by Erica L. Meltzer | Mar 25, 2011 | Blog, General Tips
When you take a standardized test, you are your own worst enemy. From what I have observed, many test-takers score lower than they should simply because they second-guess themselves and change right answers to wrong ones. Believing that the answer they chose was too obvious and thus a trap, they talk themselves out of a perfect logical selection and go for something less obvious — and wrong — instead. Almost never do I see students change incorrect answers to correct ones when they go back over a section, only the other way around. So I’m going to propose something a little radical: don’t check your work.
I know this probably flies in the face of what you’ve always been been told: make sure you leave some time at the end of every section to go back and check….right? But for many students, working this way can do more harm than good. Please do not misunderstand me: I am not at all suggesting that you just whip through the questions without thinking twice about them and then stride blithely off, confidently assuming you’ve gotten everything right. This only works if you are willing to work very, very carefully the first time through; to go just a little bit slower than you think is necessary (assuming that time isn’t a problem); and to break down the questions piece by piece and reason your way through them meticulously.
True story: One of my students never scored as well as he should have on ACT English because every time he checked his work, he changed wrong answers to right ones. So finally I just told him to stop checking his work.
When he came home from the ACT, his mother asked him if he’d checked his work on the English section. He said he had. “Don’t lie to me,” his mother responded. “Ok, fine, I didn’t,” he admitted, “but only because Erica told me not to.”
When his mother called and told me that, my first thought was, “Oh s–t, if he blows it, his mother is going to be furious.” I won’t deny that it crossed my mind that perhaps I should have made him check his work after all.
But then got his score back.
And the English was a 35.
by Erica L. Meltzer | Mar 25, 2011 | Blog, General Tips
Very often, test-takers miss “NOT” and “EXCEPT” questions (e.g. “Which of the following is NOT mentioned in by the author as a technique used by Da Vinci when he painted the “Mona Lisa”?) simply because they don’t read them carefully enough. Instead of finding the information missing from the passage, they do exactly the opposite and thereby answer the question incorrectly. Even though these all-important words are capitalized, they’re astonishingly easy to overlook.
So always circle them, underline them, star them, or do something to draw attention to them so that you won’t forget what you’re looking for. It’s worth spending an extra second or two to make sure you don’t unnecessarily lose the points.
A couple of years ago, I had an ACT student — let’s call him J. — who literally got every single one of this type of question wrong on the first few practice tests he did. After I told J. perhaps 50 or 60 times that his score would probably shoot up a good 5 points if he just started circling those words, it finally occurred to him to listen to me. Sure enough, he scored above a 30 the first time he tried that strategy. He was incredulous. “Gee,” I said. “Who ever would have guessed that would happen?”
by Erica L. Meltzer | Mar 17, 2011 | Blog, General Tips
One of the biggest mistakes juniors make is to take the SAT or ACT in the winter or the early spring –when they’re not truly prepared — just because they (or their parents) have decided they should be done by a certain time. While this certainly does work for some people, the reality is that many others will need to complete most of their junior year in order to really be ready. The skills that the SAT tests cannot be acquired overnight, or even in a month or two for most people, and if you need some extra time to really feel like you know what you’re doing, take it and don’t look back.
My general rule is that you shouldn’t take the test for real until you have already scored in your target range on a full-length, timed practice test. Your score will probably not just magically shoot up on the actual test, and even with score choice, you may still be required to submit it to certain schools. Every one of my students that decided to take the test earlier than planned “just to get a score” was unhappy with the results. The ones that waited, on the other hand, never regretted doing so.
Furthermore, taking the test before you’re ready and ending up with a score you don’t want can create a dangerous cycle of anxiety. I’ve had a number of students who took either the ACT or the SAT repeatedly before coming to me, and they spent so much time psyching themselves out that my biggest challenge was simply to persuade them that they could actually do well!
So if you originally intended to take the test and January or March but don’t end up feeling that you’re ready by then, do not take the test “just to get it over with.” If you are signed up for the May test but feel like you need an extra month to study, wait and take the test in June. I know you have finals and AP/IB exams and it sucks to still be studying that late when all of your friends have their scores already, but trust me, it pays to take the time, work on the areas you need to work on, and then take the test when you feel you’re finally in control.
by Erica L. Meltzer | Mar 8, 2011 | Blog, General Tips
This is one of those tiny tips that can make a big difference. Whenever you eliminate an answer, draw a line through the whole thing — don’t just cross out the letter, and don’t just put an “x” next to it. Otherwise, it’s very easy for your eye to get distracted. You end up going back and looking at answers that you’ve already gotten rid of. You think you’ve eliminated them, but subconsciously you haven’t done so completely, and consequently there’s a much higher likelihood that sooner or later you’ll accidentally fill in a wrong answer.
There’s also a psychological aspect. While working through a question, I find it a relief to be able to eliminate an answer thoroughly. Out of sight, of mind — it’s just one less thing to deal with. It shows you in a very concrete way that you’re making progress, and that tends to boost your motivation.
Besides, it can be very satisfying psychologically to cross something out so completely — it’s like saying, “Take that, you stupid test!”
by Erica L. Meltzer | Feb 20, 2010 | Blog, General Tips, The Mental Game, Uncategorized
One of the most-common issues that many SAT-takers face, particularly in Critical Reading, is the seeming randomness of many of the answers. While I do agree that the College Board occasionally does in fact come up with a set of answers choices that are uniformly awful, this is actually a pretty rare occurrence.
I say this because I have had countless conversations with students about why their (incorrect) answer was truly the right one, or why such-and-such answer could not possibly be correct. While I admire their conviction, my response, uttered from the bottom of my heart and with the greatest possible affection, is ‘Get Over It.’
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