<p>Hello my name is Chris. I live in a small town with a great school in New York. I have a 3.9 gpa and take all of the advanced classes offered at my school. I want to go to a top tier school for engineering. I really like BU but that’s not important right now. I went into my PSAT without studying at all and got a 165 and I didn’t really care so about a month later I took the sat without much studying at all and ended up with a 1720 which I’m really not happy with. I understand it’s just my first but I want to end up at least in the 2000’s. My parents aren’t those rich preppy people who force their kids to the limit and practically get a 2400 on the sat for them. I would like to get the opinion from someone who was in my situation on a few things: I would like to know the best review book for CR. I would also like to know the best source of vocab words, ie a book or something. Also I would like to start reading an actual novel to improve my skills so if anyone knows of a good book with good vocab. Also a good writing practice book would be nice. On math I think the practice problems in the blue book will do. And these are my scores btw: math 640 CR 530 writing 560</p>
<p>You can try working from the blue book and you can get flashcards of SAT prep words (from amazon or most bookstores). Also there are online or in-person prep classes as well if you think that might help you.</p>
<p>Thanks will do, happy. Barron’s looks like they have a nice set of flash cards</p>
<p>It is hard to bring up your CR score with just vocab studying. Students who do well don’t just read “a” novel, they read lots of novels. Study the blue book and vocabulary cards, but also start reading more on a daily basis. Take the SAT again this spring, but if you still aren’t happy with your score, try to do a lot of reading over the summer and take another attempt in the fall.</p>
<p>Thanks. I’ll start reading and doing some practice. Can you recommend any good books?</p>
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<p>That you think that will get in the way of the process that you need to follow to have a chance at a 2000+ score. Keep in mind that you may not be able to bring the score up significant because there’s an element of innate ability that the SAT measures.</p>
<p>Plan for a great deal of work. Invest in a recent SAT workbook that includes previously administered SAT exams. There are also other SAT books that contain SAT exams that are indicative of what real exams are like. You may want to get one or two of these. Then prepare to spend 5+ hours per week on preparation. Proceed slowly. Follow-up on every wrong answer with care. Taking practice exam after practice exam is rarely rewarding. Fully process every wrong answer on one exam before proceeding to another practice test. Check out the SAT preparation forum on college confidential for advice and help. And, as a previous responder suggested, set out to “read” more, and to “write” more. Your CR score of 530 indicates that perhaps you do very little of that. Also consider taking a SAT course. Some may be available through your school.</p>
<p>Thanks. Yes I certainly do need to read more and I’ll start doing that along with studying vocab and meticulously doing practice tests. After christmas I plan to put in 45 min to an hour a day towards the sat. I must say I deffinitely underestimated the work needed for this test. </p>
<p>Part of the problem is that you know the test is important but you haven’t studied. It does make a difference.</p>
<p>My kids have taken the PSAT every year since 8th grade. This year my son (now 10th grade) really didn’t study, and missed a lot of geometry problems. He’s currently in AP Calc AB, and one of the better students, so it’s not that he doesn’t have the ability. He simply didn’t devote the necessary time to making sure he had fully mastery of all math skills tested. Next year he takes it for real, and you can be sure he will put in some studying.</p>
<p>And yes, I am a parent who encourages my children, but they won’t take any prep course; rather I will just encourage them to study on their own, perhaps with my goading them a bit.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice and I respect your parenting skills. I just wish my parents had pushed me a little. As I said earlier I definitely underestimated this test and have to do some studying </p>