<p>It seems the overarching piece of advice given by most experienced SAT test takers (and the seemingly popular program, Grammatix) here is to do as many practice questions and find the PATTERNS. Patterns that most questions have in common, I suppose. </p>
<p>Though really, this advice helps very little. What exactly is a pattern in terms of SAT questions? Can someone please provide an example?</p>
<p>The advice is designed to make the people giving it sound knowledgeable, but is of very little practical use.</p>
<p>:)</p>
<p>here's a couple to get you started--when an SAT math problem includes a diagram that isn't drawn to scale, it's typically because drawing the diagram to scale would give away the answer. (see, for example, question 3 on page 396 of the Blue Book and question 2 on page 407.) when a diagram omits information that appears below the diagram, it's usually because including that information in the diagram would make the question too easy (p. 408, number 4, and page 427, number 15).</p>
<p>if you want to use this approach to the SAT, you need to work with questions written by the college board, because 3rd-party questions often violate the patterns that appear on the actual test.</p>
<p>Great math patterns, and the CR? ;)</p>
<p>Excellent post xitammarg, makes a bit of sense. Though I am looking at problem 15 on page 427 and I have no clue why that answer is right... and why it is obvious. :-/</p>
<p>that's one of the ones that would be easier, not necessarily obvious. let's take a look--</p>
<p>the included info below the diagram says that PQ is 6, but the diagram leaves that part out. when we put it in, we can see that PQ is bisected by the y-axis, which means in turn that the x-coordinate of Q is 3 (since it's 3 units from the y-axis). from there you can set out that a - x^2 = x^2 where x = 3, since Q is the intersection of the two functions, and solve for a.</p>
<p>but a faster way to answer the question is to note that y = a-x^2 will intercept the y-axis at y = a, and then try to figure out where that intercept occurs. if you know that PQ is 6 and you know that the diagram is drawn to scale, you can see that the distance from O to (y = a) is exactly 3 times the distance from P to Q. not that you asked, but that would work too :)</p>
<p>ahh, excellent. </p>
<p>Actually, your second (faster) way you suggested was one that I was actually considering when I was struggling with the question.</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>Any other patterns?</p>