Raising a 1760 SAT score? Which book is the best?

<p>So a friend of mines made a 1740 on his SAT, he increased from a 1420 the year before.</p>

<p>He has the following</p>

<p>Math: 580
Reading: 560
Writing: 620</p>

<p>He wants to get in at least the 1900s or 2000s when he retakes his SATs in December. The scores listed above were from his October SATs.</p>

<p>Now he has the Collegeboard blue book (the old version, not the new one), the Princeton Review 11 practice tests for the SAT and Princeton Review cracking the SAT book.
He did all of the practice test in those.</p>

<p>He wants a book that can give him more practice tests so he can be prepared for the SAT. </p>

<p>Which book is his best bet? (he has been considering the barron's book and grubber's for practice tests)</p>

<p>PS: Yes I am aware that there is a thread dedicated to this but the issue is I want a quick answer and not one which will take people hours to reply to. All help is appreciated.</p>

<p>Blue Book
only way all the way</p>

<p>I have heard a lot of good things about Grubbers so should he get that?</p>

<p>After doing practice tests, did he carefully go through everything he got wrong (and right), and check why he got that wrong (or right)? I think that would be more helpful than wasting time on a review book. You can only learn so much from those.</p>

<p>Yeah, I agree. You learn more by taking practice tests and recognizing the strategies that work best for you, and pinpointing your strengths and weaknesses.</p>

<p>Nevertheless, I’ve heard that Gruber’s is really good for math, although I’ve never used it myself.</p>

<p>Should he get the full grubber’s book and take practice tests in those?</p>

<p>nvm, he has the online course from his school so he can print out the practice tests. </p>

<p>He just needs to get the critical reading workbook now.</p>

<p>Although I am REALLY mad, I’d love to help your friend out.</p>

<p>I scored 1790 on my sat a while ago (similar to your friends.)</p>

<p>After taking 4 SAT practice tests, 5 full PSATS, some random critical reading sections in the BlueBook and reviewing my mistakes I got a 1940.</p>

<p>Why am I disappointed?
—My main focus during the time I studied was on Critical Reading and I did not improve one bit, mainly because the vocab really hit me. So if you have time I suggest you do vocabs, because I thought I was doing well according to the 10 tests I took (15-17 / 19 on S C), but did horrible. Writing — I always scored 4-5, but got around 8 or so just watch out, but if you do what I did I am sure you can hit 1900.</p>

<p>Well the SAT 2400 is by Barron’s Publications is the best bet anybody like your friend can have. Trust me I have used it and felt very useful…</p>

<p>if you have the time [and the money to spend]</p>

<p>i’d suggest TestMasters [houston based company, not california! … i dont know anything about that test prep company]. the online courses are really nice. some of my friends actually took the courses in person, but that would seem difficult for ur son with school and all.</p>

<p>it worked out really well for me. i liked watching the tutors [the math guy got slightly boring, but he got the job done. the english guy in the videos was amazing! ]got a decent score [28O points increase =D</p>

<p>I didnt like Grubers for math…</p>

<p>Teaches random stuff you dont need to know for the SAT I. </p>

<p>Tell your friend to get the College Board Online SAT course. Theres 9 (or 8) extra online pratices test.</p>

<p>I think he should use the PR Practice test book as I took the class and it helped me a bit. It wasn’t a considerable increase, as I already knew I was going to break 2000, but nevertheless I got a 2160 (730 M, CR and 700 W). Gonna re-take though, I think my score was balls.</p>

<p>@bumble you mentioned you took a testmasters online course. How was it taught? and most importantly, was it helpful?</p>

<p>it was great! im prepping for the Nov. 7th test!</p>

<p>i took the course last year. basically, there around 8 videos. you can only watch the videos till three days after you open the link for that video. you cannot download, so I suggest you get high bandwidth internet before signing up for the course, because all of the vids are streamed. when you watch a video, a homework assignment is assigned from the college board’s offical SAT study guide. you can send your test answers by inserting them into the site, and it will automatically grade your test. </p>

<p>the great part about testmasters is that you can write essays, and a grader will grade your essay, and send you a score back [just like the sat!] a list of SAT essay prompts from 2oo5 can be used to practice your writing skills. [same thing, time yourself, send your essay in, and itll be graded within two days] </p>

<p>i was really happy. it took about two weeks for me to get my books shipped overseas, but it was worth the wait. i had internet problems, and some problems with certain parts of the test, so I would call up the test masters office, and they would reset the videos that had expired so i could watch them again. that was very very very helpful.</p>

<p>so basically, ill sum this post up. once you’ve registered, you will recieve a test masters course manual [that you use when you watch the videos] , and online SAT course handout sheet [with cr stuff and essay topics], and the big blue book, college boad official sat study guide.</p>

<p>i would suggest taking the course one to two months prior to your sat testing date because the videos are very time consuming- and if it is hard to stream, its even harder! generally the videos were around three to four hours long. </p>

<p>i <3 test masters. </p>

<p>anyways hope this helps- bumble</p>

<p>oops- what i meant was that they give you prompts from march 2oo5 all the way to june 2oo7 [for each month, the diff topics] but since i took it a year ago, they would probably include the 2oo8 prompts as well.</p>

<p>=]</p>