<p>Does anyone know a plan, that the most successful CC students have, that score the highestttt scores.</p>
<p>do they..
1. keep doing practice tests
2. cram vocab words, cram, cram, cram
3. something else?</p>
<p>Ho OFTEN do they practice the tests? How many have u guys gone through b4 u got ur very good score? I want to know please lol! thanks</p>
<p>I'm doing the first. The unofficial master of strategies on CC, xiggi, promotes the first, and disparages the second.
Practice tests are supposedly the way to go.
The process is:
1. Take practice test.
2. Look at what you got wrong.
3.Realize why you got it wrong.
4.Think of a way to prevent yourself from making that mistake again.
5.Ingratiate all of your lessons from your mistakes into your testaking.
Like for me, a couple of my recurring mistakes are from misreading math problems and spotting errors in the writing section. I try to keep in mind to read the question carefully in the math section, and to check over all my E answers for the sentence errors ( a helpful exercise).</p>
<p>I am taking an SAT class- Elite to be exact. I take a practice test everyweek( harder than the normal test on purpose). Then i have 3 1 and 1/2 hour classes on writing, math and critical reading. Fun times. But hey it works, on the practice tests my score has one up 150 points since i started</p>
<p>I would certainly recommend doing a practice test or two, but don't overprep. Cramming vocab words is pretty useless, and, in my opinion, there are better things to do than practice SAT tests. My score was alright, and I did very little prep (4-5 practice tests over the course of a year), although I do think that it may have been to my benefit to have gone through like 20 practice tests and some of the other review books on the market. I honestly think that if you have the aptitude, the SAT is all about attitude. Be supremely confident, even arrogant, when you take the test. Don't be too nervous. It's just a test, and the answers are all there (except for grid-ins). So, in summary: don't cram vocab, don't read too much, don't take too many practice tests (just a few to learn the directions & format), and don't stress. You know all the math, and you should know how to read. DO be confident. DO trust your abilities to be in the top 2% or so of test takers. Attitude is everything. BTW, I got 800v/750m, and I certainly am no genius.</p>
<p>Other posters in this thread have mentioned that practice is important. This is no different than practicing for tennis or soccer: it's a game of strategy and repetition. The material that will be tested on the SAT is not that difficult but the presentation and language is confusing for anyone who has not done much testing or competitions. </p>
<p>In my opinion, there are two steps in preparing for the test. The first one includes building blocks of confidence and the second one involves time management. That is why I recommend to break the tests in smaller and manageable sections. The idea is to devote about thirty minutes to try to answer the tests and about the same to review the answers. While most students focus on the scores and check their wrong answers, much can be gained from checking the correct answers. It is important to TRULY understand the answers and try to understand how the SAT questions are developed. To do this, one has to be comfortable with the material tested. For this reason, the student ought to review the particular question in books like Gruber's for math. Once someone starts building his blocks of knowledge, he needs to gain more confidence. ... the confidence to approach the test with some aggressivity. One of the reasons that I recommend to start working with open books is to allow a student to make sure he understands the questions AND the answers. Again, the preliminary scores are not important and there are plenty of tests to use for score comparison. For less than twenty dollars, you can easily establish a library of close to twenty tests. </p>
<p>Knowing the format of the questions helps tremendously, recognizing the questions early leads to time savings. There are many time saving strategies that can be taught but most students should be able to develop their own. </p>
<p>One of the reasons that I recommend to start working with open books is to allow a student to make sure he understands the questions AND the answers. Again, the preliminary scores are not important and there are plenty of tests to use for score comparison. For less than twenty dollars, you can easily establish a library of close to twenty tests. </p>
<p>I do not want to make this post so lengthy that it becomes totally boring. I do not have the presumption to believe that my advice is necessarily the best but I believe that it represents the result of a disciplined and long-term review of most of the material available. </p>
<p>This brings me to the availability of material. The best source books are Princeton Review, Barrons, Gruber's, Kaplan, and McGraw-Hill -in that order! Stay away from Arco, Peterson's and especially REA. I would suggest that you buy AS MANY as you can and review them yourself. The strategies for math are pretty much universal but the approach for verbal does vary. It is IMPORTANT that you check the verbal strategies and see the one that works for your particular situation. There is NOT a BEST approach for verbal, it is very subjective. </p>
<p>Alas, The College Board no longers sells disclosed tests and ETS only sells past versions of the PSAT. Most companies have tried to write tests but do not do a great job. One issue is that most of the tests DO contain mistakes and can lead to students' confusion. As far as Barron's, the SAT book contains good strategies but the tests are mostly irrelevant as they do NOT match the difficulty of the test. It does NOT help to take a test that is more difficult than the real thing: the extra difficulty does not help a student prepare for the SAT if the type of question will NEVER show up! It is just a waste of time. It is similar to use the SAT-Math IIC to prepare for the SAT. You'll learn something but not what you seek to learn. The same criticism applies to the famous 3500 Barron's wordlist. I believe that this list is a real fraud. Barron's simply combined a list of words that appeared in past SAT and added to a recycled GRE list. It does a good job of rehashing the past but does an abysmal job to predict future words. Except for a few specific cases, spending hours learning the wordlist is a waste of time. I have addressed the relative (un)importance of vocabulary in past posts, and I do not believe it is worth repeating it here. </p>
<p>We know a lot less about the New SAT than about the old one. At this time, I would encourage everyone to read the Official Study book and suscribe to the TCB online help. I think it is important to understand HOW ETS/TCB think. Getting 'in the head" of the test writers makes a lot of difference. When reading the solutions TCB proposes, remember that they usually offer a lengthy solution to cover all bases. Part of your preparation work is to devise shortcuts - some are available in the source books, but most will be your own. </p>
<p>A last thought, ALWAYS make sure you understand the question. If the question seems nebulous, chances are that you missed an important clue. </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>xiggi great post, thanks for giving that great advice :)
i have a question for you
what do you think of Sparknotes, Cliffsnotes, and Rocket Review's SAT Prep books
do u think they r better than McGraw Hill's
i have look on the Barnes and Noble and Amazon.com sites and have seen bad reviews of McGraw Hill's SAT 2400 book
over this summer i am gonna rigorously prep for the New SAT and try to take it in January 2006
i know im gonna get Princeton Review, Barrons, Gruber's, and Kaplan SAT books but which of Cliffsnotes, McGraw Hill, and Rocket Review do you recommend the most
i dont know about cliffsnotes but i have heard good reviews of rocket reviews books so please give me any info u have about these books
thanks in advance</p>
<p>hannanaq rocket review is written by the same author as Princeton Review.
While I havent really looked at other SAT books, the rocket review has all the standard strategies that you will find and a few novel ones ( to me at least).
The math section of the book is very strategy-intensive; It fails to really explain how to do some of the harder problems but instead tells you what strategy to use and how. The other sections were very helpful.</p>
<p>Xiggi, do you really need to review problems that you got right in the math section, if you totally knew how to do them? I understand that with regards to the verbal and writing sections, where correct answers can be half guesses. In the math section, I know how to almost every problem. BTW in the CB guide there are no explanations for the practice tests.</p>
<p>Thank you everyonee</p>
<p>and wow that is the longest post i have ever read xiggi
What college do u go to , xiggi?</p>
<p>Ohh, By the WAy, I am using the REA 1995 book for the ACT right now!!
why is REA bad??</p>
<p>Listen, take practice tests, in test conditions. I tried memorizing words (helped a little bit), and taking certain difficult section of practice tests (no help at all, as it turned out). Just take the whole tests, even if your have trouble with only one part of it (critical reaing for me), and you'll do better. I improved my score by 250 pts total after doing 7 practice tests, honestly. But you guys are out of luck because they are making math more school-like. SAT math used to measure how smart you are, but now it will pretty much measure how good at math you are. Also they eliminate analogies and expand the disgustingly subjective critical reading, and adding writing, thus completely destroying immigrants' chances of succeeding on the test. Stupid collegeboard.</p>
<p>How are the sparknotes books? I plan on using them to study for the SAT Math IIC exam.</p>
<p>does REA refer to the book made by the people who make the SAT?</p>
<p>collegeborad? yes, i think so</p>
<p>xiggi, thanks so much for your incredibly thoughtful post.</p>
<p>I've just started to prepare -- better late than never, I guess. I've taken two practice tests and I'm puzzled by the results. On the verbal and critical writing sections of both tests I scored 750 or better, but on the math I scored a dismal 620 and 640. Here's the puzzling part -- I'm a stronger math student than an English student! I takes honors math at school and have always gotten A's. I do fairly well in English, too, but not nearly as consistently well as I do in math.</p>
<p>Is this happening to anyone else? Any suggestions? Thanks</p>
<p>dmitryr, REA does not refer to 10 Real SATs or the Official Studyguide for the New SAT, both by the Collegboard. Most agree that the 10 Real's book is one of the most helpful available, while REA is imo pretty dismal.</p>
<p>What is REA then?</p>