Attn: Solid readers who did well on ACT reading

fhqwgads2005
Mon, 02 Jul 2007 10:30:30 +0000

My strategy:

Study like crazy for the SAT critical reading section! I’m not kidding! Take practice tests, and try to do as well as you can. It’s hard! There are so many inferences and suggestions you need to catch. The key here, is to make sure your answer comes directly out of the text (has enough proof to hold up in court…) Make sure your answer always has proof if you can find it. Remember, this is still the SAT i’m talking about.

Now, after you’ve torn your brains out on the SAT, take an ACT practice test. If you prepared well for the SAT, I don’t see how you could get less than a 33-34 on the ACT. (especially if you say you read a lot.)

The ACT’s questions are so much more basic. They require you to just pick out simple information (actions, events, statements) and remember them. You need to do a lot less interpreting than on the SAT. You will find this incredibly easy after the SAT.

Here is kind of my basic plan:

Do everything in order. If you dont, you may forget to answer questions, or accidentally shift your answers up and down and end up missing all of them. Basically, read the whole thing through. As you are going, make sure to ask yourself what is going on. Be engaged and try to imagine what questions they are going to ask. the questions are pretty straight forward. Just try to keep track of the order in which events/information are introduced.

Try to remember (or even mark down quickly) what each paragraph is about. That way, if there is a question about a specific detail, you can find where it is (there are no line references in these questions). If you can’t find a detail, just guess a paragraph and try to find it. The answer is always right there in the text. You should be able to find it. A good memory will really help.

For the science passage, you just need to look for facts. It helps if you know a lot about science too. It is easy to do all the science questions without even reading it, as long as you can scan and pick out facts quickly. You just need to find specific sentences.

E.g. What did the scientists want to uncover when they were looking for xxxxxx in 1995?

You would use your memory of the text to find the paragraph where they were talking about research in 1995, and find the answer. It will be jumping out at you.

the prose section is definitely hardest, because it is less cut and dry. You just need to practice doing these. Make sure you really keep track of what is going on, and don’t start day dreaming.

I got a 28 on reading in March, where I completely ran out of time and had no idea what one of the passages was even saying. Then, in June, after the SAT, I took an ACT practice and got a 34 on reading. Then, I took another practice and got 36. Then, I got 36 on the actual ACT in June. That june ACT was one of the easiest readings I’ve seen though. But the curve was tight. Miss one and I might have gotten a 34…

In conclusion, just make sure there is always textual proof for the answer you give. Do a practice for the SAT without being timed (just the reading section), and see if you can find all the answers in the text (just to give you an idea). Then, once you get good at finding the answers, you can do it timed. Then, do the same thing with ACT practice tests. Make sure you find the answers in the text. Circle them. Take all the time you want. just get good at it, and then it will be easy when timed.

Good luck!