mirabillis Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 I know this has been batted around a million times, but like everyone else laments, the search functions no longer work!! so... my ds took his first (of 8) CB practice tests. he scored 1480 on his first, taken cold. so what should our study plan look like? from what i've read on prepscholar and the like - he should examine which he got wrong and why and see if there is anything he can glean from that. then should he link to khan academy and do a little practice on khan before taking the next practice test? i figure he has 7 more practice tests - we'll do one per week. then practice/study a bit in between. any thoughts on what this should entail? and should he practice the essay at all - if so how? THANKS!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.... Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 We're studying for the ACT/SAT right now, too. I feel like banging my head against the wall. I'm going to buy the College Prep Genius ecourse in September. We kept taking practice tests and working on a test prep book and now dd16 absolutely hates prepping for this (I had a feeling that would happen). And did your ds run out of time? Now matter how many practice tests we take, dd16 runs out of time and leaves an entire column of bubbles unanswered. I'm tearing my hair out here!! So, we were originally going to take the ACT, but she was running out of time on that, too...so I figured the SAT would be easier, because it's fewer questions, so you get more time per question. Yeah, she runs out of time on that, too. The ones she does answer, she actually gets most of those right. But then she leaves an ENTIRE column of blank bubbles (insert scary music)... Arrrrghhhh!!!!! *frustrated* Doesn't WTMA offer an SAT prep class? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
klmama Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 You have a lot of practice tests available. Let me suggest what worked well for my dc on the ACT. Start now by having him look up all errors on the first test. Then, on another day, have him take just one section, untimed, and look up explanations for ALL of the answers for that section right after. He'd learn about his mistakes and also about any that he guessed well on. Do again the next day - one section, untimed, read all explanations. After working through all sections of one test that way, give him another full test. You are likely to see significant improvement. If necessary, do some reteaching or work with a math tutor, and work on individual sections again, looking up all explanations. Keep in mind that it will likely be easier to improve his scores in sections he's better at. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kokotg Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 (edited) My DS did nothing but Khan (after trying out a couple of different practice books and finding them frustrating to deal with) and that worked very well for him. He opted not to do the essay. There are very few colleges that require or suggest it, so it just depends on where he wants to apply. If there's somewhere on his list that DOES require it, go ahead and have him do it when he takes his first SAT. We figured DS would take it more than once and could prepare for the essay for round 2....but then he wound up getting a score he was happy with the first time. Fortunately, the last school on his list that required the essay dropped the requirement a few months ago; otherwise he would have had to decide between taking the SAT again JUST to get an essay score and not applying to a school he was interested in because he didn't have it. With a 1480 already, he's in great shape....one things I'd say is to make sure he's taking the practice tests under the same conditions as the actual test as much as possible. I.e. do it all in one sitting without long breaks in between sections. I read that people generally do worse on the real test than the practices; this wasn't the case for my son (he scored 40-50 points higher than his highest practice test), and I think it's partially because he did the practices as if they were the real test. ETA: I think a full practice test every week for 7 weeks might be overkill; it sounds exhausting, or at least it would have been for my kid. YMMV, of course, but be careful of burnout. My son did a total of 3 full practice tests over the course of several months, IIRC. Edited August 13, 2018 by kokotg 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 (edited) I was surprised that my modest local(ish) state U recommended the essay. I’d say to have him take it, so that he doesn’t have to retake the entire test if he ends up wanting to go to a school that recommends it. We’re going to use prepscholar for test prep. I’ve spent untold hours this summer researching about the SAT. I had all sorts of books lined up for us to study, and I was finding youtube videos and articles about tips. And in the end, I still didn’t feel confident that I knew what I was doing or that we’d be focusing our energies the right way. I did the test prep with my son for some SAT subject tests last year. I did not prepare him well. That was on me. I failed him. Won’t do that again. I was going to settle on khan academy, but the weaknesses for khan are that it doesn’t teach you test taking skills. It teaches content. But the SAT is a tricky test and you have to know how they try to trick you, so you can work around the tricks to get at the right answer fast enough. If you don’t know the test taking tricks, you waste time and end up with bubbles not filled in. I will be signing up for prepscholar this week, so I can’t tell you for sure what it’s like, but I honestly didn’t find a single negative review about what they offer. There was a review that said that they charge a different amount to different people depending on where you live and people were turned off by that, but the actual content didn’t have a single negative review—not here and not on random google searches. So, I’ve decided to pay them to help us out. They say they’ll teach both content and test taking tips and that’s what I want. I’ve never taken an SAT test, so I feel completely unable to help my son with test prep and I know all too well that you can bark up the wrong tree and end up having serious negative consequences, as we did with the subject tests. I’m setting aside 20-30 minutes per day for the prepscholar studying and it’ll be part of our regular school day. We start on Monday and have until early April when he'll take the test at the local school, so we can take it slow instead of cramming at the end. Edited August 13, 2018 by Garga 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 Here are the notes I've gathered for myself over the summer. I'm going to cut and paste them here. There are little personal notes or thoughts mixed in with them--some of those notes are mine, some are ones from the people posting the thoughts. The very first note "Overall Test Prep Plan" is written by someone else, but I copied it into my notes to refer to later. I settled on prepscholar in the end, as I wrote in the post above. SAT TEST PREP PROVIDERS: OVERALL TEST PREP PLAN---this is probably the best way to describe what to do: If that first SAT run-through turns up some specific weak areas, it might be worth using another resource to bolter those areas before just continuing with testing practice. I used Chalkdust SAT Math review with my oldest for certain math concepts. I used College Prep Genius with my next one for overall SAT strategy advice, and that helped a bit, but he didn't follow their recommended techniques to the letter. He did get some valuable insights on test-taking strategy, though. I still think that nothing helped prepare him better than just working through the CB tests and carefully reviewing the answers. Doing this definitely helped him to start to see particular types of questions, especially in the Critical Reading & Writing sections. ---------------- Hs2coll opinions: One on one tutors are better than classes. And some of them feel self-study is better than classes. So, again…start with Khan. See what the weak areas might be. Go from there. -------------- Local community colleges have test prep classes. Khan academy (free) (At least 20 hours) College Prep Genius :https://store.collegeprepgenius.com/college-prep-genius-ecourses/ ($139 or $189) Does not teach content (like how to do math or specific grammar) It teaches all the tricks. CONFIRM: IS THIS FOR THE NEW TEST?? See its own tab for reviews. Mr. D ($197) Prep Scholar ($397) (Emails to and from Mr. D starting at 7/21 - 7/23, located in the Hotmail folder called "SAT." He says to clear off the schedule for the 6 weeks of the classes for intense SAT prep.) One reviewer liked Khan for identifying knowledge weaknesses, did NOT think it helped with test prep for learning the tricks of taking a test. This reviewer suggested getting a practice book and taking paper tests to practice and then analyzing what you did. This was a big deal to this person. The tricks are IMPORTANT to learn. Essay The College Panda (look up more info about this. Might be too advanced? Or just not all fluff?) College Panda SAT writing book $24 (This one looks like it's for the regular part of the test? And the 2nd link is just for the essay? Need to study and be sure.)https://express.google.com/u/0/product/6771583089808016857_17825324753025766716_8175035?mall=WashingtonDC&directCheckout=1&utm_source=google_shopping&utm_medium=product_ads&utm_campaign=gsx And also an essay book: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0989496465/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=tsp0b-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0989496465&linkId=86fe45f7f302eae5ba34ed29739bd540 Brave Writer has a 4 week class for $239. FROM AN SAT TUTOR WHO CHARGES $150/HOUR: WTMer name: Showelott Her website: https://www.stellarscores.com/ It's that time of year again - SAT time for juniors. I'm assembling resources for my niece and wanted to share what I think are the best SAT resources out there. (Among other things, I tutor kids on the SAT) 1. The Official SAT Practice Tests. The only real source of actual SATs. You can buy the book from Amazon for about $17. It has 4 tests in it. Or you can download (for free) and print out 6 tests from the College Board's (CB) website (which includes those 4 tests in the book plus 2 more.) Tests 5 and 6 were given last year so those are the most-like-the-real-thing. I have my kids practice on Test 1-4 and we save 5 and 6 for our final run-throughs closer to the actual test date. And there are full answer explanations for every question. Yay! 2. The Khan Academy They've partnered with the CB and have a lot of good study material and additional practice questions. It's not perfect - they tend to be nerd-heavy on the explanations - giving the "official" way, rather than an easier way to learn it. And, with the SAT, there are good strategies that Khan usually doesn't address - like backsolving. But - there's lots of good information for brushing up on concepts you haven't seen in a while. I'm pretty fanatical about only using official material. Most of the books on the market contain questions that *look* like SAT questions, but they miss the mark by being too simple or too complex, testing the wrong thing, or adding the wrong kind of extraneous info. I've read a ton of SAT books over the years and these are the ONLY ones I recommend - they are written by people who have worked through thousands of SAT questions and been through years of the tests, and have personally tutored hundreds (probably in the thousands by now) of kids studying for the SAT. All the expertise shows - their questions match the content, complexity level, tone and nuance of the SAT. ------------------------------------- MATH 3. The New Math SAT Game Plan OMG - my absolute most favorite SAT math book ever! There's a lot more Algebra 2 on this new SAT - and I had to learn all sort of stuff I had forgotten - parabola remainders? long division with variables? Phil is a long time high school math teacher (and he also teaches SAT math to kids) and he explains math in a way that the non-math among us can understand. (and that kids can turn into high scores) Love love love this book! 4. PWN the SAT This is another favorite. This is geared for kids already scoring in the 600s. It's HARD. It make the SAT look easy in comparison. Kids love this book b/c instead of boring "find the angle" questions, Mike's questions are things like calculating the ratio of donuts left after a zombie attack. Even though it's quite entertaining to work through, the concepts he's reinforcing are exactly what and how they are tested on the real test (minus the zombies). It covers the gaming-the-test aspects, but it also focuses nicely on identifying and patching knowledge gaps. They also have a website. https://pwntestprep.com/wp/category/qa/ READING 5. The Critical Reader This book isn't easy to wade through - it's dense in the best way. Kids need to be scoring in the 600s if they want to tackle it on their own. (Kids with lower scores can work through it with help) Erica shows you exactly what's tested and teaches you the relevant skill. This is the only book that I've found that actually breaks apart the skill set and methodically teaches each part. Erica Metzler books for EBRW WRITING 6. The Ultimate Guide to SAT Grammar Homeschoolers have a huge leg up with all the grammar that's on the new SAT so you might not need this resource. Since public schools have abandoned grammar, there's a whole generation of kids that can't find a subject, pronoun antecedent or a complete sentence. Erica breaks down each grammar point, and teaches what it is, how to recognize it and gives many examples and practice exercises. She's also got a companion workbook with 8 practice writing tests. GENERAL I've heard good things about this book: Stop Doing Math: Tips, Tricks and Strategies to find success on the most important math exams you will ever take. I've ordered it from our library to see what I think. It apparently talks about math approaches that work for any standardized test. They might help your daughter gain more confidence? _____________ I got the book today and I'm a fan! Lots of good advice, low-key tone, approaches math like a game, not a death march. Shows you how to "poke" the problem - think about it a little to see if there is a "shortcut" or a backdoor way to get the answer. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/634426-sat-resources/> ---------------------------------------- Prep Scholar website has excellent test prep book recommendations. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/662196-did-your-kids-get-high-satact-scores/> -------------------------------------- This is a book of test taking strategies: https://www.amazon.com/Your-Score-2018-2019-Underground-Outsmarting/dp/0761193650/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1532307089&sr=8-1&keywords=Up+Your+Score&dpID=51FYXKSBBZL&preST=_SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch --------------------------------- This one looks like content and test prep strategies: SAT Prep Black Bookhttps://smile.amazon.com/SAT-Prep-Black-Book-Strategies/dp/0692916164/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1532307919&sr=8-1&keywords=SAT+Prep+Black+Book -------------------- This website has you take the test. Then you watch the instructor do the exact same problems. You see where you went right…or wrong. This is for $50. For an additional $50 (total of $100) the teacher provides a bit more feedback to you.https://www.highschoolmathlive.com/sat-prep-inforegistration.html --------------------- A WTMer, Vida Winter, wrote: We use Reasonprep. It was more affordable than Prepscholar and Rob is a great instructor. He's also very accessible if you have questions. He has an online study group. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/632807-sat-prep/?tab=comments> https://members.reasonprep.com/courses/category/SAT Another person for Rob, when responding to a WTMer whose kids were already at the 740-770 mark and they wanted more for tippy-top schools: I recommend Rob at Reason Prep. My daughter's scores went up 200 points after tutoring with Rob. His test strategies are good, and he provides tons of practice material. He really helped her move from missing 4-5 questions on a section to missing 0-1, which seems to be where your kids need to focus. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/627769-how-to-improve-sat-scores-and-reach-vs-out-of-reach/> -------------------------- Study guides: Gruber's, Princeton Review, Kaplan, etc. Then, just take as many practice tests as possible, ------------------------ PWN the SAT's blog site is helpful, but not an entire program: http://blog.pwnthesat.com/ (I have signed up for their daily question. I'll pass them to Logan when I want to. This blog is probably best for me to sort through and pass to Logan.) ------------------- Search on YouTube for "SAT Math Tips" or "SAT Math Strategies" ------------------- $125: SAT and ACT: https://amandafletchertest.wixsite.com/satact ------------------- Book recs from hs2coll person: 28 New SAT Math Lessons to Improve Your Score in One Month - Advanced Course: For Students Currently Scoring Above 600 in SAT Math and Want to Score 800 https://www.amazon.com/Math-Lessons-Improve-Score-Month/dp/1519617372/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1492172354&sr=8-1&keywords=28+new+sat+math+lessons 3rd Edition, The Ultimate Guide to SAT Grammar, Erica Meltzer https://www.amazon.com/3rd-Ultimate-Guide-SAT-Grammar/dp/1511944137/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1492172432&sr=8-1&keywords=erica+meltzer ----------------------- Princeton Review (has some test taking strategies but not sure how many. Someone lightly mentioned that they have "some" useful strategies. ---------------- $100 SAT test prep online class http://woodsidelc.com/Courses.html --------------------- Another online option: $200 per subject: https://debrabell.com/product/sat-math-prep-winter-monday-evening/ ------------------- $95/hour:https://elanilearning.com/how-it-works/ ----------------- $261/48 hour online course. https://www.ed2go.com/courses/test-prep/exam-prep/bundle/sat-act-prep-series?gclid=CjwKCAjw-dXaBRAEEiwAbwCi5vNxtI5s7Ip7bW6phiBZxmwtvoew8BOvFeXSZjWCaqf_UII6LV-ARxoCYl8QAvD_BwE&site=classes&utm_campaign=Brand+Core_Exact-DT&origin=google_ppc&utm_medium=cpc&campaign=Brand+Core_Exact-DT&kw=ed2go&adgroup=40556178886&utm_source=google&network=g ---------------- This place provides example questions and then detailed answers. It also has things like flashcards 30 days=free, 90 days = $49, 180 = $79, 360 = $99https://www.uworld.com/collegeprep/sat/sat.aspx ------------------- Stephen Powell's review of the books: Barrons for difficult questions Princeton Review for "most like the test" McGraw Hill for learning about a topic. Kaplan teaches tricks for the tests more than content (his words). From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/601965-how-to-keep-from-forgetting-math-for-the-psatsat/> ------------ The guy in this article says that he did SAT prep for $1000 an hour. But he discovered that the people who came to him and only did the work that he had provided for free online did better than the ones who paid for the one-on-one tutoring. His conclusion was that going on your own and making yourself do the work paid off and those kids learned what they needed to know and could rely on themselves for the better grades. https://www.vox.com/2016/1/8/10728958/sat-tutor-expensive Here's his website: https://greentestprep.com/ It looks like he's charging $495 for membership. It's not clear to me whether or not his free resources are complete. This makes me think that khan is still a good way to go. But I'll research this more. -------------- Not sure about the DVDs. They might be for the old test. (JV) "We liked the Chalkdust SAT prep course very much." hs2coll (A few people said they liked it but some said it was $$$ to try to find used or library copies.) I have wondered if anyone used Chalkdust Prep for this purpose. Here is a link to the product. I have not used any Chalkdust products, but read about them on the Well Trained Mind Forums. I have a current 8th grade student that will be taking the PSAT test next year just to see where he is. http://www.chalkdust.com/satrev.html -------------- And there is always the Official SAT Study Guide, but with it all being on Khan, I'm not sure if it's necessary. ---------------- I think this note refers to Khanacademy. Not sure until I can get an account with them and get that going: At the top of the page of SAT practice, there are several links to "Dashboard", "Practice", "Tips & Tricks", "Full Tests", and "Review". If you click on "Full Tests" it will show the predicted score for any practice tests completed on the site. Under each section score there are buttons to review results in that section "Review Math, No Calculator" "Review Math, Calculator OK" and "Review Reading", "Review Writing and Language". If you click on one of those buttons, it will show you the raw score breakdown for that section. In the bottom right corner, there is a button for "Review Your Answers". The student can use this to see what they answered, as well as explanations of how to solve and why the incorrect answers are wrong. The printable pdfs of the tests are available under the "Full Tests" link on the bottom of the left side bar showing each practice test. They are also available from College Board. I'm not sure if the number of the tests is the same on both sites. https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/sat/practice/full-length-practice-tests --------------------- Providers to avoid: WTMer SecretGarden: Memoria Press class and another SAT tutor we used for an older student a complete disappointment and waste of money. In our experience, the only tips and tricks given where the ones stated clearly already in the official SAT book and were nothing compared to Metlzer's suggestions. Also, I expect the class to give personal feedback -- it did not. The only personal feedback we got was from the Wyzant tutor and that was cheaper than a class overall and only targeted what we needed. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/668238-sat-test-prep-class/?tab=comments> 6 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 More of my notes: TEST TAKING STRATEGIES: PrepScholar tips for taking the SAT: https://www.prepscholar.com/website-static/files/The_Best_SAT_Advice.pdf Importantly, learning the strategies isn't enough - they then must be practiced extensively until they are automatic. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/662196-did-your-kids-get-high-satact-scores/> ---------------------------- My son is also a rather slow reader, but he improved his SAT scores dramatically through regular practice. Doing the "question of the day," doing practice tests, drilling vocabulary. Becoming really familiar with the format of the test helped. At first, he could never finish all the sections, but by the time he took the real test for the second (and final) time, he had time to spare. -------------------------- There will always be problems she doesn't know how to do. Show her how to "skip" those (since you don't lose points for wrong answers, you should bubble in something - I choose "A" - on every question, even the ones that you don't look at or get to) WITHOUT losing confidence or getting intimidated. Unless you are shooting for an 800, you SHOULD NOT be answering every math question (and, of course, you will actually "answer" every questions b/c you don't want to leave any blank.) But you don't want to pay attention to all the questions. You only need to answer 62% of the questions (that's 36 of 58 questions) correctly to get a 600 (which is the 73rd percentile ranked against other college bound kids). You need to answer 82% of the questions correctly (that's 48 of 58 questions) to get a 700 (which is the 92nd percentile). The point is - you can "skip" a lot. Most kids are HUGELY relieved to know that. Also - there's one other thing she can exploit about the math section. The questions TEND to go in difficulty order by mini section (so - easy to medium to hard. Then it starts over in the grid-in section - easy to medium to hard) They don't follow that exactly, but it's a pretty good rule of thumb. So, that means she can "ignore" that last handful of questions in each mini section. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/634426-sat-resources/> ----------------------------------- DS raised the language half of the SAT from 710 to 780 in 3 weeks. And all of it came from the reading comprehension portion, on which he got a perfect mark. There was one simple idea that raised his score so much so quickly, and it goes like this: the test is objective; the writers must be able to defend that there is only one answer to any reading comprehension question or they would get arguments and complaints; therefore there must be an *objective* way to exclude every answer but the right one. And we were soon to find out that it is often a single word. So ds practiced thinking like a lawyer. He never went with a gut feeling as to the right answer, instead he searched for the single word or phrase that would *prove* an answer wrong. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/662196-did-your-kids-get-high-satact-scores/> ------------------------------------ This is a book of test taking strategies: https://www.amazon.com/Your-Score-2018-2019-Underground-Outsmarting/dp/0761193650/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1532307089&sr=8-1&keywords=Up+Your+Score&dpID=51FYXKSBBZL&preST=_SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch ---------------------------------- Prepscholar has a lot of tips, like this one:https://blog.prepscholar.com/how-to-stop-running-out-of-time-on-sat-math ------------------------------- Formulas you must know for the SAT: https://blog.prepscholar.com/critical-sat-math-formulas-you-must-know They provide formulas, yet you need to know some things going into the test. ----------------------------- The tip she felt had the biggest payoff for the critical reading section was to try and answer the questions without reading the choices first. If you can answer the question straight up you are less likely to be confused by misleading MC answers. --------------------------- My son has dyslexia and when he was practicing for the ACT he was unable to finish the reading section even with a 150% time accommodation, and he was getting lots of answers wrong (many more than I would have expected given his ITBS/ITED scores). I was concerned. Then all of the sudden he was able to finish well under the time limit *and* his answers were mostly correct! When I asked him what he did differently he told me that he didn't read the passages--he just looked at the questions and went back to the passage to find the answers. He ended up getting a 31 on the reading (with a 150% time accommodation.) ------------------------- GO TO SLEEP an hour earlier each night for the 10 nights before the test. Then, even if you can't sleep well that night, you've banked lots of sleep. --------------------- I recommend my students first work with the released test questions and analyze why the authors of the test chose one response over the other "almost as good" response. Then I found that the Princeton Review materials give some useful strategies, as far as shortcuts, timing, etc.. ---------------- From this article: https://www.vox.com/2016/1/8/10728958/sat-tutor-expensive What do you need for a perfect SAT score? A thorough knowledge of around 110 math rules and 60 grammar rules, familiarity with the test's format, and the consistent application of about 40 strategies that make each problem a bit easier to solve. If you can string together a coherent essay, that's a plus. ----------------- Strategies here from the $1000/hour guy: https://greentestprep.com/resources/sat-prep/ Use flashcards to remember his tips 3 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 More of my notes: PLANNING THE SCHOOL YEAR NEW PLAN: Use Prepscholar. OLD PLAN: 1. Work on speed reading. 2. Start using Khan asap. 2b. Start doing the question of the day now. Collegeboards and PWNs 2c. Go over the PSAT from last year with the booklet and review each question. (3. NOT YET, SEE #6) Get an SAT grammar book and use that as Grammar for English this year. 4. Get the essay book for the SAT and make sure we know how to write that kind of essay. Use that kind of essay in English. 5. Get a tips and tricks book for the SAT. 6. If Khan math/reading/grammar, etc, isn't enough, then get books to supplement. A number of WTMers mention that their student's scores jump between Junior/spring and Senior/fall year. Maturity can be a factor. (Great. So, do we schedule to take it twice? Yuck.) SecretGarden wtmer does it this way: So, this is the general plan: I treat test prep as a subject during all of junior year with a section of test from the Official SAT test prep book taken every single day. As soon as that section is taken, student goes over and studies answers missed. Concurrently, student studies Meltzer books that I have broken down into small (3-5 page) assignments, making flash cards for tips and tricks as we go...memorizing those was a lifesaver. We reviewed her flashcards daily. Meltzer lists rules to memorize in each book. For tips and tricks, like pacing and strategies, the official book covers them really well, but Meltzer's strategies for the grammar and reading sections just can't be beat. Khan is using the official book I believe. Do a lot of practice tests, then read the tips from the prep book again; they will all make more sense when the student has a feel for the test itself. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/668238-sat-test-prep-class/?tab=comments> ---------- Ktgrok: I would start with Khan and see how it goes before putting a lot of money into something else. Our plan with DS was that he'd do Khan and give it a shot (spring of Junior year) and then work more intensively on any weak spots, and he could retake fall of Senior year. We paid for the service where you get your questions and answers back with the score report so we could see exactly what to work on. But then he ended up doing very well on the March test and won't take it again unless he decides to apply somewhere that requires the essay (which he almost did, but canceled at the last second because he hadn't prepared for it much. Turns out he should have just gone ahead with it). He did Khan academy almost daily (it's just a few minutes a day mostly, except when they have you do practice tests) starting in October or November to get ready for the March test and that ended up being plenty of prep for him. But he tests well and he was super diligent about doing the Khan practice every day without me having to stay on him about it. From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/672539-sat-prep-in-summer/> ----- WTMer RootAnn: Do you already have a test prep strategy? (If not, I'd definitely have him taking practice tests (maybe one section at a time at first with no time limit) at home starting now. Go over every answer - even those he got right. Eventually, have him take a whole practice test (untimed). Go over every answer. Then, have him take a whole practice test - timed. If his score is higher than 21 by a good margin on the timed test, he can just register for the next test. If close or under, he should keep working on test prep & take it as late as spring (May/June) of junior year or sometime in the fall of Senior year.) From <https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/673263-quick-question-what-grade-do-students-take-the-act/> ------------------ Writing a lot of papers is good prep for the essay section (3-5 page long papers.) ------------------ Break the tests in the book down into separate sections. Take each section one at a time. Do not worry too much about time in the beginning. After you have finished each test, review the answers and the explanations carefully for each problem, even the ones you got right. This last is VERY important as you want to make sure you know WHY you got each problem right so you can start to recognize patterns and similar questions. Repeat the process with each section and every part of the book. Then retake the tests again, and do the same. From <https://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/68210-xiggi-s-sat-prep-advice.html> ------------------- My son is also a rather slow reader, but he improved his SAT scores dramatically through regular practice. Doing the "question of the day," doing practice tests, drilling vocabulary. Becoming really familiar with the format of the test helped. At first, he could never finish all the sections, but by the time he took the real test for the second (and final) time, he had time to spare. ------------------- One additional step that he used was to go over the English section with an adult (me!). We would go over his wrong answers out loud and speak the sentences. This was very important for him to discern which answers were wrong and what areas to watch out for. I know that this sounds elementary but reading the passages out loud seemed to be a very important part of understanding what the test was looking for. From <https://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/68210-xiggi-s-sat-prep-advice.html> The general idea is to devote about thirty minutes to completing a test section and about the same amount of time to review the answers proposed by The College Board. While most students focus on the scores and check their wrong answers, much can be gained from checking the correct answers. It is important to TRULY understand EVERY answer and to try to understand how the SAT questions are developed. To do this, one has to be comfortable with the material tested. It is for this reason that I recommend to start working with open books and without time limits. Open books include the precise answers to the test. From <https://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/68210-xiggi-s-sat-prep-advice.html> -------------------------- Do some SAT prep using this free guide: https://greentestprep.com/resources/sat-prep/ ---------------------- 2 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 (edited) Here are most of the links I had been saving for years so that I could read them this summer. Quite a bit of the above compiled information came from these links. I kept them in case I ever wanted to refer to them again, but you might want to look over them now. You might be looking for different things than what I was looking for: THREADS I STARTED: • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/668238-sat-test-prep-class/?p=7992222 • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/601965-how-to-keep-from-forgetting-math-for-the-psatsat/?p=6938710 Creekland listed SAT prep books that her son liked on this post. • How not to forget Alg on the SAT: http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/638394-forgetting-math-on-the-sat/ OTHER THREADS: • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/640531-help-for-planning-sat-re-takes-act-etc/ • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/634426-sat-resources/ • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/632807-sat-prep/?p=7991828 • https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/673263-quick-question-what-grade-do-students-take-the-act/ • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/662196-did-your-kids-get-high-satact-scores/ SAT prep in summer: • https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/672539-sat-prep-in-summer/ • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/645199-test-prep-with-old-sat-books/ • HS2COLL thread on SAT/ACT prep--one of the responses has recommended books. Someone mentions pros of Khan (they target what your student doesn't know), and another mentions cons (they don't teach test prep--they teach the subjects.) https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/hs2coll/conversations/topics/72598 • https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/hs2coll/conversations/topics/37129;_ylc=X3oDMTM3YjZjMm1kBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE0MTA2NjMwBGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MjM1MwRtc2dJZAM3MjU5MQRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawN2dHBjBHN0aW1lAzE0OTIwOTc3MDgEdHBjSWQDMzcxMjk- • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/627769-how-to-improve-sat-scores-and-reach-vs-out-of-reach/ • Thread on SAT prep, hs2coll: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/hs2coll/conversations/topics/73746;_ylc=X3oDMTM3Zmd1djVhBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE0MTA2NjMwBGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MjM1MwRtc2dJZAM3Mzc1OQRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawN2dHBjBHN0aW1lAzE0OTg2NDg3MTEEdHBjSWQDNzM3NDY- • http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/626691-anyone-care-to-share-been-theredone-that-psat-test-day-tips-for-us-newbies/ • If you don't have time to read the whole article, its main points are that there is no such thing as a "bad test taker" and to start studying for it in ninth grade instead of 11th - using any SAT-prep materials and not what you've been learning in school. (Same argument for ACT.) http://www.vox.com/2016/1/8/10728958/sat-tutor-expensive From <https://blu171.mail.live.com/?tid=cmnvAqddO65RGWaAAhWtgCCg2&fid=flinbox> • THIS ONE IS NO LONGER UP TO DATE WITH THE NEW TEST INFO: http://www.amazon.com/The-Rocket-Review-Revolution-Rocketreview/dp/0451219465 • http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/68210-xiggi-s-sat-prep-advice.html • http://www.amazon.com/The-Official-SAT-Study-Guide/dp/0874478529 • http://www.amazon.com/The-Official-SAT-Study-Guide/dp/0874479797 Edited August 13, 2018 by Garga 2 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted August 13, 2018 Share Posted August 13, 2018 You asked about the essay. Before I'd decided to go with prepscholar, I was going to use this book (College Panda Essay) for the essay. In all my reading of the above, it sounded like it was a solid option for learning the essay and I was going to use it: https://smile.amazon.com/College-Pandas-SAT-Essay-Battle-tested/dp/0989496465/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1534181001&sr=8-1&keywords=college+panda+essay&dpID=41eHf%2BWeGIL&preST=_SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch 1 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirabillis Posted August 13, 2018 Author Share Posted August 13, 2018 Wow, wow, wow! Thank you Garga! I hesitated to post knowing it had been asked countless times but I can't make search work. I'm so glad to have all your notes. Thank you! We may well look into Prepscholar too... after all THIS is the single most important test of his life. Thanks for all the replies all. So helpful 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElizabethB Posted August 14, 2018 Share Posted August 14, 2018 16 hours ago, Evanthe said: We're studying for the ACT/SAT right now, too. I feel like banging my head against the wall. I'm going to buy the College Prep Genius ecourse in September. We kept taking practice tests and working on a test prep book and now dd16 absolutely hates prepping for this (I had a feeling that would happen). And did your ds run out of time? Now matter how many practice tests we take, dd16 runs out of time and leaves an entire column of bubbles unanswered. I'm tearing my hair out here!! So, we were originally going to take the ACT, but she was running out of time on that, too...so I figured the SAT would be easier, because it's fewer questions, so you get more time per question. Yeah, she runs out of time on that, too. The ones she does answer, she actually gets most of those right. But then she leaves an ENTIRE column of blank bubbles (insert scary music)... Arrrrghhhh!!!!! *frustrated* Doesn't WTMA offer an SAT prep class? Work through my syllables class with extra nonsense words to improve reading speed. https://www.thephonicspage.org/On Reading/syllablesspellsu.html Here's a video explaining how nonsense words and syllables can improve reading speed, and some people also need help with the 2 letter vowel teams. You are decoding every sound in every word, just super fast in parallel, so even a tiny speed improvement in each sound adds up. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SanDiegoMom Posted August 14, 2018 Share Posted August 14, 2018 I haven't read the replies but my dd exclusively used Khan. She just practiced whenever she felt like it... she did take the test three times - twice as a junior and once as a senior and raised her score from low 1400's to 1540. She tried other practice books and hated them compared to Khan Academy. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hoggirl Posted August 14, 2018 Share Posted August 14, 2018 OP, what is your ds’s goal score? I think doing a full practice test each week for seven more weeks is complete overkill. I also think that over-preparing ramps up stress on the actual testing date. I agree with others who say to take some of the tests by section and read the explanations for each question whether right or wrong. I would still do these timed. We never did any practicing that wasn’t timed. A big part of any of these standardized tests is building stamina. Doing one section at a time and then building to two, three, etc. helps a lot with both pacing and building stamina. We never did anything other than test prep books, but it is important to find something that your kid likes and is willing to do. I am unaware of what all these different programs cost, but a $30 book was all we ever used. My other caution is to be aware of the issues of “scaling” and “equating” on these tests. You might do some googling about scores from the June 2018 exam. Many students were unhappy because they had missed fewer questions but had received lower scores. This has always been an issue. My ds missed ONE question on math and got a 760. Apparently, his was considered an “easy” test. Once you get up in that high 1400-1500 range, the scaling used on any particular sitting can make a big difference. A 1480 is an excellent score. I can see wanting to hit that 1,500 mark if it’s possible. There’s no reason not to score as high as one can, but it’s only one part of the picture. Are you seeking competitive merit scholarships somewhere? Is he looking at Top 20 schools? Only a very few of them have merit scholarships. What is the motivation? I would just caution you to not over-pressure your ds. Just my $0.02. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
................... Posted August 14, 2018 Share Posted August 14, 2018 We have done some research on the subject and according to all of my research, once you get to the point where you are almost hitting the 1500's there's not much you can do to raise the score. Our math instructor (PhD who sent all her kids to UCLA/Berkeley) really said at this point the only thing that might help is to take practice tests, look at the ones wrong, and just note how do to it, or the thinking or logic behind it, and take another test... Once you have a kid scoring in the 720's on math they understand math. They are good at math. They have good time management and test taking skills. Really, it's just about them not being tripped up by the very FEW questions they got wrong. And the only way to really get more and more of those types of questions, for practice, would be to just take practice tests and get more ideas with the types of harder questions... 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RootAnn Posted August 14, 2018 Share Posted August 14, 2018 Was his 'cold' test the first test linked on Khan? I don't think that was an actual administered SAT. I think you have to get down to #5 or #6 to get to a real one. (Someone check me on that.) Just FYI - we found the tests to be really variable as far as scores between 1-5. So, don't be alarmed if there are big swings on the practice tests - the important thing is to practice on Khan (or with some of the books like Erica Metzler or PWN the SAT stuff) and go through all the answers he got wrong (or guessed on). While there isn't a whole lot of room to improve between 1480-1600, there is some room. I'm sure he'll continue to do great. :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted August 14, 2018 Share Posted August 14, 2018 My advice is do not use up the official practice tests unless your son is taking his one and only SAT. Also, know that tests 1-4 were never administered to real students, and tests 5-8 were. That said, I haven't found anything that will help with high level prep. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caraway Posted January 23, 2020 Share Posted January 23, 2020 On 8/13/2018 at 10:24 AM, Garga said: Before I'd decided to go with prepscholar, @Garga would you be willing to update with your PrepScholar experience? Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElizabethB Posted January 23, 2020 Share Posted January 23, 2020 19 minutes ago, Caraway said: @Garga would you be willing to update with your PrepScholar experience? Thanks! There is a PrepScholar thread on the college board right now: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted January 23, 2020 Share Posted January 23, 2020 (edited) 1 hour ago, Caraway said: @Garga would you be willing to update with your PrepScholar experience? Thanks! 1 hour ago, ElizabethB said: There is a PrepScholar thread on the college board right now: Yes—see the other thread for sure! My son worked on his prepscholar stuff from August to just before the test in early April of last year. He’d work on it for 45 minutes a day, 4 days a week. He has slow processing speed (very slow) and everything takes him a lot longer and he has to work harder than other people for the same results, so it was very necessary for him to work for that amount of time. He didn’t “finish” what prepscholar has to offer (he didn’t make it through all of their program.). But yes, he did make the 160 (I think it’s 160?) points higher that prepscholar offers, though it’s not like he was a kid making a high score. He isn’t in the 1500-1600 range. I had him take all 8 retired SAT tests that are available. He also has anxiety issues and I wanted him to be so used to the test that there wouldn’t be any surprises. I wanted the test to be old hat by the time he took it. For the first 2 tests, we didn’t time it. He could work slowly through the problems, just to get a feel for them. For the next 2 or 3, (Can’t remember if I had him do this 2 or 3 times) he worked through the sections timed, but not all of the sections on the same day. For the remaining tests he did all of the sections on the same day timed. Because of his processing speed, he’s usually very slow on tests and by the time we were ready to practice the 7th and 8th test, he had been granted time and a half by College Board for the SAT and he practiced those with the longer time allowed. I could NOT get him to go over his incorrect answers one by one and dig deep into why he got those wrong. Personally, I think that would have been hugely beneficial, but he just would not focus or try to think through exactly why each one was wrong. He’d get somewhat emotional about it. Sometimes teenagers are weirdly stubborn about things and this happened with him. Also, prepscholar was NOT helpful with the essay portion of the exam. You could write an essay and they’d grade it the way a scorer would grade it and give back canned feedback that was not at all helpful. In fact, the feedback for one of them was completely contradictory and when I wrote to ask them about it they just said that whatever they sent me is what they sent me and if we needed more help with essays, we’d have to pay more. So...he only did so-so on the essay portion. Later, after he took the test, we worked through Windows to the World curric and a couple of chapters into that curric, it taught exactly what he’d have needed to know to do better on the SAT essay. It wasn’t until we did those chapters that I realized how poorly prepared he’d been for the essay portion. I read through a lot of the blog posts on prepscholar, which are free, and worked with my son showing him the tips. He was too overwhelmed to read the blog posts by himself, or he’d just skim and not let the information sink in Even though they didn’t do a good job of personally helping him with the essay portion, those blog posts did describe overall how to write the essay and were invaluable in making sure he was on the right track when writing the essay. We used the info in the blog posts for my son to create a sort of template of an essay. For example, before taking the test, he already knew what transition phrases he was going to use and how to lead the reader through specific points. The SAT essays ask you to analyze how a writer is swaying an audience—are they appealing to emotion? Are they using facts and figures? My son was already prepared with some canned sentences he came up with to introduce things like, “This author uses statistical facts to influence his reader. Using statistical facts in a persuasive piece of writing demonstrates that the author has researched the issue....blah blah.” When test time came around, he already had these sort of sentences floating around in his head and he could plug them in for the essay. All in all, I’m still glad he prepped with prepscholar. I would have had NO CLUE of where to begin to practice the different math concepts and English concepts. And then it would have been more on me forcing him to work through a book (see “stubborn” above.) He needed the littler reminders from Prepscholar and I needed their program that takes the students through the problems in a methodical fashion. I liked it that it was a computer program that would pinpoint the student’s weak areas and review those with them. He got a score that is good for him. It’ll put him over the 75th%tile for the college he wants to go to eventually. Due to many things, he’s going to start at the CC this year and move to a state U in a few years and if they look at his SAT score, he’ll be just fine to get into that college, or others like it. 1. I think it’s worth it. It removes you from the equation if you don’t know how to handle test prep for such a high stakes test by yourself. 2. If I could do it again, I’d have probably tried harder to find a way to make him really pick apart why he got each question wrong 3. We’d have done Windows to the World earlier, or tried to find a better SAT essay prep book. 4. Make sure you read the free blog posts that have good tips on the test, especially the essay portion. It’s a very specific type of essay they want you to write. Edited January 23, 2020 by Garga 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElizabethB Posted January 23, 2020 Share Posted January 23, 2020 25 minutes ago, Garga said: 2. If I could do it again, I’d have probably tried harder to find a way to make him really pick apart why he got each question wrong My son wants to see now. Earlier, he didn't, I'd just make up a similar question and we'd cover it in math a few days later...or wait a few months and give the exact same questions as math questions, just written out with no answers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted January 23, 2020 Share Posted January 23, 2020 If you end up purchasing prep materials, be sure that you're getting ones aimed at people trying to get perfect scores. Also, I wouldn't use up all of the practice exams. If he needs to take it again, you'll want to have some exams left to work with. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted January 23, 2020 Share Posted January 23, 2020 My daughter had good luck with the black book for ACT and there is an SAT version. I believe you will need the official test book as well. There were tips at the beginning, the student did a practice test, and then the black book gave explanations on why each answer choice was or was not correct. She got a 34. I agree that you do need to save some tests for later practice. However, we did hire a tutor online Stacy at Stellar Scores for a few sessions. We both liked her and she had a database of older tests that she would assign for my daughter to complete that they would review during the session. It was worth a lot to have access to those extra tests. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caraway Posted January 24, 2020 Share Posted January 24, 2020 2 hours ago, Mom2mthj said: My daughter had good luck with the black book for ACT and there is an SAT version. I believe you will need the official test book as well. There were tips at the beginning, the student did a practice test, and then the black book gave explanations on why each answer choice was or was not correct. She got a 34. I agree that you do need to save some tests for later practice. However, we did hire a tutor online Stacy at Stellar Scores for a few sessions. We both liked her and she had a database of older tests that she would assign for my daughter to complete that they would review during the session. It was worth a lot to have access to those extra tests. Tutor is an interesting idea. I'm afraid that left to books alone the prep work won't get done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caraway Posted January 24, 2020 Share Posted January 24, 2020 5 hours ago, Garga said: My son worked on his prepscholar stuff from August to just before the test in early April of last year. Thank you so much for this detailed post! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fourisenough Posted July 7, 2021 Share Posted July 7, 2021 (edited) ... Edited July 7, 2021 by fourisenough Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gstharr Posted September 2, 2021 Share Posted September 2, 2021 To focus your preparation, breakdown your score by sections rather than the total score. In my son's case, in an actual SAT exam taken in 8th grade, he got 730(M) -- 4 wrong responses, and 660(ERBW)-- 16 wrong. Now we are prepping for 11th grade exam this November. Practice tests show that he is even stronger in math, so we are allocating 1/4 of practice to those sections, and the remaining time to the verbal sections We are doing two verbal sections each weekend. Since you are starting with a 1480, I would destress the importance of perfection. As others have pointed out, be sure to take strictly timed paractices under adverse conditions. We do ours in front of the television, in food courts, and public parks. Lastly, a total score of 1550 is roughly 3 wrong Math, and 6 wrong Verbal. Beyond 1550, there is a slight element of luck; exam curve, knowing or being able to guess the what the heck questions, properly marking or erasing answers, etc. good luck 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.