阅读从500飞跃800的方法——哈佛牛人的SAT提分方法

SAT总分2400,哈佛录取,阅读从500飞跃800的方法->這個人真的好強大！！Do you want to learn the most infallible and least error-prone method of attacking the SAT Critical Reading Section? Learn from someone who knows. I was accepted into Harvard with a 2400 (that sounds pretentious but you should know where I'm coming from). I first have to tell you that achieving a great score on SAT CR is no t easy and there's no single silver bullet. As with everything, this method requires r epeated practice and experimentation before results can show. Please read on as I share with you my successful method of tackling CR.

Step 1. Let's start with the approach. You have probably encountered people in yo ur daily life who snidely demean the SAT or at least the experience of taking the S AT. However, you must approach this important experience with a fundamentally dif ferent mindset. Okay, perhaps the SAT is a test full of tricks - a test purely to be gamed. If so however, learning to work within a system is a very valuable skill to have in life. Furthermore, I believe that the fundamental basis of the SAT is not its tricks, but its call for a rapid comprehension of certain situations, a supple maneuv erability, and a positive approach to the material. After all, a multiple-choice test wi th any semblance of difficulty can be said to contain tricks. How good is your know ledge if you can't manipulate it to a small challenge? Don't demean your opponent - that's a recipe for disaster. The last quality, a positive approach to the material, i s the most important and the one you can control the easiest. However, it does no t come naturally (as can be seen with scores of grumbling teens) and takes reinfor cing.

Step 2. A second word about approach: You didn't pay CollegeBoard 45 bucks so t hat you could be nice. When you're faced with five choices on a question, you've g ot to be ruthless. Stop internally justifying why one answer could be right, and inst ead make the shift to asking yourself why that answer could be wrong - play Devil' s Advocate, as cliched as that may sound. I can't tell you enough how much this s hift in thinking has helped me when I have been stuck between two seemingly corr ect choices. Despite appearances, all choices ARE different and one is certainly the best, or else CollegeBoard would be losing thousands of dollars to successful lawsuit s. Keep this in mind. You have got to find the right answer and I will show you h ow.

Step 3. It is my intention to focus mostly on the long reading passages in this Ho w-To, since that is where the majority of the CR questions lie and since these ques tions give many test-takers a higher level of grief. For sentence completions, my bi ggest advice is to stop wasting your time on tricks, to buckle down, and to start at tacking vocabulary lists. Direct Hits is vouched for by many and proven to be most effective, though I personally used Princeton Review's Word Smart I and II cover to cover (perhaps not as efficient as the previously mentioned title). One problem is r etention, so what I did was that I made flashcards for every word I didn't know in

the book (it came out to about 1000 words). It takes a long time, but it pays off for the SAT, your reading, your writing, and your life. Only if you really know the words will you be able to confidently answer sentence completions (and consummat ely schmooze at cocktail parties). For the short passages, it's all about absorbing th e small paragraphs as efficiently as you can before going on to answer the questio ns. They're considerably easier if you keep your mind, and obsessing about the sho rt passages (going back to double or triple check) are a huge time drain. Most of t he time, it's a quick fact check paired with a tone question. If you practice a lot o n long passages, short passages will be an easy relief for you.

Step 4. Now, onto the long passages. I had loads of trouble with these before I fo und this method. I am going to give you my step-by-step method of attacking the m, which I have found extremely effective, albeit somewhat more time-consuming. Before anything, you MUST read the short blurb before the passage. It gives you a sense (though always limited) not only of what the passage is going to be about, but also of the position and possible tone of the author. You will then be able to p erhaps place yourself into the author's shoes. This is a good point right now to tell you that you MUST love the passage you are reading. Force yourself to love it - t hrow yourself into the passage with gusto. It works. Though it's quite ludicrous to be super-enthusiastic about a boy and his alfafa patch, with your enthusiasm comes retention, heightened focus, and an oddly vicarious interest in the passage. My ge neral mental approach was a huge contributing factor in my getting an 800 in CR a nd a 2400 on the SAT.

Step 5. After you have read that thrilling blurb, don't start reading the passage yet. Quickly jump to the questions, and as fast as you can, skim every question for lin e number references (don't read the choices or the full question yet). On some pas sages almost every single question has a line reference - on most others it's about over half. Very rarely will you see a passage with question without any line referen ces (perhaps only rarely on a six question passage). Anyway, once you see a line r eference (In lines 23-25 of the passage, the author is saying that...), you should br acket not the lines, but the sentence contained within the lines. This mark-up will a llow you to focus in on that sentence once you begin to read the passage. Based o n the question, you want to make a small annotation. For this question: (In lines 2 3-25 of the passage, the author is saying that...), you might make the annotation MEANING next to your marked-up sentence. Other annotations might include: SAYS THIS BECAUSE, REFERS TO, HOW SIMILAR TO PASSAGE 1, BACKS UP WHAT BEFO RE (think crude caveman notations - they're more efficient). Go through all of the q uestions. Perhaps some of the references will not have any line numbers. If you se e (In the last paragraph...), just put brackets around the last paragraph along with an annotation. If you see a general question referring to the passage as a whole, o n the question circle the number of the question with a large circle. This means it's a general question and must be answered AFTER all the specific questions. I find t his is always a very comfortable way of attacking the questions based on how Colle

geBoard writes these questions.

Step 6. Once you have marked up all the line references as fast as humanly possi ble, then the real art begins. You must read the passage. There is no way around reading every single word. But HOW you read it is the true art. Read the unmarke

d sections quickly yet efficiently, absorbing it briefly but not truly pausing to analyz

e. ONCE you hit a marked section, slow down and absorb it. If you feel that it wo uld not disrupt your flow to answer the corresponding question, do so. If not, keep going a little more. A vast majority of the line reference questions (even complex ones such as inferences) can be answered after reading from the beginning to the point of reference. In a few instances, it may help to read past the point of refere nce, but NEVER read the whole passage through without pausing to answer questio ns. Your retention will be terrible and it's much better to handle the passage in sm all, manageable chunks. Also, when you answer a question, just circle in the answe r in the test booklet. DO NOT BUBBLE IN THE ANSWERS UNTIL YOU FINISH THE ENTIRE PAGE, SOMETIMES EVEN THE PASSAGE. This is a huge time saver and it p revents you from making bubbling mistakes. The time saved is not necessarily the t ime difference in bubbling, but the time saved because it prevented you from break ing your focus. This is very important in CR. Don't break focus. If you're very low on time however, you can bubble as you go.

Step 7. Once you have tackled all the line and paragraph references ruthlessly, you should have already finished reading the entire passage and because you had focu sed in on the passage in numerous instances, you should also be well-equipped to answer your circled general questions. I always find it's easier to answer these gen eral question at this point, seeing as how you hit up the passage numerous times already along the way. Remember to never choose an answer unless you can truly back it up with evidence from the passage. Even "inferences" do not stray far from the text. If they did, then the "best answer" would be up in the air. Do not be m isled by the word "inference" - it's a misnomer. A large number of these can actual ly be pulled straight from the passage. It's all about the passage - not what you th ink or have learned thus far in school. Being one with a text and not extracting to o much from it is a valuable skill to learn. Don't put words into the author's mouth. Another very helpful thing to remember when viewing the choices is that extreme choices (including the words ALWAYS, NEVER, or BEST) are rarely ever correct beca use they fall under the hard-to-prove category of generalization within inductive rea soning. Though you've heard this tip many times and it sounds obvious, it is so hel pful (yet easy to forget) and you often find yourself internally justifying these kinds of generalizing answers. Just say no (in a ruthless yet eternally positive way). Step 8. My method of tackling long passages is somewhat time-consuming, but tim e is something that can be reduced through assiduous practice. This method is so effective in getting the right answer, and I fully vouch for it from personal experein ce. What I also did during practice was that I gave myself twenty minutes instead

of twenty-five in the standard CR sections, and I rapidly tried to utilize my develop ed method. It was extremely difficult to meet the twenty-minute deadline at first bu t I got better and better at it through practice. While time can be addressed easily through practice, a fundamentally bad approach to the passages cannot. You shoul d try out this method if you are having trouble with CR passages - be open. This method was THE contributing factor for my rise from a 500 to an 800 in CR. Than ks, and tell your friends about this article. My CC is Noitaraperp. Good luck!