Garga Posted July 22, 2018 Share Posted July 22, 2018 Has anyone ever used College Prep Genius for SAT prep? https://store.collegeprepgenius.com/college-prep-genius-ecourses/# It looks like it's 12 pre-recorded lessons, with worksheets after the lessons to practice what was taught in the lessons. They teach you test taking tricks and strategies and not content. So, they won't go over grammar (or whatever) with you, but they will talk about how to eliminate answers and find the best one. It sounds like it would be good to couple with Khan--Khan covers content, but I keep hearing Khan isn't so go at test taking strategies. Has anyone used College Prep Genius for SAT prep? Did it work? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted July 23, 2018 Author Share Posted July 23, 2018 Little bump...no one? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alewife Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 1 hour ago, Garga said: Little bump...no one? I am unable to send you a PM for some reason. (I have been having tech difficulties since the boards changed???) For SAT prep, I really like Erica Metzler's books for both the English and Reading sections. For math, I like either College Panda or PWN. I don't have any experience with any of the online test prep, but I have read good reviews about UWorld. Good luck! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted July 23, 2018 Author Share Posted July 23, 2018 1 hour ago, alewife said: I am unable to send you a PM for some reason. (I have been having tech difficulties since the boards changed???) For SAT prep, I really like Erica Metzler's books for both the English and Reading sections. For math, I like either College Panda or PWN. I don't have any experience with any of the online test prep, but I have read good reviews about UWorld. Good luck! Maybe my inbox was full? I deleted a few messages. Thank you for the book recommendations. ? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bristayl Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 I bought College Prep Genius but my dd didn't find it that helpful. Also I'm not sure how well it was adjusted to the 2016 SAT. My dd does highly recommend PWN the SAT for the math part. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Random Posted June 20, 2019 Share Posted June 20, 2019 (edited) I found this old thread and thought I'd bump it for more input. @Garga , did you end up using College Prep Genius? Something else? How did the SAT go? My oldest took the ACT last year and did significantly worse than we expected him to. I'm looking for specific test prep recommendations. Edited June 20, 2019 by Random Tag Garga :) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted June 20, 2019 Author Share Posted June 20, 2019 (edited) @Random We used PrepScholar https://www.prepscholar.com/sat/s/ Here’s all I can tell you: 9th grade, had completed Alg I and took the PSAT just to get familiar with the testing environment. He got a so-so score. It wasn’t like how some people say, “I had my 7th grader take the test and she got a 1550! How can we help her get a 1600??” He got what you’d expect a bright kid who took Alg I to get—a nice score, but nothing to get too excited about. This was in the fall of the year, so he was just beginning with reading higher level books, though he was nicely grounded in grammar by then. 10th grade, had completed Alg I and Geometry and took the PSAT for practice and his score was 110 points higher than 9th grade. Nice! 11th grade, had completed Alg I, Geometry, and Alg II and took the PSAT yet again, and his score was 40 points higher than 10th grade. Frustrated. I’d hoped it would shoot up the same as between 9th and 10th. He then used PrepScholar each day for about 30-45 minutes until April and then took the actual SAT. From October of 11th grade to April of 11th grade, while taking pre-calc in school and using PrepScholar, his score went up by 150 points. PrepScholar had some help for the essay, and it was good to be able to understand how to write it—the style. It’s not a persuasive essay like I’d initially thought, it’s an analysis essay, so it was good to learn tricks for how to write this particular essay. I had to find the essay information in their blog posts as it wasn’t part of the daily test prep that the student sees, so if you want help with the essay, don’t expect it to be mixed in with the daily prep when the student signs in each day. Find their posts on how to write the essay. If you wanted more targeted help with the essay specifically for your student, there was an additional fee that we didn’t pay. We’re not shooting for colleges that put a lot of weight on the essay, but I wanted him to take it just in case he applies somewhere that requires it. I think that prepscholar probably helped all his math that he’d learned over the previous 3/4 years to stay fresh. They brushed him up on grammar that we might not have touched since 8th grade (I don’t focus much on grammar in high school). I read him some of their article/blog posts about test taking tips (especially important for a homeschooled kid who wasn’t used to bubble tests), and we got a good understanding of how to write the essay. I don’t know if something else would have been better or not. It’s impossible to tell, I suppose, unless you have a bunch of kids who are all exactly the same and you put them all through different test prep programs at the same time. I suppose I can credit PrepScholar with the 150 jump in points and that’s nothing to sneeze at. Edited June 20, 2019 by Garga 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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