<p>Hi, I'm a current Amherst College sophomore who's recently been given a task of tutoring a current 10th grader. She's received relatively lower score than her ability, so it won't be difficult to raise the score. When I got into Amherst I didn't really study much and just tackled the exam and received an acceptable score-- so now I don't know how to teach my student the strategies and such relevant to the critical reading section.</p>
<p>The math section I can handle since I'm familiar with tutoring math and am very good at math myself; but critical reading I don't really understand how to "tutor". I feel as though that critical reading section is more so an assessment of reading/vocab abilities accomplished through years of schooling, not a two-week intensive training program. </p>
<p>I am going to read through some of the Rocket Review book strategies that I was given recommendations for; but any insight as to building teaching plans for critical reading section will be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>I totally agree that the critical reading can’t be “tutored” in the sense that it can’t be crammed for. But this is how I approach Critical Reading with my students.</p>
<p>I start off by reading the passage paragraph by paragraph with the student. I ask if there are any words that he/she doesn’t know and then define them and have the student write the definition down.</p>
<p>Then, I ask the student to break the paragraph down and to give me the basic point of the paragraph (if there is one). Does the paragraph introduce something? Give a counter example?
Also, I ask the student to tell me if he/she picks up on the tone of the paragraph. Is it humorous, poignant, critical, etc.
If the student just can’t figure it out, I explain the passage.</p>
<p>So I do this for the entire passage until the end and then have the student sum up the main points and tone of the passage. Hopefully, this makes the answers for most of the questions apparent.</p>
<p>Then when we get to the questions, it’s all the same standard SAT advice. For all line reference questions, read the sentence preceding and following the line being referred to. Use process of elimination, etc.</p>
<p>Fill-in-the-blanks, which account for approximately 30% of the questions on Critical Reading, is largely dependent on the student’s vocabulary. Assign one of those cram lists. If there isn’t time to go through hundreds or thousands of words, whenever you come across any word that you think she might not know, define it for her as best as you can and use a real world example.</p>
<p>I think repeated exposure to SAT critical reading passages over two weeks (meaning at least 2 long passages per day) will pick up your student’s score, if only by virtue of getting used to the style of the questions. The vocabulary portion is a different story and with only two weeks your student is at a disadvantage but not without hope. I’d be realistic with her and have her shoot for something attainable in the sub 700 range unless she is willing to put forth a ridiculous amount of effort in learning vocabulary.</p>