5 Simple Tips To Mastering the SAT
1. Attitude and Goals
Your attitude and goals as you prepare for and take the SAT Reasoning Test will prove to be two of the most important factors in mastering the test.
Preparation – Why do you want to do well on the test? What schools do you want to apply to? What score will you need to help your application? Which areas of the exam are your strengths and which areas are your weaknesses? How many hours per week are you willing to dedicate towards preparing for the exam? What unproductive daily activities are you willing to give up in the short term so that you can have more time to prepare (less TV, less video games, less time with friends)? If you can commit to preparing for the SAT for 6-12 weeks you will drastically increase your chances of Mastering the SAT. Working with a private SAT tutor or taking a group class is one way to help you create a plan for preparing for the SAT. Working with a professional tutor will keep you on track for your studying goals and will ensure that you have the right attitude.
Test Day – Your attitude alone on test day can make a 200+ point difference. If you are not mentally prepared to take the exam you will easily lose concentration and momentum on test day, making it difficult to get the score you desire. The SAT is given in the same manner each time so you should know what to expect. There are 10 sections spread out over 3 hours and 45 minutes and the Essay is always the first section of the exam. So don’t be surprised!
Eat breakfast before the exam, bring number 2 pencils and a calculator, and bring some snacks for the short breaks you’ll have throughout the test. Plan on arriving early so that you are not rushing to the test location. Do not cram the night before, but make sure you are comfortable with the methods and approaches in the week leading up to test day. Remember that the SAT will test your patience, your discipline, and your ability to think and work under pressure as much as it will test your knowledge of the material.
2. Practice, Practice, Practice
The SAT is a test in which practicing pays off. A standardized test means that each exam is similar to the previous one in terms of the types of questions and the difficulty level of those questions. For example, if there are 12 math questions involving fractions on the February SAT then there will most likely be 12 math questions involving fractions on the March SAT. The test maker also scales the results from each exam date separately so that the same percentages of students get certain scores on each test date.
Through practicing, you will become accustomed to the types of questions that will appear on test day as well as the techniques that you should use to answer each type of question. You will also begin to recognize some of the patterns that will appear on test day. For example, it is not uncommon to see a question that is almost identical to one that you have studied, except with different numbers. If you can use the same method to solve the test problem that you used during practice then you should get the correct answer.
Learning and practicing these techniques will allow you to answer questions with greater speed and accuracy. Practicing also helps you avoid common SAT traps because you will “learn your lessons” during practice and won’t make the same mistake twice.
3. Ability to recognize common question patterns and SAT traps
As previously mentioned, it is not uncommon for you to see a question on test day that is almost identical to one that you have studied, except with different numbers. If you can recognize that a given question is similar to one that you have studied, you will be able to save time by knowing exactly how to solve the problem.
It is not just enough to know that this will occur. If you want to Master the SAT, it is important for you to be “on the lookout” on test day so that you are able to recognize these common question patterns and SAT traps as they appear.
4. Discipline to apply time saving and score increasing techniques
Throughout your practice sessions, you will learn that for each section there are certain techniques or approaches that if applied will save you time and help you choose the correct answer. It is one thing to know these techniques and another thing to have the discipline to be able to use them while under pressure on test day. Creating the right habits while preparing for the SAT is crucial so that you are able to use those techniques on test day without hesitation. It is important to spend some of your practice time answering questions under timed conditions so that you can develop the discipline of using these techniques under pressure.
5. Knowledge of basic math and grammar
As mentioned, the SAT Reasoning test measures your ability to think critically under timed conditions. Many of the questions test your basic knowledge and therefore can be solved with basics skills. Math questions that are more difficult usually do not involve more difficult math concepts but are difficult because they will require you to string together several steps in order to find a solution. These questions will test your ability to recognize which basic math techniques you will need to string together and your ability to do the basic math required.
The Writing section tests your ability to recognize common grammatical errors. You can perform well on these sections by knowing the basic rules of grammar and common misuses. Having the knowledge of basic math and grammar will minimize the amount of “careless errors” you make on test day and allow you to concentrate on the methods you must use to solve the problems.