Good luck to the kiddos taking the SAT tomorrow! May the odds be ever in their favor for a one (or two - I think someone is taking it for the second time) and done!
It my DS’s second time and he came home from school today sick! Says he still wants to take it though
@3scoutsmom, I hope your DS feels better tonight and can get a good night’s sleep.
@3scoutsmom - so sorry to hear that your DS is sick - I hope he feels a little better in the morning. D18 is testing tomorrow as well.
DS was a still sick this morning but not as out of it as he was yesterday. He reports that the math section was very easy, he had enough time to triple check all his math problems. He was only stumped by one, something to do with circle theorem, but he thinks that may have been the experimental section. Of course he always thinks he’s got all the questions correct until the test graded;-) Now we wait until Oct 27th to see how he really did!
@3scoutsmom sorry to hear your DS is still sick. Hopefully feeling confident about his performance will help him focus on getting healthy this weekend.
My DS also felt confident about the test. He felt that his AP Eng.prepared him well for the essay. It was his first time taking it. Now, we play the waiting game. Thankfully, it’s not as long as waiting for the PSAT scores.
DD also feels she did well on the test today. She felt good about both math sections and said she had plenty of time to review her answers on the writing/lang section. She said that although she didn’t fully understand a couple of the reading passages, the questions at the end of those passages didn’t seem all that difficult to figure out. All-in-all, she feels pretty good about it. She’s the baby of the family & I still can’t believe she just took the SAT!
D said the test was fine and she was able to finish all sections with plenty of time. It’s Homecoming here tonight, so this is a long day here!
Thanks all for advice and tips to help me motivate my DD’18 to prepare for PSAT. She is totally aware of the importance, and also registered at Khan academy to practice half hour for 3 days a week (but didn’t even start). Her excuse was her school work, her teachers are not good, so she spent time to do homework. However, I just checked on her grade and found out she has dropped grades from all her AP classes. I decided to stop all her sport activities, and take away her phones until I see improvement.
@jjkmom - Ah, the trials & tribulations of parenting! Well, you’ve done your best by getting her the practice book, having her sign-up on Khan Academy, and getting tough on the sports until her grades come back up. At this point I’d suggest that she works hard on keeping those grades up, because there are many other opportunities for merit aid other than the National Merit scholarship.
http://www.learnu.org/full-ride-scholarships-list-of-scholarships-for-full-tuitionfull-rides/
Along those parenting lines:
Until the end of 10th grade, my D18 had this little basic flip phone (no texting/no internet access) to use to call us for whatever (rides from school mostly). She was such a good kid & hard-working student though and this past summer I broke down & got her an iPhone as a reward. Now she has all the texting/internet/streaming/snap chatting/face time and all of that.
A few weeks ago, we went to this one day event called a college readiness boot-camp where expert speakers talked to the kids about proper study habits, how to write essays & applications, etc. During one presentation, a professional counselor was telling the kids that having the phone near them (unless they are REALLY using it for a group project or something) is not a good idea because of all the distractions caused by pop-up messages and other constant contacts from friends while you are trying to study. It was a really good presentation.
So of course the other day she told me that she was swamped with homework and went into her room to work. I came in an hour later or so to find her with the headphones in & listening to music, while in a constant back-and-forth with several friends on the phone (talking about homecoming events) in-between what little studying she was getting done. So I asked her if she was paying attention during that great presentation in the boot-camp and she said that that lady didn’t know what she was talking about. I also noticed that friends were texting her even past 11 & 12 at night.
I put my hand out for her to give me the phone & she slammed it into my hand while telling me that she was the only kid who wasn’t allowed to text & listen to music while studying! Oh, the horror! When I told her that it might be time to go back to that old flip phone (we still have it) her attitude softened a bit and that seemed to be the end of it.
New rule: No iPhone in the room when studying. She can take breaks whenever and text with her friends. When she’s done with studying, she can sit and listen to music for a while. Also, I take the phone & keep it in my room at night so she’ll actually go to sleep & not get up to text. Technology - a blessing & a curse!
I guess I’m not too popular right now, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Now I’m anticipating the next bit of drama when she comes home from the homecoming dance this weekend and announces that she’s in love or something!
I hear you @LMHS73! My DD’18 was using an old old iPhone (hand me down birthday present from her aunt who always wanted to use the latest iPhone) with pre-paid plan of $100 during middle school school, each call and text will cost her 10c and she treasured those minutes and maintained straight As. We then bought her an iPhone 5C as her graduation gift to HS and give her the plan that has data, text, calls. Her 9th grade was tough a bit but she still worked hard, maintained most As but 2 B+s. Those 2 B+ could have been As but she told me how hard was the teacher and how her class average was way lower. At the time she was also addicting to Korean drama and K-pop and started listening to music while studying. She told me she would start focus more in 10th grade, then everything repeats, bad teachers, low class average, so much homework, etc, I complained about her extensive use of the phone but failed to take more severe action of taking away as she always told me she needs phone to access Google classroom, class website, group discussion, etc. 10th grade over, this time she got 7B+s (4 of them were from AP classes) and rest are As. I don’t want to be a “tiger mom” so I accept what she get, she said she tried even though I know she could do better, she was listening to music and hangout with friends (preparing for tests) even before finals. I failed to spot the problem and take away her phone. Again, she said to us, she will do extremely well in 11th grade, will ace PSAT and get straight As. Now we are just one month into the semester and I see her grades suffered so badly (I saw D and Fs and I panicked), I had to do something! So I took her phone away and don’t plan giving it back to her until I see all subjects back to As & Bs. I know she has been having golf practice and tournaments daily after school since day one, gets back around 5-6pm, then relax, dinner, homework. She is taking 4APs 1 Honor and PE/athlete, and she also started a new club with her friend. I always see her study, study but it’s just not effective. Now with only 14 days to PSAT, I gave up reminding her about this test, but rather see her focus on pulling up her grades. Sorry to rant about my frustration here…
Has anyone else been to a college fair yet or going to one? I’ve written up a long-ish list of colleges that offer the programs S is interested in and dragged him to a local college fair where several of them were represented. It’s funny what a difference the rep can make and not really surprising. One rep (a big oos public flagship) was absolutely awful and left S with little interest in that school. Another oos flagship rep was okay and S wants to look further into that school. But now he is really excited about the two that had great reps. And the colleges couldn’t be more different. One big oos flagship on the outskirts of a big city and one tiny LAC in a small town.
Prep for the PSAT and ACT has been on the very light side. But after going through the testing stuff with D17 I feel a little more zen. My kids know the deal that higher scores = more merit. If they choose not to maximize their scores they’re more likely to end up a safety, but there’s nothing wrong with that as the safeties are very strong schools.
Yes @snoozn ! I had a similar college fair experience with D this past spring. She’s very introverted and has no idea what she wants to do so it was a real test to see which reps could draw her out and which let the silence grow a bit uncomfortable. To her credit I don’t think D held the less appealing reps against the school, honestly I think she was just happy to have made it through all the uncomfortable social interactions! There were a few reps that really impressed her though and caused some unlikely schools to make it onto her list, however briefly. One sent her a postcard the other day that emphasized it’s location near the beach. She shook her head at it while remarking that it was the worst pitch possible for her and why did this school want her anyway? I reminded her about the rep at the college fair, “oh yeah… But no” she says, beach is a deal breaker for this kid…
I went to a couple with older kid and they were so crowded and such zoos that he didn’t find them worthwhile at all. We are skipping them for DD because of that experience. Waiting in line to chat with a rep for a few seconds just to get a brochure and a quick pitch were not useful from his perspective. He preferred going to the college rep visits when they came to his school and that is what DD has been doing as well.
@2014novamom that was our experience as well.
My DD went to a college fair as sophomore, she said the same, it was crowded. All kids were clogging up at few schools and had long lines, others didn’t have any. she visited the less crowded ones and she does not remember who they were now. This year she does not want to go 
DS18 wants to go to a very expensive Model UM conference in DC this year. We told him he’d have to figure out a way to help pay for some of it. He came home today and said he has a paying Com Sci tutoring job set up for $20 an hour, first meeting set for two hours - likely recurring at an hour a week. He also talked his Chinese teacher into letting him teach the Chinese 1 class (it’s during his lunch period) next Wednesday to try to drum up some students that many want tutoring in Chinese. Where there’s a will there’s a way!
I would agree that the HS visits from colleges are more useful by a longshot than college fairs. S18 hasn’t done any yet, but D17 went to one last week where she was the only student – pretty sweet. She and I also found a local reception of four colleges (at a hotel) to be useful. She was attending for one of the colleges and ended up adding one of the others to her list.
@3scoutsmom, teaching a class sounds like a great way to drum up tutoring business – good luck to your S in making it to the conference!
Do any of you have a child that took the PSAT10 in April?
MY DS18 took it in February and I’ve confirmed it is the EXACT test that’s in the 2016 PSAT practice book. @Plotinus and I were discussing this on another thread. If you have a child that took the PSAT10 in April could you ask them to compare their test questions (available on their College Board web site) to the free 2nd practice PSAT
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/psat-nmsqt-practice-test-2.pdf (this is the one the GC gave out)
to confirm that the April test was the same version of the test?
Just got back from our first big college tour with D. The verdicts: 1 Yes, 1 Maybe, 1 No, and 1 Hell No. Amazing how different colleges are on the ground than from your impressions based on their websites or Fiske guides! Even colleges that seem similar on paper can have very different feels.
Two Touring Tips:
- Don't schedule your visit for first thing in the morning. Most of the students are still asleep then and the campus will look deserted. It's the students you're mainly there to see, not the empty buildings.
- Eat lunch in the dining hall (and secretly observe/eavesdrop on the students), then give your kid a map and an hour to explore the campus on their own. This lets them form their own impression about the school without the embarrassment of parents trailing behind. Use this hour to go inside buildings and get coffee.