<p>First off, congrats to anyone who did well on their Physics (and any other) subject test(s)! </p>
<p>Anyway, I was hoping you high-scorers could help me out. I just finished my junior year of High School and I took a full year of Physics Honors. Next year I will be taking AP Physics B as a senior but of course since it will be too late to take the subject test next June, I took it this month. In my class, we basically made it up to the beginning of Electric fields and we never really got into electricity and magnetism or ANY modern physics. I'll admit I procrastinated A LOT and I only reviewed for the subject test using my Princeton Review book for about 4 days. In those 4 days, I skimmed through the book for an hour or so each day and my practicing involved taking the first Sparknotes test before even beginning to study (scored like a 490) then taking another practice test the day before the actual exam (scored a 620). On the actual exam I ended up with a score of 660, which admittedly was higher than I expected but still I wanted to score at least a 700. Anyway, now that I have a lot of time to study for the exam and I'll be taking this studying a lot more seriously, I was wondering if you guys could describe what your studying was like and what you guys recommend I do to score higher.</p>
<p>TL;DR- What do you recommend I do to bring up my score?</p>
<p>I got an 800 on the june test (yayyyyyyyyyy I guess) but I had finished AP Physics B by the time of the test. I used PR to study for the AP and borrowed kaplan sat II from a friend to study for the sat II. I didn’t use the explanations a lot but as far as I can tell for review purposes they were good although I doubt they would be good for learning for the first time (but PR was good for that). I pretty much just took the practice tests and then read the explanations for the questions I got wrong and then read the sections about those topics. I don’t know what your AP Phys book is, but mine was giancoli and it was way to long-winded etc. to study for the ap or sat II so I don’t recommend using that. The plus to this is you should be almost completely prepared for the ap (except fluids and a few other things) by the time you take it (although you prob won’t care any more…). Overall I think just study the 180 points of stuff you didn’t know and you should be fine. The curve truly is really generous.</p>
<p>I got a 790 on the Physics SATII</p>
<p>Let me tell you, I studied a ton. I took honors physics for a year (taking AP Physics C next year), but my course only covered about half the material on the subject test. The best advice I can give you is: study study study. Do practice tests. I did one every weekend for 3-4 weeks. Memorize equations and random facts. I managed to get away knowing very little about thermodynamics and gas laws, but I definitely knew a lot about everything else. </p>
<p>Learn the equations. Sometimes you can use them to answer questions you know conceptually nothing about. That’s what I did for the thermodynamics one. I knew nothing about the concepts but got away with just knowing Q = mcT. </p>
<p>The curve is super generous. Take advantage of that. Of course, I would’ve loved an 800, but I’m not complaining. Learn when to guess, and when to skip questions. </p>
<p>I used PR. Sparknotes has some good (but difficult) practice tests online that you can access for free. I’d stay away from Kaplan. </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>The test was more conceptual. It does not require math for every section so you should have a grasp at the basic mechanisms (how things work, how systems behave in such a way, etc.) In order of my preference, I used PR, Kaplan, Sparknotes, and Barrons all together. By the way, I got an 800.</p>
<p>I got an 800 this june with only 1 year of prep, Physics B class. I recommend PR because it focuses on concepts which the test mostly focuses on. I don’t believe spark notes is accurate because I got low 700s on it and still got a solid 800 on the test (was only expecting -4).</p>
<p>@Muskrat267: Haha yeah I wish I could of taken AP Physics B this year but I guess I learned from my mistakes. Anyway yeah I thought Princeton Review did a good job of explaining everything… I think if I would have really read it instead of skimming through, I could have done a lot better. Also, trust me I am going to be putting a lot of effort in school even though it IS my senior year. I plan on taking the AP test along with 4 others so I’m glad I will be familiar with these types of tests. Thanks for your insight.</p>
<p>@bailey42: It’s funny you bring up thermodynamics… in my honors class we learned practically everything about the subject EXCEPT for thermal expansion. I don’t know why we skipped over it but I figured if we didn’t cover it in class it wasn’t important. BIG MISTAKE! There were a couple of questions on the June test about it and I had to leave them blank (although maybe they were on the practice tests i took the day before… it’s all a blur =P). Anyway I plan on taking at least 5 practice tests before the next test day.</p>
<p>@benhpark: I’m glad you pointed that out… that was one of the things I kind of noticed while taking the actual test. At first I wondered how I was going to get through the exam without a calculator but I saw I really didn’t need it. I plan to use PR, Barrons, then Sparknotes’s practice tests to prepare for the next test. With such a generous curve, I do believe a 750+ is very possible or at the very least a 700+.</p>
<p>I took AP Physics B this year and scored a 780 ( 
) on the SAT II exam. The SAT II in Physics is very, very, very similar to the MC section of the AP exam. This is because both exams test concepts more than calculations (because calculators are banned). I thought that doing past Physics B MC was good enough practice for me, though some of the topics on the SAT II (like permanent magnets, fiber optics, whether or not a running car engine would affect the shock felt by a person touching the car) were completely foreign to me. Still, doing Physics B MC got me a 780 (I had expected 800), and there was no way I could expect something like permanent magnets to be on the test, so I’d say the MC was very good practice.</p>
<p>@meteman: Yeah I wish I would have taken Physics B… def would of helped =/. Also, thanks for reassuring me that PR is a good study guide.</p>
<p>@314159265: Although I know that 800 would have been so much more appealing/satisfying, a 780 is still a remarkable score no matter how you look at it. Then again, I know that what I believe is a great score might not be what others want so I guess I can understand where you are coming from. Anyway, it’s nice to know that this test will help me prepare for the AP test even if these subject tests don’t make or break my application and probably have less importance than I think. </p>
<p>Thanks to everyone that replied so far. I’m going to go to sleep now but I’ll be back sometime tomorrow hopefully.</p>
<p>I didn’t reply originally because I only got a 700, but I thought you might want some input from another person who didn’t take AP Physics B. I didn’t even take an honors physics class (my school didn’t have it) - the only option open to me for my junior year was a regular physics class, because I wasn’t in calc yet, so I couldn’t do AP Physics C. Anyway, it didn’t even come close to covering the SAT II material, so I had to study on my own.</p>
<p>Like you, I used the Princeton Review book - I went through the whole thing pretty carefully, did all the sample problems, etc. I didn’t do any of the sample tests, though. The other thing I did the I think really helped was that I went to my library, and they had a copy of the official guide to all SAT subject tests. I took the Physics SAT test of of that book (and this was like 2 days before my SAT!), and it was quite different form the Princeton Review. I think I scored like a 580 or something? Not good. Anyway, after taking the test, I literally went back through every single problem I missed and made sure I absolutely understood each one. Then I retook that test, and kept doing it until I had it down cold. I think that’s what really helped me get to 700 on the actual test; it really helped to look at an actual previously administered test made by the college board. I know it sounds like it might not help, because I was using the same questions over and over, but the Physics SAT, like many standardized tests, is fairly formulaic. I definitely saw some of the exact same questions on the test, with maybe a few numbers changed or something. </p>
<p>Sidenote - I also had the world’s <em>worst</em> proctor ever for the Physics SAT (she like locked us out of our test room for 25 minutes and then though she was giving the SAT I…), so I feel like it wasn’t an ideal testing environment. Regardless, I can only claim a 700, so not as high as a lot of other people, but hopefully hearing from someone who didn’t have AP Physics B helps!</p>
<p>Wait… if I am taking AP Physics C: Mechanics only, is that completely unrelated to the Physics SAT II?</p>
<p>^Not completely, but with only knowledge from Physics C: Mechanics (and no other class), you will fail the exam. You will be able to do most to all of the problems relating to mechanics, but you won’t be able to do everything else–E&M, thermodynamics, fluids, waves, optics, nuclear physics, etc.</p>
<p>@CaliforniaDancer: Thanks for replying… that information was actually very helpful. I think my biggest problem was even though I was familiar with the majority of the information (except for E&M and Modern Physics), I just took 2 practice tests and never bothered to see what I did wrong. I only cared about what score I got. I guess my preparation for the next exam will be taking as many practice tests as possible.</p>