Number 1: They’re standardized.

This means that there is a certain level of consistency that the exams need to have from test to test, so many of the topics will be repeated on each of those tests. For example, in SAT Writing, you’re almost guaranteed to see one misplaced modifier question per test. In Reading, you’ve got those two-part questions for the SAT. For science, you’ve got questions where you’re going to have to cross-reference information from one figure to another.

They’re going to lay some traps again and again, particularly in the SAT Reading. You’ll see extreme answer choices, reusing words from the passage, going too far with inferences, etc. So, as you take the tests, you will notice patterns in each of the sections and different question types. Therefore, the best way to get better, besides of course learning the content and targeting these different target areas, is to practice with real tests. Take practice sections and tests and review your work. If you could only do one thing to improve, it would be to take practice sections and practice tests and do them timed!

The most important part of taking practice sections and practices tests is to review your work. It’s not enough to just do a test and check your score repeatedly. You must take the time to review. A lot of this review you can do yourself, but you might need help with some of the questions. In these cases, you could work with a friend, a teacher, a tutor, or check out a book or videos like we have that will go through the solutions. This is the number one thing that will help you recognize those patterns, see the question types that come up again and again, and lead you to success when you take the test that counts.

Number Two: It’s a multiple-choice test…for the most part!

The SAT and the ACT, except for your free-response in SAT Math, are multiple-choice tests. So, on every single question, the answer is somewhere right in front of you. All we need to do is find which of those answers is right. However, even though the answers are right in front of us, both tests do a pretty good job of pushing us away from the right answer and towards wrong answers.

But you can take advantage of this weakness by using the choices. The choices they give you, both wrong answers and right answers, are another batch of information that you can use to answer those questions. The question matters, the passage matters, the math matters, the formulas matter, but those choices also matter. They are full of more information that you can use by process of elimination. Plug in your answers, evaluate them and squeeze as much information as you can from them so that you can eliminate the wrong answers and move towards the right ones.

Number Three: You can take the test multiple times.

Think of your score not as a single number, but rather as a range of numbers. You can even think of it as a range of possibilities. Imagine if you took the SAT one million times and you averaged those scores. You would have an average number, but your score on any given test would vary by plus or minus 40,50, 60 points from that true mean score. This means that when you take the SAT, it is a sample of this hypothetical range of possible scores. And as we know, if you’ve studied anything having to do with surveys and data with the SAT Math, a sample is just a good approximation of the true value. But it’s just that. An approximation. The more times you take the test and get samples, the different approximations you’ll get. Sometimes they will be lower than the true value, sometimes they are higher, and sometimes they are right on.

This is why it’s important to exercise a little patience with your score. A lot of students want to finish as soon they can because they’ve got a lot of other things they want to focus on. This is valid, but sometimes it pays off to be patient, right? Take your tests when you’re ready, but don’t be afraid to take a stab at them either. The fear of taking it too many times and colleges not liking that has lessened with score choice and the way score reporting is working. Again, it depends from college to college as well as your situation, but don’t focus on if a certain college will be upset if you take it a fourth time. Instead, focus on whether taking it that third or fourth time will give you the chance to get that top score. Focus on whether it will get you a sample from somewhere on the upper end of your range.