<p>For my first SAT I had a 6 on the essay, then after searching the net, a day before my second sit, I discovered that some essay 'formulas' could actually make you have a 12, because of my lack of knowledge about the SAT at that time I studied like...0 minutes... lol, and got an 8. </p>
<p>And now I am going to be taking the SAT in October and I really want to get a 12!
Do you have a list of words that you revise before the test, in case it might apply to the context of your essay?
Also, which words should I alwayssss remember that could be manipulated into any subject? </p>
<p>Thanks :)</p>
<p>There are no formulas that guarantee a 12. Also, having a set of words that you want to use will likely work against you because artificiality is frequently salient.</p>
<p>Silverturtle, if I talked to you on a regular basis, my vocabulary would skyrocket.</p>
<p>Silverturtle is correct. There is no definitive way to actually get a 12. It depends on the reader. The reader would probably be more irritated to actually search the word that you wrote, because there is a chance that they wouldn’t know the word. The thing is that you DON’T want to irritate the reader, or he/she might give you a lower grade. </p>
<p>You want to keep your essay simple, yet very detailed with your examples. Don’t use the SAT vocabulary. </p>
<p>[SAT:</a> Improve SAT Score with SparkNotes: Beat the Essay](<a href=“SparkNotes: Today's Most Popular Study Guides”>SparkNotes: Today's Most Popular Study Guides)</p>
<p>I hope this gives you a sense of what I am saying.</p>
<p>I would just use a fancy word here and there; you don’t want your essay to reflect that your trying to be pedantic.</p>
<p>A lot of people tend to believe that “thesaurusizing” will somehow improve the quality of their essays. This is a false presumption and an ideal that can serve detrimental to your essay score if you’re not careful. </p>
<p>By thesaurusizing, I mean don’t try and use fancy words in an attempt to awe your reader, because, nine out of ten times, it will not happen. Words like “metagrobolize”, believe it or not, typically look out of place and will utterly ruin the flow of a sentence if you’re not an experienced writer.</p>
<p>But don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad thing to use nice words because they’re definitely…nice. Just make sure that you know what you’re doing and your essay doesn’t sound awkward at the end of it all. </p>
<p>Awkward:
“Joey and I were close friends, but his insipidity and fatuity always discombobulated me at the worst times! It always happened when we were in close company.”</p>
<p>Good:
“Joey and I were close friends, but his lack of common sense made me embarrassed to be around him sometimes!”</p>
<p>There were no fancy words anywhere in the second sentence, but it clearly triumphs over the first example in terms of organization and structure. When people try to incorporate all of these different words that no one has ever heard of, sentences tend to fall apart and lose all rhyme and reason. </p>
<p>The best advice I can offer you is this: use long sentences and mix them up with short sentences to add variety to your essay. Short sentences alone will make your paper look choppy, whereas long sentences alone will make your essay feel incredibly long winded and boring.</p>
<p>Cheers.</p>
<p>@silverturtle - “artificiality is frequently salient.” owned it! 
By the way I am reading the entire sat help thread by you, thank you so much!
@nothingto - thanks for the link! I completely understand what you are saying: as an example, I shouldn’t learn new words for the sake of impressing my reader if I don’t know how to apply it to the context.
@protoslg - that is exactly what I want ‘a fancy word here and there’… I agree that too much is never too good 
(by the way nice word ‘pedantic’, I had actually never heard of it before.)
@collegeattempt - thanks for sharing, I totally understand what you are conveying, great examples by the way the ‘wrong’ one made me giggle a bit </p>
<p>I guess now I see my question was a bit ‘off’, what I really have to focus on is making my thoughts and ideas clearer not only in my head but on paper, I think this is what goes wrong with my essays. Sentence structure is also something I definitely need to look into a little more.</p>
<p>Silverturtle - that was a good threat onSAT preparation!</p>