<p>tips to get from high 600s to 800s in each subject? (how to improve essay, level 5 math questions, difficult critical reading questions, etc etc etc)</p>
<p>CR - Brush up on vocab. Those are fairly preventable mistakes. Books include Direct Hits and SAT Vocab Cartoons, apps include Mindsnacks (Apple app store) and Test Your English Vocabulary (Android app - good for on-the-go practice, rather than actual studying). Try Erica Meltzer’s, as well. Perhaps someone else (who got an 800) can contribute more to this, as my highest was a 720 (an improvement from 620 at the beginning of the year).</p>
<p>Math - Dr. Chung’s is supposed to be good for the difficult math questions. For the most part, though, it’s just a matter of mastering the SAT math questions through consistent practice. Don’t take simple mistakes, either. It’s easier said than done. Personal experience - I missed 1 on two of the three SAT’s I took, until I finally got an 800 on my last try during June of junior year.</p>
<p>Writing - For multiple choice, I honestly never mastered any grammar rules. It’s just a matter of practicing proper grammar in daily conversation/writing, and making the sentences sound “right” in your head. Erica Meltzer’s Grammar book is supposed to be helpful. Also, don’t overthink; that’s what cost me 3 questions on two SAT administrations during junior year. Once I reminded myself not to overthink (especially the “No Errors”), I scored a perfect 80 MC score. </p>
<p>As for the essay, come up with a list of canned examples prior to the actual test. Organize by literature, history, people and optionally, current event. Include themes/attributes for each examples. As a result, you will almost never blank out and have writer’s block during the actual test (important since you only have 25 minutes to write the essay). The first two SAT’s, I never made a formal list, yet still got a 10. The third time through, I really made sure to type up the list, and it helped make it much easier to get a 10 on the third time in June, which allowed me to score an 800. Remember: a 10 on the essay will never hurt you. Also, write ~2 pages and sprinkle in some universal vocab words (ex. plethora, paragon, epitome, etc.) to help you guarantee that 10.</p>
<p>Hope this helps! Good Luck! :)</p>
<p>Thanks so much; bump…</p>
<p>Well if you can get 600s you get most of the stuff but you have to make sure to make no mistakes.</p>
<p>writing
Evolution leads to new traits within species vs the species evolve for new traits. Well, it would be the former because although you may reason that evolution can’t lead to something, the latter is choppy and it’s ok.</p>
<p>Another problem I had was the following: the sword was in the display
although you would say on display, in refers to the noun display so it’s ok (I figure, the book just said no error)</p>
<p>math
each point is equivalent to one inch. find blah blah in feet
and I found it in inches. Do not do that! read carefully and all will be simple</p>
<p>Reading
cross out the three dumb answer choices and when left with 2, see what’s the difference between them.</p>
<p>But then, it really isn’t easy to get 800. I mean once you get used to it, you score 800 from time to time but if it were so easy, the incidence of 2400 would be higher. However, you can reduce the careless mistakes and get 800s or at least very close (at least a consistent 700+)</p>
<p>hey, @College123college ! not sure how much I can help since I’m still in the middle of my journey, but I’ve so far improved my overall score by about 100-200 points and am getting really close to perfect, though I’m not there yet :)</p>
<p>Step 1: Get the blue book. I started out buying a TON of prep books from barons and whatnot but also the ones highly regarded and CC, and the Blue Book is honestly the only one I’ve actually used. It’s the College Board’s Official Guide to the SAT, and it has 10 real SAT’s. I don’t know if you have it yet but if you don’t, get it. I personally take 1 test a week from there. I log all my progress in a spreadsheet that shows my improvement in each section. After each test, I go through and log each problem I missed in a separate spreadsheet that shows why I missed it and what I can do next time to not miss it. I even have a color coding system for those I missed due to conceptual issues vs. dumb mistakes. I’d be happy to show it to you if you want. You don’t need to be this organized, but reviewing the tests is a must.</p>
<p>Step 2: Read through this information: </p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/763933-everyone-read-this-before-posting-best-of-sat-prep-forum-and-faqs-p1.html”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/763933-everyone-read-this-before-posting-best-of-sat-prep-forum-and-faqs-p1.html</a></p>
<p>It’s an absolutely invaluable resource that is better than anything I’ve ever paid for. </p>
<p>Math: I know it’s possible to improve from high 600’s to 800’s on math because I started at a 680 myself and only missed 1 question on my most recent practice test, so I’m getting close! I personally got Dr. Chung’s and thought it was somewhat helpful. There was really only 2 questions in the first 5 tests of the blue book that I actually found easier because of Dr. Chungs, though, so if you don’t want to splurge then don’t. It really depends on whether you’re struggling on the Math section because you genuinely don’t graph the concepts or you just make dumb mistakes or do the wrong thing on simple questions. For the former, really any prep book including the blue book itself should help you review those concepts. For the latter, the only solution is practice. Just do as many math sections as possible. Go back and redo the ones you’ve missed until you do them right; periodically, go back and do some of the ones you missed all over again. </p>
<p>Reading: Get Direct Hits volumes 1 and 2 and memorize this vocab. make an ongoing set of flashcards of words you don’t know; I recommend a program called Memnosync that shows you a few each day to maximize retention. Read often; when you find a word you don’t know, make a not of it on your phone. Add it to the flashcards when you get home, and review flash cards every day. Old books tend to have a ton of SAT words, as do articles in The New Yorker and The New York Times; Pride and Predjudice, for instance, has a TON of words from SAT’s. But honestly, you’re better off improving critical reading than vocab. Critical reading really is just a mix of practice and understand how CR questions are structured. I recommend reading through this: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/750399-how-attack-sat-critical-reading-section-effectively.html”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/750399-how-attack-sat-critical-reading-section-effectively.html</a> and see if the strategy works for you. The important thing here is that EVERY correct answer is DIRECTLY supported by the text. It’s extremely straightforward; do NOT interpret the text so to speak, just reiterate what’s already there. So if you start looking for textual proof instead of what you think is the right answer that should help your score. This helped me go from missing about 5 questions per test to 2-3; I still make dumb mistakes, but I’m getting there.</p>
<p>Writing: Read through Sparknotes’s grammar guide here : <a href=“SparkNotes: Today's Most Popular Study Guides”>SparkNotes: Today's Most Popular Study Guides;
<p>and you should be good on the multiple choice. Again, improving depends on what your problem is. Personally, I overthink things and sometimes make the mistake of choosing an “awkward” answer because I’m overanalyzing the well-written ones and find some nonexistent mistake; if you can’t easily find a grammar error such as subject-verb agreement, parallel structure, or the correct pronoun, the one that sounds the best is usually right. I usually only miss 1 in this section.</p>
<p>If you have any more questions let me know and good luck!</p>
<p>I can only speak for writing. I went from high 500s to 790 on my SAT, -1 MC and 10 essay. Granted it’s not an 800, but I didn’t practice my essay at all besides going over a practice template and familiarizing myself with some basic rules like fill up the whole 2 pages, use three examples, etc.</p>
<p>I took A LOT of practice tests. I’ve always really liked grammar and writing so these were actually enjoyable for me. Plus, if you only take MC, that’s a max of like 35 minutes whereas the other sections are like 75 minutes. That made it easy for me to be willing to do so many practice tests, and in the end I probably took around 25 between a mix of PSAT and SAT practice. </p>
<p>Like others have mentioned, I also used Erica Meltzer’s book. Honestly, it’s really good. I write a lot so I think I have a natural instinct for when things sound right, but I actually don’t read that much so sometimes I mix up vernacular with proper grammar. I studied grammar rules, but Erica Meltzer’s book helped me be able to apply these rules to the SAT and gave good tips on what’s likely to be on the test and what is not likely. </p>
<p>I had a HUGE problem with idioms. I mentioned that I don’t read a lot, and this makes my knowledge of idioms nearly non-existent. I usually messed up on about 2-3 questions because I thought it was an idiom question when it really wasn’t, or it was an idiom question when I thought it wasn’t. I used sparknotes list of idioms for the SAT to study for this. I studied the day before to have it fresh in my memory because I knew any sooner would get me confused. My other problem was tenses. I’m still not good at tenses, but Erica Meltzer’s book had a good section that explained the difficult parts to me. I would mix up stuff like “did” “had done” “would have done” but the book cleared it up for me. So part of the solution is identifying what you have a problem with and figuring out what resources would work the best. In sections like math and reading, I think it’s hard to identify the problem section because a lot of it has to do with misreading the question or doing it wrong, even though you actually know the material. So you can get 5 wrong on algebra one day and 5 wrong on probability the next day. But I don’t think this is the case for writing. It’s usually pretty clear to identify a weakness because the questions are straightforward. </p>
<p>I don’t think you need to extensively research examples before writing the essay. To me that’s just a waste of time since people who make up examples on the spot can get a 12. Instead, WRITE a list of things you know a lot about a couple days before your SAT. It can be your favorite TV show, a book you analyzed heavily for school or a subject in history. Having written down a list will help you come up with what you know best when you’re taking the SAT. Instead of searching all through your brain for examples, you can just think of the list and search for things on there. I think it also helps to write down some fake examples beforehand, per category. The SAT usually has some categories, like success/failure, something about character, education, etc. What I did was came up with this imaginary character who was the former king of Bahrain (did Bahrain even have a monarchy, lol idk?) in 1926 when the Hadaad (that’s my friend’s last name lol) empire was ruling. If the question was about character, I would make up something noble that this king did and pass it off as history. With education, I always use Guyana as an example because there’s a very little chance that the person reading the essay is from Guyana or will know anything about the actual system, therefore I can make stuff up. I can say they have an extremely well regarded education system because it’s free or I can say their education is free but has led to violence all over the country because “free” indicates to others that it should not be taken seriously. The benefit of having these go-to examples is that it makes writing so much quicker. If you have 25 minutes to write and you need to come up with an example off the top of your head, that can sometimes be very daunting. You may end up with a major loose end in the story or it can end up sounding too fake because you’re rushing the details. By developing it beforehand, you save time and your essay sounds better. Overall, remember to use up the full two pages, use some high level vocabulary CORRECTLY and not awkwardly, have an intro-body-conclusion (you’d be surprised at how many of my friends forgot to write a conclusion), try to maintain good grammar with an active voice (spelling is not a big deal), and be specific even it means making up facts. There are multiple guides on CC to writing essays and all of them are better than mine.</p>
<p>I hope this helped. I didn’t get an 800 but I did start from around the high 500s so I think at least some of my advice has worth. Remember to take a lot of practice tests. If you’re good at searching the internet, you can find links to available SATs and PSATs to get extra actual practice tests (when you run out of tests from the blue book). I also think your mood can sway your scores a lot. When do you think you perform better on the section? When you’re calm, totally in the mood and focused? Or when you’re sort of on-edge, nervous and caffeinated? Try both. The second worked better for me because I felt sharper and more likely to catch small mistakes in sentences since I was using all my brain whereas being calm and focused sometimes made me forget stuff. The first works better for others though because being on-edge also catalyzes stupid mistakes. </p>