What is the best book for vocabulary?

<p>I took the March 10 SAT and I got a 650 in the CR section. I know my major problem was the fact that I hardly knew the vocabulary that came up in the choices of a lot of the questions. </p>

<p>I've heard that the Sparknotes Vocabulary book is good... Is this true? If not, which one should I get to memorize vocabulary? I think i'm retaking the SAT in October of this year... So that should give me about seven months to study... I am a junior, by the way. Also, do you guys have any tips on memorizing vocabulary?</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

<p>I would recommend a dictionary...</p>

<p>Seriously though, my first course of action would be to ask a respected <cough>AP</cough> teacher at my high school. Then I would check this</a> search on Amazon. Also become familliar with greek and latin roots. I don't know much about the Sparknotes book.</p>

<p>As for memorizing, it is just like anything else-practice. Word associations, acronyms, stories, songs: they all work. Just takes time.</p>

<p>Ultimately though, vocab is hard to study for because so many words exist and so few are used on a single test. It is like trying to eliminate smoke with a flashlight. Don't waste too much time.</p>

<p>yeah memorizing lists of words isn't going to get you anywhere
if you really want to stare at lists of **** all day for no reaons, i guess learning some latin/greek roots would be more effective</p>

<p>i havent taken the sat yet, but i did get 80-80-78 on the psat if that counts for anything, so i'll just tell you what i did:
princeton review - learn what to look for in the sentences, they've got a lot of good strategies and stuff
i did NOT try to memorize a single word, didn't look at any vocab lists, nothing like that, it just isn't effective or helpful
I just accepted that i wouldn't know what most of the words meant and just got good at quickly identifying contextual clues and all that good stuff...
just my 2 cents</p>

<p>Well, if vocab is your problem, then yes, you should study it. It's good to increase your vocab anyway.</p>

<p>Get Word Smart. The SAT vocab list is great. Good tips too.</p>

<p>Learn the most popular words, from sparknotes. It'll at least help you eliminate answer choices.</p>

<p>What about the Barrons word lists?</p>

<p>Oh, so it would be best for me to just study roots then?
Thanks guys!</p>

<p>Definitely a good idea to study roots, but not just roots. Get the whole picture.</p>