1. SAT PREP

2. ABOUT THE SAT Order of Attack 1. Critical Reading 2. Math 3. Writing and Essay

3. Critical Reading - easiest to notice how the SAT uses rules and patterns to make questions predictable and objective even when they might seem not to be. - good introduction to the extreme importance of reading carefully and paying attention to details.

4. Math - the math section is all about basic concepts being combined and presented in strange ways, and our goal is to learn how to look at a Math question that seems impossible at first and figure out which basic concepts are involved, and then use them to answer the question.

5. Writing and Essay - Before attacking this section make sure that your target schools require this section. If they don’t then don’t devote your energy to improving these sections. - You can find out by looking at the schools website or contacting admissions directly.

6. Only work with questions from The College Board Three of the most important themes to remember 1. SAT questions are written according to specific rules and patterns 2. learning to beat the SAT is a matter of learning to identify those rules and patterns and exploit their inherent weaknesses systematically 3. Most of the problems that most people have on the SAT are the result of poor test-taking skills, not of deficiencies in subject-matter knowledge.

7. ……so if you want to raise your SAT score, the skill you need to develop is the ability to look at strange questions, figure out whatever basic thing they actually want you to do, and then do it. ***Only THE COLLEGE BOARD can reflect the actual rules and strategies that will be on the SAT because they wrote it***

8. GUESSING??? DON’T

9. GUESSING??? First Things First: Natural test takers encounter things they don’t know or have never heard of every time they take the SAT. It’s totally normal. In fact, in a lot of ways it’s inevitable. We are NOT talking about marking an answer choice when we don’t know the meaning of every word in the question, when we don’t know what a sentence says, when we’re not sure of the grammar, when we don’t know for certain how to do the math involved, or anything like that. For our purposes the above examples are NOT guessing – guessing only happens when you’re not sure the answer you’re marking is right.

10. The order of the questions range from easiest to hardest First 1/3 are easy Second 1/3 are medium difficulty Last 1/3 are hard

11. You may not understand everything in the question but you can still be sure that you get the answer right! Don’t quit on these questions, because you will come across many of them on the test. Point System - you get a single raw point for every question that you get right. - You lose a fraction of a raw point for each wrong answer.

12. What to do instead of guessing? When you come to a question you don’t understand, skip it. Don’t think about it, just do it.

13. CERTAINTY AND THE SAT The SAT only gives you one correct answer choice for each question, and this correct answer choice is totally, definitively, incontrovertible the correct answer. There are no arguments to be made against it. There is only ONE correct answer to every single question!

14. KEY REALIZATIONS 1. the only way to do really well on the SAT is to mark the correct answer to most of the questions on the test. 2. the only reliable way to mark the correct answer consistently is to be able to identify it consistently. 3. Before you can identify the correct answer consistently, you have to know and believe that there will always be one correct answer for every question – if you’re open to the possibility that more than one answer will be correct, you won’t be strict about eliminating answers by using the rules and patterns of the test. 4. most students never realize this, and as a result they never maximize their performance. Instead, they treat the SAT like a regular high school test, which is huge mistake for the reasons we just discussed.

15. WHERE TO FIND MISSING POINTS Most test takers have an idea of a target score they need to get for their target schools or for certain scholarships. This range is usually between 1500- 2250. Most students try to hit their target score by improving areas where they are weakest, but I would recommend improving your strongest areas first for these 3 reasons: 1. People usually feel more comfortable working on their strong areas, so there’s less stress. 2. The mistake you’re making in your strong areas are more likely to be things related to “careless errors,” or things you can correct with minimal effort.

16. CONTINUED… 3. The closer you are to the top of the scoring scale, the bigger the impact of each new question that you answer correctly. In other words, if you’re scoring around 710 in the Math section, then answering or two more questions correctly might increase your math score by 30 point or more. But if you’re score around a 520, then answering another one or two questions correctly might only raise your score 10 points. This is the result of the norming process that the College Board uses to “curve” the test scores.

17. SAT PASSAGE-BASED READING Overview and Reminders - THE ANSWER TO A READING QUSTION IS ALWAYS AS CLEAR AND DEFINITE AND OBJECTIVELY PREDICTABLE AS THE ANSWER TO A MATH QUESTION. - You are required to look at the passage in a way that’s totally different from the approach you would use in an English class. In English you are rewarded for coming up with as many different interpretations

18. PASSAGE BASED READING 5 Reasons why most test takers never notice how passage based reading questions work: 1. Most students aren’t even looking for an answer choice to be stated directly in the text. -most test takers are used to analyzing everything they read the way an English teacher would want. They don’t even notice the answer being restated.

19. 2. The college board deliberately phrases questions to make you think you should use subject interpretation to find the answer. - The college board wants you to think that there are 2-3 correct answers. They use words such as “primarily”, “probably”, “suggests” and so on. IGNORE these words completely. EX: “in line 10, the author primarily suggest which of the following?” Rephrase this question to “Which of the following ideas appears directly in the text somewhere close to line 10?”

20. 3. We sometimes have to be extremely particular about the exact meanings of words, both in the text and in the answer choice. - the college board can get very picky about the specific meaning of words. This causes test takers to conclude incorrectly. Ex: a text mentioned dolphins sharing certain abilities with “very few animals”. -one of the wrong answers said dolphins had “unique” talents. This is wrong because it doesn’t just mean something is rare. In the strictest sense of the word, “unique” means something is literally one of a kind. In a school setting you can use unique loosely and use the word to mean rare and teachers may over look it but not on the SAT. Only consider exactly what the word means and read each word carefully.

21. 4. Test Takers are sometimes mistaken about what words mean. Memorizing vocab words won’t help this problem and can actually hurt you even more. There are going to be questions where you don’t know what some of the words mean. If you are looking at a question and none of the answer choices seems to restate the passage, the bottom line is that you’ve made a mistake somewhere.

22. 5. The college board has a special rule that it sometimes invokes. The college board will treat two ideas expressed in quick succession as though they are perfectly synonymous; if there is a negating word between those two ideas, the college board will treat those ideas as though they are perfect antonyms.

23. WRONG ANSWERS Wrong answers don’t restate the relevant portion of the text. There are specific ways in which wrong answers don’t restate the text. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals…

24. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong Answer Type 1: Extra information -some information is true and other is added in Example: his sister was having difficulty seeing the equipment that she used to run her dress shop

25. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong answer type 2: Direct Contradiction This type of wrong answer directly contradicts something in the citation. Example: His sister’s perfect vision served as an inspiration.

26. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong answer type 3: Complete irrelevance -this wrong answer type has nothing to do with the cited text. The text is not a piece of literature from English class so do not try to interpret it. Example: He wanted to revolutionize the way society viewed glass.

27. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong answer type 4: Confused concepts This type uses a lot of the ideas mentioned in the citation, but messes up the relationships between them. Example: His sister invested in a cure for his vision problems.

28. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong answer type 5: Factual Accuracy College board will throw in a wrong answer that might be factually accurate, but isn’t specifically stated in the text. Example: He was tired of having to switch between different types of glasses.

29. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong answer type 6: Off by one word This is one of the most dangerous wrong answer types. They use a phrase that mirrors the text exactly except for one or two words. Example: His sister had a congenital vision problem.

30. Example Citation: …Researchers have shown that Benjamin Franklin’s sister was visually impaired, which might explain the amount of energy that Franklin invested in the invention of bifocals… Wrong answer type 7: Valid Interpretation Valid and defensible interpretations of the text in a literature class. Franklin never mentioned loving his sister so we can not assume. Example: Franklin loved his sister and wanted to make her life easier.