@ 3scoutsmom - out of curiosity why are you having him take the SAT on March 5 as he has already taken 2 PSATs this year?
@labegg it’s because he is taking the March 5 SAT that he took both PSATs! Taking the March 5 SAT works best for his schedule. He doesn’t want to take the May SAT because he wants to take the Math 2 SAT in May and you can’t take the SATII’s and the regular SAT on the same test date. It’s recommended here that the Math 2 SAT it be taken in May the year you finish Pre AP Pre Cal so the math is still ‘fresh’.
He’ll be out of the country for June and July but he wants to take the new, real SAT before the Oct SAT which should be his last. National Merit is very important to us and he will be heavily prepping for the PSAT in August and September since the SAT and PSAT are similar, prepping for one it pretty much prepping for the other. For us it’s best to get it out of the way early in his junior year. Of course if he just rocks the March SAT (unlikely) then he’ll only have to worry about the PSAT. He’ll also be applying for some special programs and with apps due in September and having an official SAT score, although not required, may help.
D16 followed a similar testing pattern and she was so thankful to have her SATs done early in her Junior year .
@3scoutsmom - DS didn’t take the PSAT10, but he did take a practice SAT through his school. It was the new format and it did not go well. So poorly in fact that he did worse than he did when he took the SAT cold at 13 for CTY! And he did a great job on the PSAT this fall. It was bad enough that he’s taking a practice ACT this weekend to see if it will be a better test for him. After his PSAT scores being pretty high, we were really surprised to see such a low SAT score. We at least expected it to be better than his score from three years ago!
I guess what I’m trying to say is make sure your DS preps a bit with the new material (more than just taking the PSAT)!
Thanks for the heads up! @RoonilWazlib99 I thought the the PSAT this Fall and the new SAT were supposed to be very similar? DS has taken a couple of practice SAT’s in the new format from Khan. He’s going to an essay writing class for the new SAT tonight, I’ve heard that is very different and Khan didn’t include an essay (or at least I couldn’t find one).
Was this one of the College Board’s published practice tests?
Is there any specific area you son did worse on? DS is good with vocab and math, but struggles with "what did the author mean’ or ‘what was his intent’ rather than what did the author say type questions and ‘which line is an example of this.’
I too thought the fall PSAT was similar to the new PSAT 10/11! Uh oh if not…
@3scoutsmom - I am all about having the tests done well before senior year application season and given the test score issues/ delays over the past year with both SAT and ACT it is probably never too early!
Don’t even get me started on the CB’s “delays” we just got d18’s OCT paper PSAT scores in the mail YESTERDAY! 4 months -really CB?
I thought it was going to be very similar as well! Yes, it was one of their official practice tests he took. We actually got an incredibly detailed report so I can tell you what areas he had the most trouble with. He actually did about the same in all reading/writing sections with about 78-80% correct in those areas except Command of Evidence where he got 72% correct.
Math was the pits for him. He is only in Algebra 2 this year though and they said the new SAT covers through some Trig, which he won’t have until next year. In fact, that was his worst area: Passport to Advanced Math. He scored a 25% on that section with only 5 questions answered, 1 incorrect, and 11 he just skipped/didn’t get to (we told him to skip anything where he really had no clue because we wanted to see where he had deficits and by guessing, he could have answered correctly and we wouldn’t know it was a problem area). He had about 55% on both of the other math sections - Heart of Algebra and Problem Solving and Data Analysis.
It was not pretty.
On the essay he did fine - an 8 for the reading score, a 6 for the Analysis, and a 7 for the writing score.
If your son has done some practice, you should be good. The only practice our son did was take the PSAT in October.
I’ll update with how the ACT goes this weekend!
@3scoutsmom I actually took the PSAT in October. I actually also commented on how late the PSAT acores. I feel the PSAT results being put on paper are mainly for those without internet access. The PSAT 10 I took was pretty okay. However, the test felt mainly more reading and writing, and less math. I had a 990/1520 on the test with a reading score of 510 and a math score of 480. Just wanted to point out that this was my first time ever taking a PSAT. I had only practiced by doing one practice test a week before the test. I’m actually pretty confident in my score and feel that if I use Khan Academy’s study program over the summer and use my time more wisely next year, I’ll do fine. I actually have a set goal of getting at least between 1150 - 1250 on the next PSAT. However, I guess now there is going to be a new PSAT next fall, which I feel is unnecessary. I’ll be taking the SAT and the ACT for the first time, February of next year. I also plan to, hopefully, take the SAT Math II and SAT Chemistry tests next year.
@2014novamom Also, as an aspiring engineer, I was very surprised that I scored higher in reading than in math. But then I checked my answer sheet and saw that this was due to the fact that I had answered more questions on the reading and writing instead of on the math. However, on the math calculator section, I had correctly answered all of the questions I had answered expect for one. I am only in Algebra 2 right now, so that might be it. So I know I definitely need to improve on my math the most.
@RoonilWazlib99 My worst subscore for the PSAT was The Heart of Algebra, a 6/15 or 40%, and my best being Standard English Conventions, 10/15 or 66%.
@ak2018 - I’m not sure how far back you’ve read in the thread, but the reason his scores are a surprise is that on the PSAT in Oct (which he took with zero prep), he scored a 730 in the Reading/Writing section and a 670 in the math. And when he was 13, he took the old SAT to qualify for a summer program and scored higher on the math section than he did with this SAT practice test he just did.
It is such a huge disparity that it made me wonder what was different between the PSAT and the SAT. He is a bright kid, straight As in honors classes, in gifted/talented program, etc, so we were not surprised he did really well on the PSAT, but we were very surprised by his score on this SAT.
@RoonilWazlib99 I believe, but this is only what I’ve heard, that the SAT, over the years, has become more for the humanities and arts kids. So basically, the test is said to lean more towards kids who are good at English and History. I also heard, from a Khan Academy video, that the reading test purposely gives an extra 5 minutes than Math. This might not make a difference. The ACT is usually favorable to those out west as well as STEM kids.
@RoonilWazlib99 Also, I checked my score and answer sheet and I would have been a lot higher had I just guessed on some of the questions. I would have done that but I didn’t know that there was not a guessing penalty this year. I would had a good 80 - 120 points extra. I actually omitted a lot of questions because of this guessing penalty, which was the rule on the old one. I honestly wish they just stuck with the old SAT/PSAT. Or at least told us the rules in advance.
@ak2018 I’ve got a data point of one, but my engineer DS did much better on the ACT than the SAT. He scored 2140 on the SAT (math 720), which he took first. He actually took it twice and scored the same on both tests. So he took the ACT and scored a 34 composite (36 math, 36 science). He did no prep for either test and if he had bothered to even prep a little bit for the ACT he probably could have bumped his score to a 35 or even a 36. But he didn’t want to and a 34 was good enough for him, so he was one and done with the ACT.
@ak2018 could you elaborate on this?
Have you been told they are changing the PSAT format again?
@3scoutsmom I thought someone had mentioned that the PSAT taken a few days was somewhat different from the one in October. Like it was seemingly harder. I don’t believe their changing it again.
I think @ak2018 meant that the PSAT10 and the PSAT are different. Not sure, but that’s what it seems.
Son surprised us with some planning ahead and asked us to sign his application for the IB program yesterday. Not due for another week. He had to indicate his course selections for the next two years. Not set in stone, but he chose:
Junior Year:
IB English HL
IB American Studies SL
IB Spanish SL
IB Physics HL
IB Chemistry SL
IB Math SL
Senior Year:
IB English HL
IB History HL (this is up in the air for him whether or not he wants to take this as an HL course or move on and try something different like IB Psychology SL or IB World Religions SL)
IB Physics HL
IB Chemistry HL
IB Math SL
TOK
So he will have the flexibility since he will already have three HL courses with English, Physics, and Chem to either do the History as two full years or do it as an SL and an second, separate SL senior year. What is nice is that Chemistry is offered as an SL and an HL course, with SL just being the first year and the HL the optional second year. So if he thought it was too much having two high-level lab classes, he could just drop Chem after Junior year and then complete the History HL instead or continue on in Spanish for an HL.
@RoonilWazlib99 that is nice that he has that flexibility on a few of his HL/SL choices! I think my D might have considered History more if that had been an option. Am I imagining it or does your S have 4 SLs and 3 HLs? We only take 3/3 or 2/4 (though I would not let my D take 4 HLs I get too many stressed out phone calls from her as it is!), could he have a non-IB course senior year in that spot? Or is it a requirement particular to your school?
We started spring sports this week, D runs track (hurdles). They have their first meet next week. Her biggest complaint is that this year they are not using the athletic period (that 99-100% of the team has) for practice, they are only practicing after school. But I think they (the athletes) actually are using their athletic period for this purpose, even if the coaches aren’t there. Her athletic period is every other day, so on those days she essentially has a double practice and comes home wiped out. And grumpy because she didn’t get to work on homework afterschool like she does in her off-season. I told her it’s good time-management skills practice for her. ;
So far she seems to be managing everything ok, we’ll see how she feels tonight. She has an academic league meet tonight and she’s going over to a friend’s after practice to carpool to the meet, which isn’t until after dinner, so she’ll really have to figure out how to use her time well.
The real question is, are they going to keep or eliminate the athletic period next year? She thinks they want to get rid of it, but she is worried about it because during the fall and winter it is really used by the athletes in those sports. But none of the spring sports are using it and there are a LOT of spring sports. I told her not to worry about it until it happens because it’s really not in her hands.
@1822mom -
We don’t have an athletic period. What do non-athletes do during that time? It seems strange that she would have a practice during school and then the coach would have her practice again. I guess I just don’t understand what it is. I’ve never heard of that before in any of the school districts we’ve lived in.
For my son’s IB schedule, he has:
HL - English, Physics, Chem (and maybe History, depending on his choice senior year)
SL - Math, Spanish
The Chem SL is an option and his school offers both SL and HL for Chem. you have to take SL first and then HL would be the optional second year.
If he decides to do just IB American Studies and not continue with the second year, History would change to an SL and then his other choice would be an elective, and the course he is most interested in just happens to be an IB SL course.
So, right now he has 4HL and 2 SL, plus TOK for one year. The other option would give him 3 HL and 3 SL (with an optional free/elective course if he did this).
The athletic period is a PE class, so non-athletes just don’t take it and have a different class that period. Not all schools have them, her school has had an inconsistent history, some years they do, some not. As a sophomore she is able to use this period in place of the required PE class (2 years req. for graduation), but last year she was required to take both 9th grade PE AND athletics PE so she had 2 PE classes. Athletics PE is scheduled at the end of the day, so 4th period, and 8th period (they have 4 periods each day), girls is 4th period, boys 8th period. This has enabled them to effectively share the 1 field they have for practice during fall and winter seasons between field hockey/football, and boys/girls soccer (a winter sport here). She is worried that if they lose the athletic period they will lose access to the field in the fall (she’s a field hockey player) because football takes precedence over everything, relegating them to the mole infested patch of grass they practiced ineffectively on while the field was being built last year. But all is just rumor and conjecture at this point (and teenage rumor at that!).
@RoonilWazlib99 That is what I actually meant to say. Sorry if I wasn’t being clear.