Passages that "click"...

<p>I find that my CR score is jumping like mad. I got a 620 in the June SAT, and now in the blue book I'm scoring anywhere between the ranges of 620-760 (taking into account the score ranges). I find that in "good" passages that click, such as ones about science or physics (which I'm interested in), I get 2-3 wrong, whereas for passages about history I get a lot more wrong (5-7). Consequently, depending on the kind of passages I get, my score is quite volatile.</p>

<p>Has anyone else had this issue before? I find that boring history passages are more difficult to keep up with, and as a result my score drops. What short term practice can I do to overcome this issue for the October SAT?</p>

<p>This touches on the reality that one’s performance on CR is highly psychological; you have to really force yourself to like the passage in order to score well.</p>

<p>The brain is wired biologically to forget things that it doesn’t think it needs to keep. If you don’t have an interest, your brain will do the efficient thing and forget the information in favor of things that it considers more meaningful. The best way to remember the passage and focus on it is to become highly interested in whatever it is you’re reading.</p>

<p>Just spend some time in the weeks leading up to the test reading history/literature books and forcing yourself to be interested in them.</p>

<p>try focusing more
and make marginal notes</p>

<p>What notes should I take exactly? I’ve tried taking notes before but they’ve basically been useless.</p>

<p>That’s weird. Yes there are some passages that are “interesting” and others that are downright sleep inducers but that doesn’t really affect my performance.</p>

<p>If you really care to take notes, then write the main idea of the intro paragraph and each paragraph after the first should somehow connect to the first paragraph. Write that relationship in the margin. Helps focus and retention.</p>

<p>Yes I’ve felt like you. I usually do well on the more science oriented articles (I usually don’t even need to re-read it, I somehow memorized most of the information), but on other ones, I just lose focus and have no idea of what they’re writing about</p>

<p>Yup - it’s the same for me - I can almost just read the science passage once and answer all the questions without any problems.</p>

<p>Thanks for all the responses :)</p>

<p>LOL I only read magazines/ news articles/ essays…</p>

<p>I have not read a single book (and I’m serious) for the past 3 years. I’ve only used sparknotes lol!</p>

<p>Thus, I get 1 wrong on all the other passages, and probably 3-4 wrong on the literature ones…</p>

<p>Maybe I should start reading the books</p>