<p>For Christmas, I can spend money to get one or two helpful SAT Books. I would like to improve my Critical Reading and Writing scores (whether it be by a little or more than a little). Maybe a specific book (not just an SAT-everything book, but a more focused workbook perhaps?). I’ve noticed over the years that the Writing Section answers in certain books aren’t clearly explained (in some cases). Amazon.com seems like a good place to buy books nowadays.</p>
<p>I plan on going to a state school; however, I’m not sure which standardized tests I should take (I am a HS junior). Maybe an ACT book would be fine, for all I know. :P</p>
<p>If anyone can help, I would appreciate it! :)</p>
<p>For the SAT, buy the Blue Book (the only SAT prep book by Collegeboard) and then DEVOUR it! Know this book well before you risk studying possibly irrelevant material from other prep books. </p>
<p>I’m agreeing with ncm2012 on this one, Princeton helped my practice scores quite a bit; my last practice test score was 200 points higher than my first practice test score.
I’ll let you know how much it REALLY helped when I found out how I did on the December SAT (hopefully in a few hours).
I’m thinking about buying The Official SAT Book, especially if my December score is a bit lower than I’d like…
Anyone have a comparison for the Princeton book vs. the Official SAT book? I’ll shell out the extra 30 bucks if the Official is REALLY that much more beneficial.</p>
<p>I recommend Gruber’s Complete SAT Guide. It helped me to improve my scores! I learned a lot of words (there are over 4000, oh my god) … But it really did prepare me. I’m good at Math, so I didn’t really needed help on that. </p>
<p>Also, to improve my CR score, I read a British classic (I read ‘Jude the Obscure’ written by Thomas Hardy) and wrote down all the words I didn’t know. That book taught me a lot and gave me enough to write about in my essay! (I got an 11!) </p>
<p>My best advice is to just practice, practice, practice! I worked through all the SATs in the Blue Book, and when I finished those, I searched the internet and found over 7 new administered SATs! (They were scanned in by someone who requested that service where you can see the answers etc.) … If you need those, just send me a message and I will send them to you. </p>
<p>I was able to improve my scores from CR520 M640 W540 to CR670 M750 W730 …</p>
<p>In my opinion, don’t buy any of the books. Save your money and buy something you like, perhaps go out for a drink. The only book I recommend you to buy is a dictionary. With an adequate education and a month’s time spent on memorizing all the definitions of words in the dictionary, a 2400 is a sure thing. That’s because the only things I got wrong were the definition questions asking me to place words to fill in the blanks.</p>