<p>My son can’t seem to get past the 167 mark on his practice tests. What are the chances at this point he can/will improve by the June test? Thanks.</p>
<p>What was his SAT score? Did he take a diagnostic? What sections is he weakest on?</p>
<p>Hi SAT was 800 Verbal, 710 Math. He’s taken 6 diagnostic tests and there’s no single weak points. He gets 3-4 wrong in each section.</p>
<p>The very first test, before he had studied at all, what did he get? Based on the SAT score there should be another few points in there for him, but that’s not always a good indicator.</p>
<p>On his first test, he got 165 before studying. So he’s only gone up 2 points and he’s doing the Powerscore on line classroom. Any advice?</p>
<p>Yeah, something’s not right here. At a minimum, we should be talking about a 172. Is there any particular type of question he’s missing in each section? One poster on here a few days back noticed that he was missing questions towards the end of each section, which hints that he’s just getting tired. Alternatively, missing questions towards the beginning means you need a little while to warm up (a much better problem to have). Specific question forms mean he needs practice or maybe a couple extra insights.</p>
<p>Having plateaued at +2 is really quite strange. I’m curious to see what’s going on.</p>
<p>Hey, bluedevil… This is acinva’s son.</p>
<p>Yeah, the problems I’m having with the test are frustratingly unpredictable. There doesn’t seem to be any specific question type or portion of the section that I’m consistently missing. I mean, I still don’t really feel all that confident with the games, but I don’t really miss any more questions in the games section than in the LR or RC–about 3 to 4 in each section.</p>
<p>It’s pretty discouraging to the point that I’m almost leaning towards taking the test in October now… Although I won’t have nearly as much free time to devote to studying, so I don’t know. Can a metamorphosis happen in 2 weeks? I know I’m smart enough to get a 170+, but just can’t seem to reach it (except on one random test from 1994 or something).</p>
<p>Thanks for the help.</p>
<p>Hi… uh, Acinvito. I spent about three weeks on the whole thing and went up nine points, so the timeframe isn’t the problem here per se. What’s puzzling me is that you’re plateauing without a specific reason why.</p>
<p>If you’re feeling uncomfortable with the games, that’s where you want to start, easy. It might not be a weak spot compared to the other sections, but that’s not the proper comparison. It’s weak compared to where you might be able to get, since you report feeling uncomfortable with it. That’s the place to start. I looked up my conversion table (which is now a little old) and going from 12 to 9 questions wrong (assuming you can improve the LG by quite a bit) changes you from a 168 to a 171. So even if you can’t do anything to fix LR or RC at all, that’s still a substantial improvement. It’s not like the LSAT only uses your worst section, after all.</p>
<p>I’d be inclined at this point to almost give up on RC. Do enough of them to stay sharp, but it’s the hardest one to improve.</p>
<p>I’d be curious to hear more about your LR troubles, especially because it’s double-weighted; getting a little better at LR is worth twice as much as the same improvement in LG or RC. That, and LR is traditionally considered the easiest of the three sections. If we can improve that, even by half, we’re looking pretty good all of a sudden.</p>
<p>Feel free to use the e-mail function to chat with me more about it – especially if you have specific questions about specific question types.</p>