@greeneggsandsam9 Testing just stinks in general!!
Omg everyone T-minus 3 hours and 48 minutes until I see my SAT scores online.
I HATE THE FREAKING PARCC WITH A PASSION! IT HAS MADE ME BEHIND IN SOME CLASSES AND IS POINTLESS!
@Spiral7 I really like the Crucible! It was very interesting and analytical.
@MissSuzyQ yeah our newspaper is really big. I know if I got in sometime during April? I forgot when they notified us last year.
@SallyStephens I hope you did well!
I want to start a speech and debate team but I have some problems.
- I don’t know/think many people would be interested
- I don’t think my area has many competitions
and 3. I don’t know how to start a team/get involved in competitions
Any advice/tips? I’ll probably start a thread; there’s no need to post again there.
@FaultyStart 1. Ask your friends to join! Promote it in classrooms, on the announcements, make flyers, etc.
2. Search for speech/debate competitions for your county. Where do you live? Mine’s has it on the district, regional, state, and national level. (Although I’m not a part of it.)
3. Get a teacher-sponsor, probably an English or Social Studies teacher, and they should be able to get more info concerning competitions. They can also help promote the club in their class and tells their students about it too.
Good luck!
@SirSly I live in Southwest Ohio. Thanks for the advice; I already have a teacher in mind.
@Faultystart Thanks, I did! I got a 2260 AHHHHH OMG OMGG
@SallyStephens Nice job! I’m your hard work paid off!
(Also, out of curiosity-- what was the breakdown?)
@SallyStephens OMG thats amazing! congrats!
(Whoops *I’m glad)
@SallyStephens thats so good! omg your score is goals!!!
How long did you prepare, how much of each section did you prepare, did you take any prep classes, what workbooks do you suggest, etc.? I’m planning on taking it in October and your advice will truly help. Thanks in advance!
Great job @SallyStephens! Also, I took a diagnostic test at the test prep company my parents are trying to get me to sign up for and did relatively well (although I did badly on a section that is usually my best), so my parents are reconsidering making me take SAT prep over the summer. I mean, it’s still lower than my goal, but it’s halfway decent.
@SallyStephens WHOA, nice job and congratulations!
Thanks everyone!!
Here was the breakdown:
Math: 800
Writing: 800
Reading: 660 (oops…)
Yes I realize how badly I screwed up in reading. It ruined my score (kind of). The thing is, this year’s critical reading was SO hard. Almost every question had a different better answer and I felt my confidence draining in that section. It was awful… and I knew it would be a bad score. Now I know for my next SAT that I need to practice more reading sections…
So the thing about math is you need to know a lot of geometry. Know all your facts and information. Know how to solve function notation, basic equations, factoring, and percentages. Every SAT test has those basic things. I would suggest the “SAT Math” book by Dr. John Chung and the SAT Math Workbook by Kaplan. They were a huge help.
For writing, I just memorized and practiced all the basic grammar rules of the English language. Literally the writing section is the only section, in my opinion, you can study for as if it’s a test at school. The other SAT sections are so subjective, but the writing section is literally, get a grammar book and memorize things. Know which is right between: my sister and I, and my sister and me. There was a lot of that!! On the SAT writing, there is generally a LOT of parallel structure so once you learn that, that’s ten questions you can get right.
Wait this might make it easier. The SAT writing topics I noticed:
- Parallel Structure
- Subject-Verb Agreement
( THOSE ARE TOP TWO ) - Plural or Singular? Pay attention to those. Is the subject singular? Should the verb be plural? Some are easy, and some are hard. I remember I got stuck on one because I forgot if Everyone is a singular or plural word. PS: It’s singular.
- I’m not sure how to categorize this but here’s an example: “Mr. Bean and Mr. Potter both ran for president, but he won.” Both is underlined, ran is underlined, he is underlined, won is underlined, and there’s a no error.
Well the thing is they are both males so when the sentence says he, you don’t which of them won. So he would be wrong; you’d need to specify the name. There were like a lot of those. - Those dang pronouns! IT IS NOT FOR PEOPLE
- IDIOMS OMG ---- These are common phrases that can’t be said any other way. For instance, You usually say “walking in the room”, not “walking on the room”, and you usually say “He is famous for something” not “famous about something”.
Here is a link to read up on the SAT idioms used on the test: http://www.veritasprep.com/blog/2013/09/common-idioms-you-should-know-for-the-sat/
THE ESSAY
I have no idea how I got a 12 on the essay. I didn’t see it coming. The topic was ridiculous, and I knew my essay was bad because I had no idea what to say about it. I LITERALLY MADE UP A BOOK. I was like “I’ve read a book once with this exact topic…” and I never named the book but made it sound like a real thing.
Moral of the story: LYING GETS YOU FAR. It was literally written out in my SAT Prep book that I should make stuff up. They don’t care if I make it up or not, as long as I apply it to the topic. That is evident in the way they scored it. So keep that in mind, I guess.
But if I sit at the essay again in the future, I won’t make up anything again because it is a game of chance. What if the reader is mean or wants to go by-the-book? It’s a subjective aspect of the SAT so keep that in mind. Two people grade your essay so if I don’t agree it would be a half-way score.
CRITICAL READING
Lol I did so bad on this section. The fact that I could have had a perfect score on the SAT if it weren’t for this is so depressing…
Let’s take a moment about the vocabulary. What the heck was that 
Cries My mistake was not reading the complete vocabulary list my prep book gave me. I only went through half of it but it’s because I RAN OUT OF TIME TO STUDY. Please everyone-- begin the vocab list ASAP. It’s about 500 words usually. But it’s worth it. Whatever is on that list WILL come. You don’t want to end up like me, coming home after the test and seeing the word in the list I didn’t finish and then considering shaving your head.
Don’t do my mistake. Please. I am 99% sure it killed my score.
Or maybe it was the fact that every single passage was a stupid historic address. Don’t depend on narratives to keep you awake because you could end up with the critical reading test that has no fun story. So basically I wish I had practice more of the nonfiction sections.
That’s okay, though. I’m telling you guys so you don’t make the same mistake. The closest I got to a narrative was a how-to passage.
If you don’t practice at least a million SAT reading sections, survival is a minimal prospect. People think math is hard but honestly critical reading can be the hardest section. It is a lot of analyzing; it’s important to be professional in dissecting passages. I will admit I underestimated this section, thinking I would be okay. Well, no…
I think this is getting way too long. I also have other links to websites I used to practice sections, so if any of you are studying for the SAT currently or have the SAT coming up, you can private message me for more info
Oh, I forgot to mention. I had been doing a little bit of SAT since the beginning of sophomore year, but I truly decided to take the March SAT halfway through January. SO I had a little over a month to hard-core study. I guess you could say I devoted my life to it for over a month. I really didn’t want to take the new SAT… but I will have to take it again because my critical reading score is too embarrassing.
@SallyStephens WOW! With a score like yours, I wouldn’t even bother retaking it! However, good luck if you do decide to improve your reading score!
@SallyStephens nice job! Also thank you very much for the tips that you put up in your post. I am plannig on taking the SAT in September or October and then again in January. It would be great to get the kind of score you got. Can you PM me the resources and sits you used?
@SallyStephens great job! Surprisingly (considering that I’ve been writing for a gazillion years and I edit other’s works for grammatical mistakes, among other things), writing is my worst section (probably because SAT writing is extraordinarily ambiguous and there are sometimes two grammatically correct sentences to choose from).
For CR, just read a lot. It helps build your vocabulary and your analysis skills (especially classics. classics are good; 1984 and Brave New World are some of my favorites). Also take lots of practice tests so you know what they’re looking for in an analysis.
If you’re going to retake it, you’ll probably going to get a 2400. If not, you still got an amazing score!
@greeneggsandsam9 I definitely will! 
and thank you…
@SirSly @topaz1116 Thanks! Good luck to both of you. Let me know if you need anything:)
@SallyStephens I’m pretty sure that the new SAT isn’t until winter or spring of our Junior year, so if you want to retake it, you likely can while still taking this SAT. Thanks for the tips! Also, how did your SAT compare to your PSAT?