Questions from a first time SAT test taker

Test Preparation
1

<p>I am taking my first SAT in March and hoping to get a 2100. So, I pretty much want around a 700 on each section. </p>

<p>First, I know each test is different but how many can you get wrong to still get a 700+? How many could you omit and still get a 700+</p>

<p>Second, is it better to guess on a question or just omit it when aiming for a high score? </p>

<p>I know these may be hard to answer but I will appreciate any tries! Thank you!</p>

2

<p>Not only is each section different, but each test administration is different. For example, on the math sections, sometimes you must answer every question (correctly) to get an 800. Other times, you need only answer 53 out of the 54 questions correctly. You can see examples of the curves here:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.erikthered.com/tutor/SAT-Released-Test-Curves.pdf[/url]”>http://www.erikthered.com/tutor/SAT-Released-Test-Curves.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>To get a 700 on the math sections, you generally need 48-50 points (out of 54). So if you need a 50, that means you can omit 4. Or, you can omit 2 and get 1 wrong.</p>

<p>To get a 700 on the reading sections, you generally need 58-60 points (out of 67).</p>

<p>It’s hard to figure out what you need on the writing sections, because 25-30% of the score will be from your essay.</p>

<p>With respect to your second question: the conventional wisdom is that you should guess if and only if you can eliminate at least one of the answer choices because statistically you will come out ahead. Other people think you should guess no matter what because statistically you’ll be no worse off than if you omitted the question. Other people think you should never guess, because there is no such thing as random guessing on the SAT (you’ll always be misled by the trap answers).</p>

<p>One time you should ALWAYS guess, though, is on the math grid-ins. They do not have a wrong-answer penalty. So, it only takes you 2 seconds to bubble in “1” or whatever, and you might pick up a point.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

3

<p>College Board has a really weird - and unfair - curve that favors low-performing students. Basically, one question wrong is about 20-30 points off if you’re in the 700s range!</p>