Up Your Score (8 page)

Of course, if you’re feeling ambitious, you might also try reading a book.

The reading passages are the one place where you should abandon negative thinking. As impossible as this may sound, it is important to assume a positive attitude toward the critical reading section. Why is this? Well, remember the chapter on oral hygiene in the health textbook you had in sixth grade? No, because it was boring and you didn’t
want
to read it. But do you remember the chapter on sex? Yes, because you did want to read it. It’s the same way with reading passages. You won’t remember them if you have the attitude that they are boring and useless. (They
are
boring and useless, but that’s beside the point.) Instead, you must convince yourself that you are dying to read them because you are passionately interested in whatever they are about. Get psyched to read them. Treat them as you would a love letter. Ponder them as you would a passage from a piece of great literature. Cherish them as you would a section of
Up Your Score
.

There is sound psychological backing for this claim. Scientists have shown that comprehension and retention levels are much higher when people are interested in what they are reading than when people aren’t. Your brain just doesn’t bother remembering stuff that it finds totally dull.

The following strategies may be useful when taking the test. You probably shouldn’t use all of them because that would take a lot of time. The strategies you choose are a matter of personal preference. Try them all and see which ones you like.

Strategy 1

Skim the questions before reading the passage. This gives you an idea of what to look for while you read. Follow the four guidelines below if you use this method.

a. Read only the questions; don’t read the answers, too. If the question is about a specific line in the passage, mark that line so that when you read the passage you will know to focus on the marked lines. (This is especially helpful for the vocabulary-in-context questions.)

b. When you see a question that asks for something general, such as “Which is the best title?” or “The main idea of the passage is . . . ,” disregard it and go on to the next question. Why? Because you should always assume that there will be at least one question like that, so you don’t even have to bother reading it.

c. As you read the passage, circle anything that is an answer to one of the questions. Don’t immediately go and answer the question because that will break your concentration and interfere with your comprehension.

d. Make sure that when you read the passage, you don’t get so caught up in looking for the answers to the questions that you fail to understand the overall meaning.

Strategy 2

After you read a paragraph, ask yourself, “Self, what was that paragraph about?” Spend two to six seconds summarizing the contents of the paragraph in your head. It helps to look at the paragraph while you are doing this because then you will remember where things are located in the passage. If you want, jot down notes and paraphrases in the margins or underline key phrases. This can save time later when you have to look for the answers. If you are a flake who, like Larry, can read
an entire passage before realizing that you weren’t paying attention and that you have no idea what it was about, then this strategy might be of help in forcing you to concentrate.

JaJa says: Don’t be afraid to write all over the page. They throw everything away at the end, anyway.

Strategy 3

Usually the passage will be composed of a few sentences that state the author’s main idea and others that contain facts to support the main idea. As you read the passage, underline any sentence that is purely a statement of the author’s main idea. It is guaranteed that there will be at least one question relating to these sentences, and if you underline them, you won’t have to waste time looking for them. We highly recommend that you use this strategy.

Strategy 4

While you are reading, underline the main sentence in each paragraph. The sound of your pencil will distract the other test takers, making them lose concentration and improving your score in comparison. And when you are answering the questions, the underlining will automatically draw your attention to the main idea of each paragraph.

Strategy 5

The Princeton Review suggests that if you are having trouble finishing the verbal subsections, you should skip the last (or longest) reading passage. They argue that it takes several minutes to do this passage, and since it’s the hardest one, a lot of students get the questions wrong anyway. If you skip it, you will have much more time to devote to the rest of the questions that take less time, are easier, and are worth the same number of points.

Strategy 6

Read the passage, then translate the whole thing into Swedish. (This will help only if you are Swedish.)

A few more pointers from JaJa:

a. When you begin answering the questions after reading the passage, cover up the answer choices. Spend a few seconds
thinking about the answer. Pretend that it is an open-ended question. A lot of the time, the answer you came up with will closely match one of the answer choices. Bingo.

b. Lean toward the politically correct. Never pick an answer that seems too extreme. The ETS tries to be as politically correct and posh as possible.

c. Don’t be scared of searching for answers. The answer—or, at least, clues to it—is always in the passage, just sitting there, waiting for you to find it.

You can expect to see four long reading passages of between 450 and 850 words on the SAT. (There are actually five long passages because one is double—more on that later.) There will be 5 to 13 questions associated with each of the long passages. Each short reading passage of approximately 100 words will have two or three associated questions. There is always a passage on something scientific and a passage that is an excerpt from a narrative, which could be fiction or nonfiction. The other passage topics may include something historical, something about an art form, or something about a minority group.

Each passage has a short introduction in italics. Read it carefully. It will help you understand the passage, and often it will define words or identify names that you need to know.

The Scientific Passage

Do not be intimidated by scientific jargon. The scientific passage will inevitably have some far-out scientific terms that you have never heard of. Don’t worry.
You don’t need to know scientific terms
. Either the terms will be totally irrelevant or they will be explained in the passage. Take for example the following excerpt from an actual SAT:

“. . . Kinematic studies of such objects show them to be receding from us at a rate proportional to their distance . . .”

Some students might panic when reading this sentence because of the word
kinematic
. However, there is no need to panic. You don’t have to know what
kinematic studies
are to answer the questions correctly.

The second reason this sentence could be intimidating is that it refers to proportions. Proportions are math, and math is scary. Once again, there is no need to worry. If you read the sentence that follows the difficult sentence, you’ll see that it explains the math, so you don’t have to do any thinking:

“That is, those galaxies most distant from us have larger recessional velocities.”

(You don’t have to know what a
recessional velocity
is, either.) The expression “that is . . .” clues us in to the fact that this sentence is going to explain the previous sentence. You will frequently find this sort of thing in the scientific passages. If you don’t understand a sentence, look at the sentences that precede and follow it. Chances are, one of them explains whatever it is you don’t understand. Whatever you do, don’t be daunted by the ETS!

The Historical Passage

The historical passage will discuss a particular trend or period in history. The author will be making her own interpretation of that trend or period. She will support her interpretation with examples. When the author starts listing examples, read the first example, then skip the rest of the examples and write “EX” (for “example”) in the margin near the list of examples. In many cases, the author will also support her interpretation by referring to other historians who agree with her. In other cases, she will refer to other historians who disagree with her so that she can refute their interpretation. Circle the names of historians the author refers to and decide whether they agree or disagree—there will probably be a question about them.

The author will never say, “Beethoven sucks.”

The Art Passage

The art passage will be about an art—literature, painting, sculpture, crafts, music, etc.—or a particular artist—musician, craftsman, writer, etc. In
all
the examples we looked at, the author had a positive attitude toward the artist or art form. The author might have some specific criticisms, but the overall point of the passage will be complimentary. The author will never say, “Beethoven sucks.” (This rule does not apply to the double passage.)

The Fiction Passage

The literature passage will be an excerpt from a piece of literary fiction. It is hard to predict what the passage will be like. Don’t skim it too quickly. You have to read carefully to pick up the subtleties. However, when you start to answer the questions, do not read too deeply. You might have to interpret the figurative meanings of parts of the passage, but don’t try to be profound and read things into the passage that aren’t there. Also, make sure that you pay attention to the author’s style and tone. There will almost certainly be a question about that. Practice in English class—teachers love it when you ask questions about style and tone (and remember, your grades count toward college, too).

The Minority Passage

The ETS has been accused of being biased against minorities. In the 1970s, the ETS decided to respond to these accusations by putting a reading passage about minorities in each SAT. This was a pointless politically correct gesture on their part because it didn’t make the SAT any less culturally biased. (For more on the SAT and bias, see
page 311
.)

As far as we’re concerned, the minority passage makes the SAT easier for everyone—minorities and majorities. This is because the passage is incredibly predictable. You
know
that the ETS is going to say good things about the minority group. That’s the whole point of the passage. Therefore, many of the questions are giveaways, for example this one from a real SAT:

The author’s attitude toward the Chinese achievements mentioned in lines 1–45 is best described as one of

(A) disbelief

(B) admiration

(C) anxiety

(D) ambivalence

(E) apathy