<p>Hi,</p>
<p>I have found after recently taking a practice paper that I always lose a lot of marks on the CR sections whenever there is a passage that I find uninteresting and plain boring - in particular the passages on history. I really really hate the history passages and dropped the subject 3 years ago because it didn't work for me.</p>
<p>On the other hand, I'm bagging all the marks where there are passages that I enjoy. </p>
<p>With the other passages, however, the words go right through me and I barely understand what is being conveyed in the passage. I don't know whether this is an issue of lack of concentration or simply detesting the topic of the passage.</p>
<p>This is very worrying because I feel that (for me) there is a lot of luck involved in the CR section because my score partly depends on how good the passages are, and I don't want this to be a problem when I take the real SAT.</p>
<p>Has anyone else come across a similar problem? And do you have any ways of overcoming it? Any advice will be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Read a lot of stuff that's boring to you, and maybe you'll get used to it.</p>
<p>Motivate yourself.Just say ''Hey,i ve been studying for X months (years).My success at life depends ot this.It is just a 4 - hour exam.After that i am free''
This always helps.</p>
<p>Yes, I've confronted that problem. I was about 8, and fortunately for me I identified it as a problem at the same time that I read Heinlein's "Space Cadet," a book that really affected my thinking about education in general and how I ought to feed my mind.</p>
<p>There are all kinds of reasons why something that is not inherently interesting to me may really be interesting after all, and I try to find them. </p>
<p>Maybe it would be interesting to someone I know, and I work on it in order to prepare myself for a conversation (real or imaginary -- I often think about what my father would find interesting, although he died some years ago) about it. What would So-and-so be most interested in?</p>
<p>Maybe it relates to something that does interest me. The book I read yesterday is about a group of institutionalized people were victimized and their subsequent response to that victimization. At the start was a prologue that located the events being discussed in time and social attitudes. I wasn't really all that interested in reading it yesterday because (a) I was really looking for a book that wouldn't be too challenging for me and (b) I'm going to be reading entire boks on the context in the future, and I'll be getting a lot more detail (and the details interest me). All the same, since I am interested in the events described in the book, I stuck with it, trying to make as many connections between the ideologies being described and what i already knew about the incident, trying to recall the details and discussions I already know about, and trying to guess what was in the book that I didn't already know, based on what the author thought was important enough to include. (I also identified a couple of books I didn't know about that I should at least check out.)</p>
<p>Or maybe it's worth checking out because I believe that I should have at least a little knowledge of fields other than mine because (a) it keeps my mind limber and (b) It will increase the number of people with whom I can have an intellectual conversation. I know someone who's done research related to some of the topics discussed and I tried to recall some of what she'd told me about it.</p>
<p>Ultimately, though, if I limit my reading to things that interest me at the time I start reading them I'm going to limit myself terribly in the world today, and that's not acceptable to me, so I read over and over and over if that's what it takes, to get the words to penetrate my skull.</p>
<p>Yeah this seems to be a big problem for me too. When the passage is like some story I usually just dominate it.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the tips, they're really helpful. I was aware of this issue of mine from some time ago, so I was selecting some books on amazon that I wouldn't normally to develop more of an interest in those topics. I've been looking at some books on history and philosophy - if you've got any books to recommend then I'd be delighted to check it out.</p>
<p>Try a psychological approach. Lean over the test and follow the words with the eraser of your pencil. Immerse yourself.</p>
<p>During the actual test you'll be very alert so the boredom might be less of a problem. But do remind yourself of the cost of losing concentration. The CR passages are a real test of patience...don't let them get the best of ya! All the best.</p>
<p>What sorts of things do interest you? You might do better trying history and philosophy that ties in to your interests at least a bit.</p>
<p>My interests are mainly science and math. The previous passage that I read was about computers that use algorithms to imitate human thinking. I found that one very interesting and ended up getting all the questions on that passage correct.</p>
<p>I just try to convince myself that I'm thoroughly interested in whatever topic I'm reading - "Oh boy! Celery development!!!"</p>
<p>Okay, then, how about going over to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (it's a free online resource that is well-respected in the philosophy world and that contains articles written by leading philosophers) and checking out such topics as</p>
<ul>
<li>Aristotle and Mathematics</li>
<li>Francis Bacon</li>
<li>Feminist Social Epistemology</li>
<li>Galileo Galilei</li>
<li>Historicist Theories of Rationality</li>
<li>Hume's Newtonianism and Anti-Newtonianism</li>
<li>Thomas Kuhn </li>
<li>Lvov-Warsaw School</li>
<li>Medieval Theories of Demonstration</li>
</ul>
<p>I suspect that these might be close enough to things that interest you that you can find links, but still come from an approach that you might find uninteresting.</p>
<p>Also online you can find</p>
<ul>
<li>Descartes' "Meditations on First Philosophy"</li>
<li>Gettier's "Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?"</li>
<li>Plato's "Meno"</li>
<li>Quine's "Two Dogmas of Empiricism"</li>
</ul>
<p>Are any of these sufficiently boring to be good practice, but sufficiently related to the things that do interest you that you have at least some grounds for talking yourself into them being interesting?</p>
<p>Now, if you're interested in a trip to the library for books that you may not immediately think are interesting but that I think you might turn out to like, I'd suggest things like biographies of J. Robert Oppenheimer, Robert Kanigel's "The Man Who Knew Infinity," and Ken Silverstein's "The Radioactive Boy Scout." Books that I've thought were interesting that you might have to work harder to enjoy include things like Nora Groce's "Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language," Lawrence & Matsuda's "We Won't Go Back," and Ron Rosenbaum's "Explaining Hitler." I've just started Richard Westfall's "Never at Rest" but the first chapter at least might be one you'd enjoy.</p>
<p>I'll check this thread later in case you want to keep the conversation going, but please don't feel as if you have to.</p>
<p>^ Thanks so much for your detailed reply. I'll look into everything you've suggested, and might read some of the books you suggested.</p>
<p>I'm currently reading "The Kite Runner" and am thoroughly enjoying it, just to give you an idea of a book that interests me... I'm also about to read "Interventions" by Noam Chomsky which is more a collection of articles he's written, and "The Audacity of Hope" by Barack Obama...</p>