I recently took a a practice PSAT and got a score of 960 (translate to around 151 for the old test). I got a 143 my previous year as a sophomore and seeing this lack of improvement, I am pretty scared about the coming PSAT in two weeks.
Furthermore, my SAT results are lacking.
I took a self benchmark over the summer and got a 800 out of 1600 (I opted the essay out). I bought the Blue book and 'The Ultimate Guide to SAT Grammar" books to help supplement my practice. Currently, I am trying to use Xiggi’s method and Silverturtle’s by doing self prepping and avoiding the big box prep material. Still, I feel that I am not going to be prepared in time for the Dec SAT. Despite prepping, I find myself overwhelmed with Junior year (“August Stock market Loss” grades) and not being able to drill myself everyday with questions.
Should I take a prep class for PSAT/SAT? I was thinking of some local big ones such as C2, Elite, or ThinkTank, but I am concerned about the extremely high cost. There is an online one called Prepscholar (Friend told me about it and it’s way cheaper), I know little about it.
How do I prepare for these tests? Especially the PSAT in the coming two weeks?!
Any comment would be helpful in this moment of high stress. Thank you.
You should do everything you can to prepare in the remaining two weeks. If you can prepare on your own following some recommendations you read somewhere, then you don’t have to pay the big fees, but if your fear of the results is preventing you from preparing well, taking a commercial course might be a good idea.
The College Board SAT Online Course is a great resource for the current SAT. Do a complete practice test, determine your weak areas, do the lessons and quizzes in your weak areas, then do another practice test and repeat. Read the solutions carefully for all the questions you get wrong.
The Online Course costs $70 ($60 if you bought the Blue Book.
Unfortunately, the Online Course is available only for the current SAT.
Khan Academy is free and is the best prep currently available for the new PSAT/SAT. Don’t stress the PSAT, it doesn’t matter unless your score is in the NM range and 2 weeks is probably not enough to get it there even with PrepScholar. Have you tried the ACT? There is a free prep for the ACT and the old SAT on Naviance.
The questions on the Khan Academy Redesigned PSAT/SAT prep are significantly different from the official questions and practice tests that College Board has published. I have discussed this at length on another thread. You can consult that discussion if you are interested.
I recommend the 4 CB SAT’s, 1 CB PSAT and the additional sample practice problems on the CB website.
After that, obviously you have no alternative but to use what is available. Try to look for questions that are as similar as possible to the CB material. Some of the Khan questions are better than others in this regard.
Some other resources:
ACT material to prep for the writing section. (It is not exactly the same, but similar.)
Old PSAT and SAT CR without the sentence completions.
Some Math Level 2 and some Math Level 1 questions.
The Barron’s New PSAT book is not too bad, but short. The Kaplan book is dreadful. I will probably get the Barron’s New SAT when it comes out. Maybe also the Princeton Review.
Lobby CB for more official practice material.
Consider taking the ACT until better prep material is available.
If you want to read a technical paper with official sample questions, there are some interesting insights into how the test and the questions are supposed to work here:
I just read a recent article on an SAT prep blog that says you can prep for the new SAT math using old SAT questions.
I don’t agree with this. I would not use most old SAT math questions to prepare for the new SAT.
The new SAT math is different from the old SAT math.
Some areas have been removed, some added.
There is the no-calculator section. If you don’t remember how to find lcms or gdcs without a calculator, your elementary school math textbook is going to help you more than will old SAT math questions. There are fractions all over the place.
There are multipart questions with lengthy wording. You are going to need better verbal skills for the math than for the reading (almost).
The style of many questions has changed from “IQ puzzle” to “school” or “real world”.
There are still questions that have are unique either because of the peculiar language, or because of the math fudged to favor pattern recognition, or just because ETS has a bunch of clever people whose job it is to write unusual questions that you would not see anywhere else. It looks to me like those people are making a concerted effort NOT to write the same kind of unusual questions that were on the old SAT (or at least, not many).
You are right! There IS a fire sale. Grab it if you need it.
You can prep pretty decently for the old SAT with the Blue Book + the Official SAT Online Course + 2 SAT Preparation booklets (the third Preparation Booklet test is also in the Online Course). You should do not only all Online Course full tests but also all the quizzes. There are a few unusual problems in the quizzes.
IMO it’s a lot more and a lot better practice material than what you will get from Khan Academy for the new test.
I think @Plotinus does an excellent job in another thread of showing why computer driven prep programs, like prepscholar, are bound to have some serious flaws. They can’t evaluate how a student attacks each problem or why a question was answered right or wrong.
I wouldn’t make a black and white statement about the right kind of prep for every student.
I think automated prep courses can be good enough for some students. I consider prep with an automated course to be essentially a form of self-instruction. Students who are highly motivated, have good basic skills, and are able to learn from written explanations or video’s can certainly improve their scores from an online course. A course that uses official material or material very similar to official material is preferable.
There are some very good students who can self-prep just from the Blue Book. Hey, there are a few geniuses who can walk in and ace the test cold.
My point was that an automated course is never going to provide WORLD CLASS prep. For WORLD CLASS prep, you need a WORLD CLASS teacher.
When Khan Academy says that its computerized instruction is WORLD CLASS, I take this to be normal hyperbole from a start-up looking for grant money. I have no problem with that. Khan Academy is offering a very valuable resource to people around the world who want to learn some things on their own for free. Khan Academy needs money from foundations to support its work.
But when COLLEGE BOARD says that automated SAT prep is world class, implying that this automated prep is as good as or better than all other forms of prep, and claiming that it “levels the field” between wealthy kids and everyone else, then I start to get uncomfortable. College Board is supposed to be made up of experts in the field of education. College Board is not a start-up. College Board should not use marketing hype that is clearly false and also demeaning to teachers.
