believersmom

Sorry if this has been asked before but how does one get their hands on all of these resources or do you have to take a class/get a tutor?

Karl S

believersmom, Just go to Barnes & Noble, Boarders, Amazon or the College Board's web site to get the The Official SAT Study Guide. I'd like to hear from montrose9272 on how to get the QAS booklets.

Redwood

yea how do u get QAS booklets?

tanman

The QAS booklets for a particular test are officially avaliable from CB only if you took that test.

StergiaEmman

montrose Are you a tutor? How did u design SAT's. Do you have access to any of these QAS tests thanks stergia

Karl S

You may want to tell your buddy that he is violating US copyright laws by copying and posting College Board problems.

pyroclastic

Not really. My understanding is that while the WORDING on a problem can be copyrighted, the idea itself cannot. That's why, for example, this archive of AIME problems paraphrases the wording but keeps the ideas intact.

montrose9272

If you use more than three meaningful consecutive words (with the exception of standard test boilerplate such as "which of the following could be the value of...") then you are looking for trouble.

Karl S

The first problem I saw this guy do was a CB problem verbatim. I wonder if he has a chance under the Fair Use Doctrine. I guess like almost everything in law . . . it depends. Anyway, back to education. While he is not the most charismatic teacher, I think his intent is somewhat admirable.

montrose9272

Well, I always get QAS booklets, as well as PSAT booklets, from my students, or from well, myself. I've taken the SAT and SAT Subjects Tests (along with a lot of other admissions tests) far too many times to count. Until a couple of years ago, you could order packs of PSAT's and all of the released QAS books back to 11/97, so I bought all of those. And I have all the editions of 10 REAL SAT's. Classroom courses almost never have the QAS booklets. The problem with the retail test prep courses run by the big name companies is that the person in front of you, even if they are well-trained, personable, smart, and got perfect scores themselves, has not actually studied the test, or taken it recently, in most cases. So they are repeating something that their trainer said, who is at best a Xerox of the person who wrote the materials (assuming the company has a good training program). They may be a few steps removed from the person who wrote the materials, but even then, few of the materials designers know the test very well, which is obvious from the materials they give their students (I get a lot of students who took those courses, got their money back or got to take a free repeater course, wasted a year and/or lots of money, with no result). For most smaller classroom courses/coaching companies, there is simply not the effort or number of people to put into thorough R&D, and hence no real understanding of what's going on, so you'd still be better off taking a bigger name classroom course. Even then, some of the strategies propounded don't work that well. It's as if someone said "hmm, let's try this tactic...it seems like it might work", and that became the (unproven) method. There are a few good really small companies, but they are hard to find.
In my experience, the better tutors have a very thorough collection of QAS booklets. Certainly I've traded a couple of test booklets with colleagues who took the SAT in a month when I was taking the Writing, Math I, and Math 2 exams. So that's a good thing. Except that I've noticed that the tests given in the unreleased (non-QAS) months have a distinctive flavor which is quite different from the QAS booklets. This is because ETS is cannibalizing all the old SAT's and SAT-II Writing tests to put together the most scrutinized tests first, before they bother to write new tests from scratch. This is how they constructed the blue book and 5 of the 6 online course tests, as well as the May 05 test which was repeated and then released in January 2006.
So, the better tutors have all of the QAS booklets. That is good, but not great.

The very best tutors take the test every time, and study and formulate their results, so that they can focus on what each student needs to know. If you want to know if a well-respected tutor really knows how important each topic is, simply ask them "How many questions on the SAT test functions?". If they can't give you the exact number, they have not studied the test. This is really important for the 2005-2007 era, since CB won't come out with another 10 REAL SAT's for a couple of years. So anyone who claims to really know the SAT has either taken it recently, or is referring to the "old SAT", since there is a large body of released "old SAT's". So, for students/parents, the best way to get a QAS or PSAT booklet is to ask friends who took the tests in the past couple of years if they have it. Also, the registration bulletin contains the March 2005 test. The registration bulletin from the year before last (guidance counselors may have an old one lying around) contains the field test, which is one of the tests in the CB online course. However, you can buy the PSAT's at collegeboard.com, including the Hurricane Katrina Alternate Version from 2005. Remember that PSAT questions are all old SAT and SAT-II Writing questions, though they don't hit some of the harder SAT math topics.

DaniWB

montros9272,

You sound like a pretty with it tutor. It seems to me, however, that you are probably a good tutor because you connect well with students and help them learn content and develop their problem solving and critical thinking skills. I think you over-emphasize the importance of tutors taking the test and having the latest QAS booklet. If you missed the next October administration of the test, for example, would you fall from your so called "best tutors” category? I hardly think so. Taking every test and having every QAS are not critical factors.

What makes a tutor effective, first and foremost, is his or her ability to connect with students, not his or her knowledge of how many function problems are on the test. Writing stuff like that makes you sound like someone who lacks professional confidence.

montrose9272

DaniWB,
I agree with what you say about what makes someone a good tutor, in general. Those qualities are necessary, no question, and I've been tutoring younger kids since I was in high school. There's a lot more to it than just the connection, as well. There's the real-time evaluation, reading the student, getting into their brain...I've written a few guides, but I should probably write a book about tutoring--thanks for the idea But I don't feel that these personal qualities are sufficient---it's one thing to be a good tutor, and another to be a good SAT tutor. As far as taking the test and collecting QAS booklets, it's a real question of authenticity for me, and for colleagues of mine. We would be good tutors if we didn't take the SAT, but we wouldn't be good SAT tutors. It's not like math, French, physics or whatever, where you really need to have a broad and deep understanding of the subject. It's very focused, and very specific, and about changing someone's response to a particular situation. To simplify: apart from strategies that apply to any timed test, you learn a lot from really getting into tests.
First and foremost is content. Many books are filled with concepts that are not tested, questions that are not posed in the style of the test, and strategies that are inefficient (in many cases), ineffective (in some cases), or irrelevant (in a few cases). I don't take the test to feed my ego, I take it to memorize it, study variations in the concepts, and see its evolution. I don't collect QAS to weight my bookshelf, but because it allows me to study the questions, answer choices, content emphasis, difficulty, etc. It's also funny to see how many mistakes the test writers make. When you show this to a student, it tends to deflate a lot of their anxiety about the test. You can be very focussed and effective (and convincing, if that's something you aren't normally) when you expand the students understanding to include all of what is on the test today, and don't bother with anything that is not. You should spend time on each topic based on how often it shows up, the student's facility with it, and how much score improvement they need in that area. While I was working toward a deadline at Borders the other day (on my laptop), I overheard a tutor for a big name company. First of all, tutoring at a noisy cafe seemed a bit ridiculous. But what struck me most is that the tutor spent the entire two hour session going over unrealistic problems on a topic that is NOT EVEN TESTED on the GMAT. If you spend a lot of time tutoring someone on something that shows up once a year or never, and don't focus on what shows up a lot, you are ripping them off, pure and simple. So, complete content knowledge is necessary.
Second is question-specific strategy. Some people see prep as cheating, as short-circuiting the test. And yes, a few strategies make hard questions into easy ones. Fine. Other folks believe that they've hit the goldmine and outsmarted the test writers when they find some fantastic new way to do one or two questions. What neither of these people realize is that the designers BUILD SHORTCUTS INTO THE QUESTIONS ON PURPOSE. Some harder questions can be solved: quickly; fairly quickly; really slowly; not at all; wrongly in 4 different ways. Easier questions can be solved: instantaneously; in a little bit of time. This is what, in fact, creates the bell curve. So understanding the features of the test is not cheating, and it's also not some brilliant creative endeavor that merits a "Eureka!" It's just the result of lots of analysis and organization. It's also important to give students a number of tools to solve questions, since each student is going to be able to handle different levels of concept. They should never have to wonder: "Gee, what way am I *supposed* to do it?"
By the way, I don't lack any professional confidence whatsoever--quite the opposite, as anyone who knows me would tell you. I probably seem a bit too much in the other direction. However, I'm sure that confidence gives my students (and especially their parents) confidence, too. But I'm just acting the way any professional does. E.g., a doctor who reads the latest research in her area is not insecure, she just wants to be the best doctor she can be, so she can most help her patients. I'm not saving lives, but I do take this as seriously as the parents (and most of the students) who work with me.

DaniWB

I enjoyed your response

vadox6466

what on earth happened to xiggi?

tanman

He's still around, mostly on the Parent's Forum though