p>
<p>@Mysonsdad – The curves on the subject tests are in general pretty forgiving. Although I have no idea about the accuracy of this site, here’s a link to the (?alleged) curve for the Math 2 Subject Test: <a href=“SparkNotes: Today's Most Popular Study Guides”>SparkNotes: Today's Most Popular Study Guides;
Here’s one more link, to the percentile ranks for the SAT Subject Tests (for 2012 college-bound high school seniors). Note that the Math 2 is a particularly forgiving test. One only need be in the top 15% to score an 800: <a href=“http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/SAT-Subject-Tests-Percentile-Ranks-2012.pdf”>http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/SAT-Subject-Tests-Percentile-Ranks-2012.pdf</a>
If your son answered 45 questions and missed two, that would give him a raw score of 42.5. However, fractional scores are rounded up, so that would make his raw score 43. According to the sparknotes site that would give him something in the upper-700’s, and with a bit of luck possibly an 800!! Now, you’ll definitely have to report back on this thread when he gets his score.</p>
<p>My son thought that the Chemistry test was easier than the practice tests in the Barron’s prep book. Of note, there was stuff in the Barron’s book that he had not covered in his high school Chemistry class, so the prep was essential. The test had 85 questions in 60 minutes, which to me seems like a brutal pace. He’s pretty confident that he did well. We’ll see.</p>
<p>While we’re on the topic, based on a lot of homework (on my part) and S16’s experience I have some definite favorite prep books for the ‘regular’ SAT’s. Let me know if you’re interested and I can post them here or PM you. But being a teacher you may already have your own favorites/choices. No worries either way.</p>
<p>Our oldest girl decided that she’d forego college (she had been admitted to Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo), and would become a waitress. She started at a restaurant where the menu was a laminated placemat. Working in a real job where the expectations were related to work product (and not academic product) was of great benefit to her. She climbed her way up from there. Your daughter will definitely get a real slice of life and insight into the human condition working in the ER. Might help her continue to make better and better choices. </p>
<p>My daughter is going for valedictorian too. She pushes herself. She is # 1 in her class right now, neck and neck with another girl. I hate the competition and as someone mentioned it makes them almost ocd. My daughter is very much like this and I have to to tell her to relax all the time. Her school acknowledges (and they all give speeches) the top 5 in the class but states who the valedictorian and salutatorian is.</p>
<p>my S is going for…“I’m going to get into that top school and work as hard as I want…and still have plenty of time for my gaming and my friends…'what’s a Val?” ‘…"! :-<
He took the Chem SAT II today also. He thought it was much more difficult than the SAT prep book put out by the College board. He did some kind of review in school for it…but, I am not so sure how he studied on his own. He doesnt’ share that. BUT MySonsDad…I like your statement to your kid about the SAT’s…I’m going to try that one. I think for my kid, he still doesn’t quite understand this studying thing. He has relied so much on his memory and brain power…he really has not needed to work too hard in school to get what he considers a good grade. I am really beginning to wonder where he will end up. </p>
<p>According to today’s Portal check (waiting for that last grade to be entered), S is currently 5th/3rd (makes him sound like a bank) out of 300-something, depending on weighted or not. (He ranks higher weighted, as opposed to his sister, who ranks slightly higher un-.) I refuse to tell him, or he’d probably be plotting the demise of the two girls who are ahead of him. Yes, hyperbole, but he is a little on the hypercompetitive side.</p>
<p>Asleep, please post the books that you think helped the most for the SAT. My son already has the Blue Book. I take it you are in California because of where you daughter got admitted. I am in Ca also, I always figured you were somewhere back East. Thanks for the links. I hope my S is accurate on what he thinks he missed on the SAT II Math. I remember when he took the PSAT last year and told me he thought he only missed 4, he ended up with a score of 180. So who knows. After reading your post and drmom, I don’t know why I didn’t have my son take the Chem SAT test yesterday. </p>
<p>Sophmore1, I wish my S had the drive you daughter does, he is smart and knows how to do well in school, but as soon as something is difficult he wants to give up. For example, he plays golf and when he is in a tournament, if he has a few bad holes he will tell me afterward that he “just gave up after that.” Or he wanted to drop out of orchestra because he said, “The violin did not come easy to him.” He is kinda lucky about being val because some of the other kids either have given up because they don’t want to work that hard, or they made some mistakes and took the wrong classes along the way and are out of the running. At the end of sophmore (this) year there were actually something like 9 kids going for it.</p>
<p>Drmom, I think we have agreed before that we have gifted, yet unmotivated kids (I don’t mean that offensively). The lack of motivation drives me crazy because I had to work so hard in school and life in general to accomplish stuff. </p>
<p>Yes Asleep, please post the list of SAT books/resources you found useful. This is something I am very interested in.</p>
<p>Here are the ones I’ve picked for my kids but I’m always interested in seeing what has worked well for others kids:
CB’s Blue Book
Kaplan SAT flash cards (these were suggested by CC member when I was looking for non electronic SAT prep to use when traveling)
The Ultimate Guide to SAT Grammar by Erica Meltzer
PWN the SAT: Math Guide by Mike McClenathan
PWN the SAT: Essay Guide Paperback by Mike McClenathan</p>
<p>We are also doing <a href=“http://www.shmoop.com”>www.shmoop.com</a> PSAT/SAT test prep I have mixed feeling about this.
pros: inexpensive, engaging, not very time consuming
cons: doesn’t use real test questions, fraught with errors, the “teacher” interfaces does not give me detailed access to students answers, initially I was sold on this program because it purported to track how much the student spent working on each problem. I wanted to know if a student was spending to much time on a specific type of problem. It does track time and the students can see this as they take the practice test but it doesn’t save this information for later review.
They say they are revamping their entire test prep program and hope to have the new version available in Oct, too late for D16’s PSAT but will keep an eye one it for S18 and S20</p>
<p>@Mysonsdad, I hope she maintains the determination - just doesn’t over do it. The other girl will take ever advantage and has even tried to cheat. My daughter knows this and it did work with her winning the math award this year by a tenth of a point. She begged the teacher to change the grade with lame excuses. My daughter will not do this. It is such a disgusting game at times.</p>
<p>I too look forward to @AsleepAtTheWheel posting his Sat Books. She will be needing to prep for the PSAT soon. </p>
<p>@mysonsdad @3scoutsmom </p>
<p>S14 is graduating later today. Very mixed emotions. Wonderful kid, but he definitely did not take advantage of all the opportunities, either academic or non-academic, that were open to him over the past four years. He will NOT look back fondly on his high school years, and today could not come fast enough for him. But he’s gotten past some chronic disease issues, he’s excited about attending Emory Univ next year, and is optimistically looking forward to wiping the high school slate clean and starting the next chapter.</p>
<p>That’s all to say that I’ll post what we learned about test prep later. It’s really not all that much. Just a few books and some thoughts.</p>
<p>Emory’s a pretty good destination, though, for someone who didn’t entirely work up to his potential. That’s some darned impressive potential he has, then! Congratulations and good luck to him.</p>
<p>No kidding, Emory is a great place to end up. I can only imagine where your other son will end up. Btw, Congratulations to you S on graduating.</p>
<p>Drmom, the “This is what college will be like” isn’t working. My S slept in today until 10 and then went to a girls house.</p>
<p>Mysonsdad–yeah,…I tried the line at breakfast…as he was getting ready to go to some amusement park…he just gave me this look that if he had used words…He’d have been a whole lot of trouble!</p>
<p>S took the AP world test this past Saturday. Thought it went ok - but we’ll see. We had a little bit of unwanted excitement the day before with H getting admitted to the hospital for a suspected heart attack and all the tests - hopefully, that didn’t throw S off too much. Prep books? What are those? 
S didn’t think he needed to prep - he took a look at the SAT II questions on the website for the first time a couple of days before the exam. Said he needed to learn a bit more that they hadn’t covered in class. I don’t think he really studied after though - so we’ll see.</p>
<p>He did the same routine for SATII Chem last month and did pretty well - so maybe the class in school really did prepare them fairly well. </p>
<p>In other news, he’s taking driver ed classes every afternoon - it’s boring is the only comment I’ve heard so far. Intending for him to go take the permit test sometime this week.</p>
<p>We tried to get S16 to do some prep but he said they were doing plenty of that in class (Chem and Math II). Of course, the math prep they were doing was SAT not SAT II and they cover different material. There were some areas where he forgot stuff learned long ago that he could have refreshed quite easily if he’d put in the time. Unfortunately, all his spare time has been spent trying catch up and finish up the quarter. On the bright side, the set of schools he’s likely to apply to don’t require SAT II’s. And, it was worth taking them just to have reality start to sink in.</p>
<p>On the more gloomy side, he’ll be relying on test scores to demonstrate the potential he has that won’t be apparent in his grades. And I’ve forgotten the College Board account name/email we used for S16.</p>
<p>On Val/Sal - my son is just hoping to crack the top 10. Hard to do when the top 10 is dominated by IB kids and son is not IB. The IB program is weighted equal to 13 APs plus those kids take 2 APs in 9th and 10th and the ones going for Val try to take even more APs as electives. This year’s Val has a 5.0. Son has taken 3 APs so far and his plan is 5 in 11th and 5 in 12th. He can’t jam in more in there because he wants to take business classes. We are fine with that. </p>
<p>On the plus side in both the class of 2013 & 2014 students ranked lower than Val ended up at better schools then the Vals (who still got into very good schools) including Cal Tech, Johns Hopkins, and a couple of Ivies. </p>
<p>Son is taking finals this week and the ACT on Saturday. After that he will be out for the summer and straight off to work at summer camp. </p>
<p>Our goal for D is to make it into the top 25 but will be happy if she stays in the top 10%. She has the grades (last semester she her GPA was UW 97.71 W 105.14 and ranked 37 out of 640) she brought her grades up and now has UW 98.11 and W 106.16. We won’t know the new rank for another month. Even though she brought her grades up, if others did well in more weighted classes, her rank will still slide. </p>
<p>The weighting really works against her. She plays an instrument so no weighted class for four year of orchestra. She was homeschooled until 9th grade so they wouldn’t let her start in all the pre-ap classes she wanted and most of the kids that were in ps for 8th grade took their first year of a language then so they will make it to pre-ap (language 3) and ap (language 4) a year before my daughter. It’s a real game here, the kids that are going for Val/Sal have been planning out their high school classes since 6th grade. She only has one selective school on her list and that’s a complete lottery and huge financial reach so we aren’t worried about about class rank too much as long as she stays in the top 10% she is an auto admit for our financial safety.</p>
<p>Although GPA, rank, SAT and ACT are important our main goal is the PSAT in Oct. If she can nail that for National Merit, I wouldn’t care about class rank and retaking the SAT would be totally optional on her part.</p>
<p>Our district’s vals and sals have historically gone to State Flagship U. because of the state lottery scholarship. It’s not nearly as good a scholarship as it used to be, but it keeps 'em home. Occasionally a couple of them will break loose, but not for the most part, even for the IB kids. </p>
<p>Just out of curiosity, how big are your kids’ graduating classes? Our numbers seem to vary minute by minute but stay right around 400, maybe a bit under.</p>
<p>@3scoutsmom - ITA about the weighting. My DS16 wanted to (and did) add a 2nd language. His best friend did not. So my DS had a non-honors (all first year language courses are non-honors) credit. All of his other classes are honors/AP. He got A’s in everything, but his extra language A brought down his average relative to his friend, who had a free period instead and the rest the same (!). I don’t think that a class vs. free period should hurt you with all A’s, but it’s how the numbers work…</p>
<p>My DS’s class is roughly 125. It is quite hard to be top 10%! </p>
<p>Music classes suffer the same unweighted “penalty” and harm GPA more than a free period–even chamber which requires an audition and only accepts a few kids. That game does get played here as well but maybe not quite as cutthroat since everyone knows everyone. This year’s val is going to Harvard. </p>