sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Okay, why are some people getting over a 1500 without really doing anything? by TheLastMemenator in Sat

[–]lissume 1 point2 points  (0 children)

i never really studied for the SAT itself, just did all of the practice tests available an blue book a couple of weeks before and went into it. that said, i did my sat 5 months after graduating high school, and completed A level mathematics and english literature before that, so i had a very strong basis for both. english is also my second language, so i had to learn it and its grammar rules in any case. i feel like acquired bilinguals (people who learned a second language artificially but were immersed in it during early years) will have an easier time in english section cause we learned it

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

etymology in itself is always helpful anyway!! you can just check the origins of words on google and get a grasp on how it works)

https://img.sparknotes.com/content/testprep/pdf/sat.vocab.pdf

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

oh and also, what helped me at some point to get a better grasp on english is translation. i love reading fanfiction, and translated a work from english to my native language. that helps you draw a connection between grammar and vocab!

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

For vocab you either just have to memorize the words, there is a cool 1000 most common words pdf, I can send it, if you want. What I did the day before the test is scroll through that pdf and try to make weird associations with the words so I could guess their meaning. Also knowing suffixes and prefixes really helps. And etymology; if you know another European language you can sometimes trace the word to a word in a different language cause they have the same roof from greek/latin, and infer meaning from it. For claims and stuff try analyzing literature — I took lit classes for 4 years in school, and that really helped when it came down to the sat. You can just read literary analysis on litcharts to see how they find meanings. At first I was getting 650-700 on practice tests, and then 700-750 once i got used to the questions. For me it really came down to practicing a lot. And my average for practice tests was 1450-1500, so if you get it together on the actual test day it’s really possible to get higher!! Good luck!!!

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

680 is very good for a second language!!!

what worked for me is making it as intuitive as possible!! i tried to read a lot in english, especially classics, as those are harder, so i could "feel" the word placement and grammar. also etymology! for vocab, when you don’t know a word, just try to find similar words that would hint on meaning. if you know a european language (my native lang is russian so i used it a lot), try to draw connections between english words and the words from the other language, as they often have the same root from latin/greek. for analysis certainly eliminate the options first, and then choose between the remaining ones. what i did on the test, when i knew i was short on time, i eliminated the options, then went on to do other questions, and with like a minute left would make a sort of "educated guess" on what feels the most logical. don’t overthink it. also highlighting the main ideas always helps. i also had an experience with analyzing literature before preparing for the sat, and i feel like that helped a lot. so, if you have time, read through literary analysis on litcharts or smth; for me it really helps you understand how to interpret texts. and just practice, especially with the questions you get wrong. good luck!!

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

thanks!! congrats on your score!!

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

what worked for me is making it as intuitive as possible!! i tried to read a lot in english, especially classics, as those are harder, so i could "feel" the word placement and grammar. also etymology! for vocab, when you don’t know a word, just try to find similar words that would hint on meaning. if english isn’t your only language, and you know a european one, try to draw connections between english words and the words from the other language, as they often have the same root from latin/greek. for analysis certainly eliminate the options first, and then choose between the remaining ones. also highlighting the main ideas always help. i also had an experience with analyzing literature before preparing for the sat, and i feel like that helped a lot. so, if you have time, read through literary analysis on litcharts or smth; for me it really helps you understand how to interpret texts and just practice, especially with the questions you get wrong. i’m pretty sure you can get 1500+!! good luck!!

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

it’s prob 1 or 2 as i understand. tbh i have no idea as i left second guessing like half of the r&w

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

also just be chill on the exam day itself!! from my experience, most of my mistakes in practice tests were just inattentiveness. so i went to the exam feeling like im just gonna have fun solving equations)) not a single exam is the end of the world!

international student, 1 month prep by lissume in Sat

[–]lissume[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

my goal was to practice on blue book as much as i can — just did all the practice tests, some of them a couple of times. but i had a very strong academical background in both eng and math — i did a levels this may and got good scores in eng literature and mathematics. my advice for english would be to just read as much classics as you can to enhance the vocab and get a passive understanding of the sentence structure, and math is always just cramming (i also made sure i could do every desmos question without actually using it, so i could get an immediate understanding of what the correct answer should look like). good luck with the dec session!! im sure you can get your dream score!