Hi all, I wanted to start a discussion with those who are taking the SAT US History subject test at all during the next school year. I’m taking it in October, after hearing the test was pretty difficult and knowing my APUSH knowledge probably fell short of what would be needed. For those who will be taking it, what have you heard about the test? Which prep books will you be using? I’ll be primarily using Barron’s and Kaplan. Please let me know what you guys are planning on.
I used Kaplan SAT book and the PR AP book and got an 800 in May. Studied for about 2.5 weeks and took all the Kaplan practice tests and a few I found online. Good luck.
I recently took the US History SAT exam, so I have a lot of pointers.
Books: I recommend three books, in this order;
- The Insiders Complete Guide to APUSH by Larry Krieger - This book is a must! I personally loved this book, and it is perfect for SAT even if the title says it’s for AP. He gives great pointers for SAT and AP, and the explanations are amazing.
- Barron’s - This book is very detail oriented, and while I got a bit bored, it was good for the exam. The practice tests are harder than the actual exam, but are considerably realistic.
- Kaplan - I have mixed reviews for this book. I really liked the style, in which it was like summarizing all of the information. This is good for after reading the first two. My only problem was that the practice tests were either too easy or unrealistic, but it is good for testing information. Don’t rely on the practice tests though.
Strategies:
- Be mindful of time. Have a specific plan set up. For me, I planned to finish the first thirty questions in the first twenty minutes, the next thirty in the next twenty minutes, and the last thirty in the last twenty minutes. I ended up finishing early, but it’s good to have a time limit to stick by. You should also try to finish the first thirty earlier, because they are the easiest. It gives you an ample amount of time to spend on the harder questions.
- Eliminate as many answer choices as possible. If even one word of the answer is incorrect, cross it out immediately. You’ll notice sometimes, that in the first answer, the first part is correct, and the second part isn’t. So if you’re not paying attention, you’ll make a mistake that could’ve been avoided.
- Read the question carefully. I can not stress this point. SO many questions were worded in a way that if you did not read it concisely, you would get it wrong. There are traps.
- If you have no idea, or can’t eliminate two or more answers, SKIP IT. I skipped five questions on my exam, and while I did not get my scores yet, I’m confident in a 750+, maybe even 780+. The curve for US History is extremely lenient. This is because you are not expected to know every single thing on there. Those five I skipped, I either had no idea or I couldn’t chose between my non-eliminated answers.
- Think of the answer before you read the actual answers. I’m not sure if this works for everyone, but I like to read the question, think of the answer in my head, and then read the choices. This may not work for you, but I found it helped my from carelessly choosing incorrect or partially correct answers.
- Study extensively. If you’re good at memorization, that’s a plus!
- Know your time periods and trends. Here’s an example:
The 1920s: Roaring Twenties/Jazz Age/Flappers/Red Scare/Margin Buying/Underconsumption and Overproduction/Hard time for farmers/Mainly Republican power/The Lost Generation
You’ll find that the more obvious ones, like the roaring twenties and flappers will have less questions than the others, mainly because they know that the majority of us will know the generalizations of the time period. Knowing time periods and trends help tremendously on questions, and even on tables and graphs that use dates. - Know the literature/music/art, but not too much. You don’t need to memorize every single book, the author, the year of publication, and every single detail about it. But you should know the most important (Larry Krieger’s book is perfect for this) and what types of books/art came out at specific time periods.
That’s all I can think of for now! Good Luck
Actually, I recommend the PR study book. It was the only one I used, and it split each time period into “20 important things” or something like that. It was dry reading but I skipped all the stuff I knew and just skimmed the stuff I didn’t. I also took APUSH 2014-15 (I took the SAT history in June 2015) so I already knew most of the info.
Make sure you review the format, too. There were a lot of quote questions, which I found really strange since I didn’t know the subject test would have any of those. And then I didn’t know a lot of the people either haha. But I still got a decent score so oh well 
Actually, I recommend the PR study book. It was the only one I used, and it split each time period into “20 important things” or something like that. It was dry reading but I skipped all the stuff I knew and just skimmed the stuff I didn’t. I also took APUSH 2014-15 (I took the SAT history in June 2015) so I already knew most of the info.
Make sure you review the format, too. There were a lot of quote questions, which I found really strange since I didn’t know the subject test would have any of those. And then I didn’t know a lot of the people either haha. But I still got a decent score so oh well
Actually, I recommend the PR study book. It was the only one I used, and it split each time period into “20 important things” or something like that. It was dry reading but I skipped all the stuff I knew and just skimmed the stuff I didn’t. I also took APUSH 2014-15 (I took the SAT history in June 2015) so I already knew most of the info.
Make sure you review the format, too. There were a lot of quote questions, which I found really strange since I didn’t know the subject test would have any of those. And then I didn’t know a lot of the people either haha. But I still got a decent score so oh well
I think the most important thing for these history SAT tests is contextualization. What this is is basically understanding the various time periods (Roaring 20s, WW2, 1950s, etc) and their characteristics and prominent events/people. When taking the actual test, contextualize each question in a certain period/era and the answer is easy to infer from there. There’s no real way to 100% know everything without doing some inferring.
You can gain the context knowledge about the time periods from class, and reading various review books (AMSCO, Larry Krieger etc).
Honestly, don’t worry too much. I had laringitis for 2 weeks before the test and was in bed with a fever most of the time. I was coughing like a lunatic during the exam and I finished 20 minutes early. I got a 760. Try to keep calm. When you are studying, focus on the court cases and causes of wars. I swear, half the questions in May were on court cases. If you take apush and work hard in the course, by May you’ll be good to go.
Thanks everyone for responding. I will be taking the test in November, and I’m just about to finish Kaplan. I’ve been pretty satisfied with the content and readability of Kaplan, but I observed two things:
- The 2015-2016 edition is nearly identical to the 2013-2014 edition. Don't bother buying the newer edition if the older one is cheaper, as the practice tests, questions, and reading content are exactly the same.
- The practice questions in the book seem a little too easy for the test. I guess that might be because I'm comparing it to Barron's, but nonetheless I wouldn't recommend using just Kaplan for practice tests. I've heard good things about Princeton Review and Barron's, but both have their trade-offs. I'll be using all three.
If any of you have other suggestions on prep books, or have already taken the test, feel free to post and get this discussion rolling.
Anybody taking this test tomorrow? My school doesn’t do AP so I had to self study for this. I’ve used PR, Kaplan and the APUSH book. I also have Barron’s but found that it was way too detailed and difficult and not accurate at all. A little concerned about the arts/books/music questions. How much do we need to know for those?
taking it tomorrow ! @emma27 yeah same I’m scared about the art questions. I’m using this quilzlet for review https://quizlet.com/82102691/apush-important-acts-flash-cards/
https://quizlet.com/82102962/apush-people-books-and-culture-flash-cards/
Good flashcards. A good strategy is to remember the name of the act and what it means as well as era and what it was associated with.
who’s taking this today?
How did you find it? @Gatortristan
@Emma27 I thought it was harder than all the practice tests I took but still doable. I took 3 tests and finished with 15 minutes left on all to go back and review but today i only finished with 4-5 minutes left to relook my work. I left 6 or 7 blank but I already know i missed 2 off that bat.
@Gatortristan
How about the fine arts & lit questions?
@Chrysanthemum14 we meet again.
what question was that?
@Chrysanthemum14 I knew all of the authors and their books but when they gave the song lyrics and the poems, I had no clue. I omitted those
Just hoping for a 700+
@Gatortristan i said the song was a protestant missionary hymn
teddy roosevelt’s trust busting policy: break up all monopolies or only trusts against the public interest?