<p>To you smarty pantses who didn’t study for the SAT:</p>
<p>How’d you do? I have taken the SAT three times without studying prior to any of them. I improved 180 points between my first and second tries, and expect ~100 point improvement when I check my scores on Feb. 13th. </p>
<p>Personally, I think the best way to improve your score is to take it until you feel completely comfortable with the setting, time constraints, stress etc… Study all you want and take practice tests til your arms fall off, but I still think experience yields results. When I took my test this morning, I was completely comfortable. It was a familiar environment; I knew what to expect and how to deal with roadblocks. </p>
<p>My advice to improve your score without months of study:</p>
<p>READING
-Don’t completely bubble in your letters til the very end. Put just a little scratch mark on the correct answer so you can get back to reading without losing your train of thought.
-Read the questions before reading the passage. Determine what you should be thinking about as you read.
-Bracket all lines that are the focus of questions before you even read the passage.
-DO NOT GET CAUGHT UP IN THE STORY. Don’t like the passage. Don’t appreciate it. Think objectively, as if you were the author of the passage. Think about why you wrote what you wrote, and think about what you were trying to convey.</p>
<p>MATH
-Know how to use a calculator effectively.
-If the correct way to solve it doesn’t come to you within 3 seconds, skip it.
-I have created roughly scale drawings of geometry problems I didn’t immediately understand which helped me cut out nonsensical answers. Only do this if you have already answered every other problem.
-Once you have answered everything you can, test possible answers on the ones you don’t know. On problems where you can’t test values, leave them blank.</p>
<p>WRITING
-Use at least two quotes/specific historical references in your essay. Memorize quotes about Freedom, leadership, power, and other cliche topics. Odds are, the essay will be about something generic like that.
-In the essay, there is no wrong answer. Simply support your position.
-They aren’t looking for an award winning creative masterpiece. They are looking for focus, grammar, and an inkling of intelligence in your writing.
-For the sentence correction portions, don’t repeat the sentence in your head, It doesn’t work. The hard ones are designed so that they sound ok. Instead, identify subject nouns, verbs etc. and make sure they line up. Cut out the unimportant clauses in the sentence. The sentences are filled with unnecessary fluff meant to distract you. Don’t let them.</p>
<p>My general advice would be to sleep a lot the night before and have a HUGE breakfast the morning of the test. Other than that, simply be aware of the fact that this is a test you can take more than once. If you mess up now, no worries. :)</p>