{"id":12098,"date":"2018-02-23t12:15:44","date_gmt":"2018-02-23t20:15:44","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.catharsisit.com\/hs\/?p=12098"},"modified":"2018-07-03t07:35:38","modified_gmt":"2018-07-03t14:35:38","slug":"sat-reading-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.catharsisit.com\/hs\/sat\/sat-reading-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"sat reading practice: everything you need to know to score big"},"content":{"rendered":"
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for a lot of students, sitting down for the official sat and flipping open the booklet is a bit of an anxiety-provoking scenario. the one thing that\u2019ll help you more than anything else on sat reading\u2026 is sat reading practice. we’re going to compare our best sat reading tips<\/a> to the show, friends<\/em>, so you might also want to brush up on your friends<\/em> knowledge in order for this to make sense!<\/p>\n okay, we may love them, but episodes about those comical new yorkers really did have a formula (and it got increasingly obvious after all those seasons!). bad news for friends<\/em>, but great news on the sat! once you get used to the pattern of the sat reading test\u2026guess what? it\u2019s not going to change! so download an sat practice test<\/a> now, take a look at what you\u2019ll encounter on test day, and settle in. it\u2019s a standardized test—and that\u2019s a good thing!<\/p>\n the fact that the sat reading test uses the same format every single time is really helpful for clever students. as you learn more about the test, you’ll get to see that there are a limited number of question types<\/a>. work on identifying them during your sat reading practice and look for patterns. for example, when you see “in context, [word] most nearly means\u2026” you’re probably dealing with a “words in context<\/a>” problem, and you’ll want to go back to the sentence to make your own vocabulary<\/a> prediction before plugging in the answer options. similarly, a “which sentence best supports\u2026” question stem is a “command of evidence” problem, and you’ll want to look at your answer to the previous question first and consider how you got to the answer before you move forward with this one. once you master these types of patterns, you’re golden!<\/li>\n just because you know what to expect generally<\/em> doesn’t mean you should get careless when it comes to the particulars! you’ll be amazed at the difference one little word (like “not” or “except”) can make to your score. for example, “the author would agree with each of the following statements except\u2026” has a very different answer than “the author would agree with which of the following statements?”<\/p>\n similarly, “which of the following statements does the author not use as support for her claim that\u2026” is going to have a different response than the question, “which of the following statements does the author use as support for her claim that\u2026”<\/p>\n if friends<\/em> could go on for so long (10 seasons, people!), you can definitely devote a few hours a week to working on sat reading practice for a few months. don\u2019t think of it as obsessive practicing. think of it as binge-watching the sat.<\/p>\n what might that look like? if you have three evenings a week set aside for sat study, consider devoting one of them to sat reading—and, of course, a saturday morning to an sat practice test<\/a>!<\/p>\n not sure how to make this work in your schedule? here are some awesome sat study schedules to help you out.<\/p>\n now that you’re familiar with the types of questions you’ll find during sat reading practice, it’s time to get familiar with the types of passages<\/a> you’ll see, as well. the passages, of course, will change every time, but you can expect to see the same types of passages on each test: u.s. and world literature (1 passage), history\/social studies (2 passages), and science (2 passages). you’ll soon notice that there’s also a paired passage, and it always takes the place of one of the history\/social studies or science single passages. why is it important to know the passage types? as you get closer to your official test, you’ll need to know what to do if you start running out of time. by approaching your favorite\/best passage types first, you maximize your chances of a great score.<\/p>\n sat practice questions<\/a> will help you master this skill. you’ll see, as you go along, that the wrong answers to a question start to take on patterns, too. sometimes they’ll be slightly exaggerated, or answering the opposite question, or only vaguely related to the passage. a lot of the time, certain wrong answer choices will appear with certain problem types. for example, get used to seeing opinions swapped in the wrong answers for paired passages! of course, it’s a big waste of time to label every wrong answer you see (particularly on test day), but it is<\/em> helpful to think like the test-makers!<\/p>\n here, practice looking at data in tandem with the text. as you practice, ask yourself a series of questions about what you’re seeing:<\/p>\n you’ll find that familiarizing yourself with the data right away can get you big points on the official exam!<\/p>\n another question type that’s particular to the “new” (post-2016) sat reading section is the line reference question. as you work through practice questions, you’ll see a lot of these: they ask you which lines best support the answer to the previous question. of course, if you got the previous question wrong, these become a whole lot harder. the more you see these questions, though, the easier getting them right<\/a> will become.<\/p>\n nobody’s making you watch those weird episodes where (fifteen-year-old spoiler alert?) joey and rachel get together for no apparent reason. skip ’em! you can come back later, after you’ve watched some more chandler and monica awesomeness. same thing goes for sat reading practice: by now, you know what passage types you’re best at, and which you like the most (those coincidentally often happen to be the same passage types). nobody’s making you do them in order! pick your favorites and start there. it’ll put you in a better frame of mind—and, if you don’t get to all the questions in time, you’ll have had a better chance of answering the questions you did get to correctly.<\/p>\n let’s face it: out of all the friends, ross is probably the one you’d least like to hang out with (i’m not saying you don’t<\/em> want to hang out with him, just that the others would be more fun). but you have to have him in the mix! just like the resident scientist on friends<\/em>, the more science you read in everyday life, the more palatable it becomes. for a lot of students, the science passages on sat reading are their least favorite, but skimming through scientific american<\/em> every now and again can really give you a leg up.<\/p>\n it can be hard to know where to start with that extra reading, so we’ve made a list for you<\/a>. and if you’re worried about the other sat sections, take a deep breath, because we’ve also put together posts on how to get the best sat writing and language practice <\/a>and sat math practice<\/a>. enjoy!<\/p>\nsat reading practice: what beginners need to know (aka season 1)<\/h2>\n
know what to expect<\/h3>\n
know the question types<\/h3>\n
read the questions carefully<\/h3>\n
commit<\/h3>\n
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sat reading practice: what improvers need to know (aka season 5)<\/h2>\n
know the passage types<\/h3>\n
know the wrong answer types<\/h3>\n
charts and graphs<\/h3>\n
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\nyou’re not joey going into an audition. you actually need to have these skills—and they are skills that can be developed! as you work on sat reading practice, make sure not to skim over those visual stimuli<\/a>. it’s vital to study the charts and graphs you’ll see on sat reading differently than the data you’ll see on sat math.<\/p>\n\n
find the right support<\/h3>\n
sat reading practice: what masters need to know (aka is ross going to get to the airport in time?)<\/h2>\n
pick your favorite passages<\/h3>\n
read, all the time, a lot (and don’t skip the science!)<\/h3>\n
based on your netflix queue, you might also enjoy\u2026<\/h4>\n
next week, on sat reading practice\u2026<\/h2>\n