The biggest thing you can do to improve your SAT Critical Reading score is to focus on the main idea of the passage.
If you can really get this concept and apply it when you’re taking the SAT, your score on the Critical Reading section will increase dramatically. In fact, if you combine this one tip with my Sentence Completion method, your Critical Reading score will go up by 50 to 100 points.
Here’s why.
If you’re having trouble with the critical reading passages, you’re probably getting stuck on the details and missing the main idea of the passage.
Sometimes when you read a passage, you may get confused by certain words, sentences, or even whole paragraphs. You might be tempted to re-read those parts until you understand exactly what they mean. Don’t do it, it’s a waste of valuable time.
Why?
Most of what’s confusing you is details, but not all of the details will be referred to in the questions.
If they don’t ask you about them, you don’t have to know them. That’s why it’s important that you don’t get caught up in the details as you read.
Which details do you have to know? The SAT will tell you. Any question that asks about specific details from the passage will refer you back to specific lines. When that happens, you do need to go back and re-read lines, and usually a little bit before and after as well.
While you don’t need to know all the details, you must know the main idea, which for our purposes includes the author’s opinion on the topic if his opinion is clear.
Most of the questions, even if they’re about specific details, relate back to the main idea in some way. That’s why once you know the main idea, almost all of the questions get a lot easier.
I’ll show you how that works in a moment. First we have to look at our second tip.
In the Critical Reading section of the SAT, unlike in the Math section, you’re not looking for an exactly right answer. You have to look for the best possible answer among the choices they give you.
Sometimes you’ll be doing a question and think to yourself, none of these answers seem right to me. I know. Sometimes none of them seem right to me, either.
Sometimes none of the answers will be the same as how you would answer if you could write anything you want. That’s OK. One of the answers will still be better than all the rest.
All of the wrong answers have something about them that make them wrong. Students who do really well on this section know this. They use the process of elimination to eliminate the answers that are clearly wrong, then pick the best remaining answer.
The good news is that in almost every question, 3 of the answers will obviously be wrong, and you’ll be able to cross them out right away.
In fact, when using the process of elimination, after you’re done crossing off the answers that are obviously wrong, if you’re not sure which of the remaining answers is the best choice, pick pick the one that most closely reflects the main idea of the passage.
Let’s see how this works for the second long critical reading passage in Section 7 of the Official SAT Practice Test for 2009 – 2010. It’s the passage that begins, “Ridiculing television, and warning about its inherent evils, is nothing new.”
Download it now and follow along with me.
The main idea of that passage, and the authors opinion, can be simply stated as:
“The idea that TV is evil and dangerous is not new. In fact, going all the way back to Plato, the primary means of artistic expression have always been attacked like TV is today. I think that people who do that are wrong.”
If you thought the main idea was anything along those lines, you probably did pretty well. Here’s how knowing the main idea applies to the questions.
Question 16: If you know that the passage is about criticizing TV, you know that B, D, and E are wrong. If you know that the author himself is not criticizing TV, you know that A is wrong, and the answer is C.
Question 17: The lines they refer to say, “television has been blamed for corrupting our youth,” and is a, “big, perhaps dangerous, waste of time.” Notice that this detail is just an expression of the main idea of the passage. This question is easy. The least bad television show is D, which is the correct answer.
Question 18: This type of question is asking you about what a word means in the context of the passage. The main idea won’t help you on a question like this. Just plug the answer choices into the sentence in place of the word “drawn” and you’ll see that the correct answer is D.
Question 19: Plato thought those stories, and their heroes, were bad, in the same way some people today think that TV is bad, so you know that A and B are wrong. Since Plato felt very strongly about that, the answer is E.
Question 20: If you realize that the “academic” mentioned in this question disagrees with Plato (and agrees with the author), you know that A, B, and D are wrong. If you noticed that he called Plato an “elitist”, you know the correct answer is E.
Question 21: This question is about the same lines you read for the previous question. The author is building up his argument that Plato was wrong, so the answer is A.
Question 22: Remembering the main idea, the correct answer is D.
Question 23: The author disagrees with Plato, so A, C, and D are wrong. Plato was a Greek philosopher, so E is wrong. The correct answer is B.
Question 24: Again, remembering the main idea, the correct answer has to be E.
Get how this works?
Knowing the main idea and using the process of elimination is like having super powers.
I picked this passage to show you this concept because it’s particularly clear. In some other passages, it’s not quite this easy to apply the main idea to each of the questions. For all passages, though, knowing the main idea is the key.
Let me add a few additional steps that will help you do your best on the reading passages, and put it all together in order.
- Read the part in italics before the passage.
- Always read the passage before answering the questions.
- Read for the main idea and the author’s opinion, not the details.
- If a question refers to specific line numbers, always go back and re-read those lines. It usually helps to read a little bit before and after those lines, as well.
- For most questions, when you’ve eliminated the answers that are obviously wrong, if you’re having trouble deciding which of the remaining answers is right, pick the one that is closest to the main idea of the passage.
- As long as you’re not rushing, always go with your gut on this section of the test.
That’s it. Practice this a few times until you get the hang of it. Then watch your Critical Reading score shoot way up.
Try it and let me know how it works.
P.S. If you want a full length Critical Reading video course that will help you raise your CR score fast, check out my SAT Critical Reading Quick Fix.
Thank you so much, this article is full of great tips and pointers! I just took the new SAT where the top score is 1600 and I scored a 1150 which is way lower than I want it to be. I struggled with the Critical Reading section because I get bogged down and re-read almost every paragraph, so for me the first tip was so helpful! Once again thank you for writing a great article!
Hi, I’m a high school senior taking the January SAT test (Jan. 23). I have taken the SAT only once before, back in March 2015, and scored a 1970 (680 CR, 680 Math, 610 Writing). I’ve been studying and taking practice tests lately (though I don’t do each all at once in 3 hours), and have have been scoring around 2050, though many times it’s inconsistent (sometimes i score 1900, sometimes 2100). The hardest section for me has always been reading, as its not like the other sections where you can directly start answering questions without ‘wasting time’ per se and do not need to spend a significant amount of time reading, in my opinion. I almost always have to use up all the time and have very little, if any, time to review. I just recently stumbled on this website and your idea of utilizing the main idea, which I have yet to apply but seems to be very effective the way you’ve shown it in your video(s). I think my problem is with the actual time it takes me to read and process correctly the given passages. I try to read too quickly so I would have more time to do the questions, but when I read too quickly I sometimes start to zone out indirectly as I’m not fully absorbing the meaning of the words…they just appear as words to me without meaning, which then makes me go back and reread, etc. and that wastes a lot of time in my opinion. Should I just read slow enough so that I can process enough (i have a hard time defining ‘enough’, as many times I just pay too much attention to details, like you said, which sometimes aren’t even tested), and formulate a good main idea, in which would increase my speed in answering the questions? This problem is partially (maybe entirely) driven by my paranoia of running out of time on the reading questions if I spend too long reading the actual passage. Should I be able to state the main idea after reading the passage once? Basically, any tips on time management and ideally how much time I SHOULD have left after every reading section? Thanks. Im retaking the SAT in hopes of getting into MIT…so yeah.
Hi Jeffrey,
You ask some really good questions.
The first thing you have to do about timing is to figure out how much time it takes you to do your best on a CR section. Here are the steps to figure that out.
1) Do a CR section (or all 3 CR sections from a practice test) taking the time you need to finish the section but keeping track of how long it takes. Set the timer for the time allowed, when the 20 or 25 minutes is up mark where you are, keep working to finish the section, and mark all of the questions you did after the time elapsed.
2) You’ll probably find that you’re only a few minutes over time, if you’re over time at all.
3) Repeat that process making sure to skip the questions that are taking you longer to answer. Skip those questions quickly, as soon as you realize that they’re taking longer than most of the other questions. Come back to them after you’ve gotten to all the other questions in the section.
4) You’ll probably find that you answered all of the questions that don’t take you too long in the time allowed for the section, and that the questions you answered after the time allowed are the ones you skipped at first.
5) When you try it this way, you’ll probably find that you got most of the questions that you answered in the allowed time right, and that most of the questions you got wrong were those that you skipped at first and answered after the time expired.
6) If that’s true, and you really can’t figure out the answers to those questions that you missed, then your timing problem is solved. You have successfully rearranged the way you pace yourself through the section to be able to answer all of the questions that you know how to answer in the time allowed, and those questions you can’t answer will be the ones you didn’t have time to get to anyway.
7) If this process reveals that you still can’t answer all of the questions that you know in the time allowed, the next thing to look at is how long it takes you to answer the questions that you know. Many times, we know the answer before we’re totally comfortable marking it and moving on. We doublecheck or rethink it to be sure. However, if you’ve practiced enough, you know that you know the answer. You can save time by learning to trust yourself and choosing the answer faster.
Trust me, for someone at your level, this is probably enough. Don’t worry about saving time and having a little time left at the end to go back and look at your answers. Get them right the first time.
Now, about how fast to read…
You say that when you read too quickly you sometimes start to zone out and not fully absorb the meaning of the words, or see words without meaning.
This is a really good point. I’m glad you bring it up, because some people read this post of watch my videos and think that I’m telling them to skim the passage. I’m not.
Don’t skim. If you skim, you’ll do worse.
You explain why. You don’t get the meaning of the words, and then you go back and reread and end up wasting time.
Try this instead:
1. Read every word of the passage, but don’t worry if you don’t understand some of them.
2. Read for the main idea, the main point that the author is trying to make. Don’t worry about the details when you read the passage, because they might not ask you questions about them.
3. You don’t have to get the main idea exactly right. You just have to have a good idea of what it is.
4. Count on the fact that there will be some easier questions that will help you figure out more specifically what the main idea is. That will help you to answer harder questions.
5. When a question sends you back to specific line numbers, you should read those lines again. This gives you a second chance to try to understand something if you’ve missed it the first time.
6. When you answer the questions, quickly eliminate each wrong answer choice. Don’t spend too much time on any once choice. If you’re not sure, leave it in. Then when you have 2 or 3 choices remaining, ask yourself which one is better.
Why do these things?
When you don’t read every word of the passage, you might miss very important, but easy to understand, words and phrases such as: “I don’t agree”, “Other people think”, “However”, and “not”.
These are the kinds of words that let you know what the author thinks about the topic, which is what you have to know to get most questions right.
On the other hand, you’ll rarely have to understand a more difficult to understand phrase such as, “time-honored, reflexive overreaction to the dominant medium of the moment.”
That’s why when you come across something you don’t understand, just keep reading. It rarely has to do with the main idea.
Now, about the process of answering questions…
Most questions relate back to the main idea of the passage or the main point of a paragraph, so an answer choice that goes against the main idea has to be wrong.
When you cross off the obviously wrong answers first, it’s much easier to tell which of the remaining answer choices is better. And if you read the passage the way I just described, you’ll almost always be able to cross off 2 or 3 choices right away.
Here’s an example of how this works. I’m going more in depth into the passage from this post:
Read this paragraph. I’ve put the main idea in bold. The rest of the paragraph is details.
Ridiculing television, and warning about its inherent evils, is nothing new. It has been that way since the medium was invented, and television hasn’t exactly been lavished with respect as the decades have passed. I suspect, though, that a lot of the fear and loathing directed at television comes out of a time-honored, reflexive overreaction to the dominant medium of the moment. For the past several decades, television has been blamed for corrupting our youth and exciting our adults, distorting reality, and basically being a big, perhaps dangerous, waste of time. Before TV, radio and film were accused of the same things. And long before that—in fact, some 2,500 years earlier— philosophers were arguing that poetry and drama should be excluded from any ideal city on much the same grounds.
The author’s point is: Ridiculing television and warning about it’s evils is nothing new.
Everything else just explains why the author thinks his point is true.
You don’t have to know anything else about the paragraph (unless a question sends you back to those line numbers). You don’t even have to know what “inherent” means.
Let’s use that point to answer the first question for that passage:
16. The opening paragraph primarily serves to
(A) criticize the way television distorts the truth
(B) examine the evolution of television as a medium
(C) place contemporary criticism of television in a historical context
(D) directly compare television and drama as art forms
(E) explain why television, radio, and drama appeal to the masses
First of all, we know the point is saying something bad about television. Another word for that is “criticism”, so the answer has to have the word “criticism” in it. That eliminates 3 choices. Now we’re left with this…
(A) criticize the way television distorts the truth
(C) place contemporary criticism of television in a historical context
Which answer is better? The other part of the main point is that this criticism is nothing new. That means it’s been going on for a long time. Another word for that is “historical”.
That’s why (C) is the better answer.
That’s SO MUCH EASIER, isn’t it?
If you practice the reading passages this way, your score can go up 80 to 150 points very, very quickly.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes.
Good luck!
-Jeff
Hi Jeff. My name is Vivek and I am using a college board book to study for my SAT. I will be taking the SAT on 23rd January and this will be my second time. I am really confused on what strategy I should use on the passages. Should I read the entire passage first and then look to answer the questions or should I look at the questions beforehand? Your help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Regards
Vivek Parkash Lohana
Hi Vivek,
Almost everyone should read the passage first. The only exceptions to this are people who have a very bad attention problem and people who are very low scorers who can’t come close to finishing the section on time if they read the passage first.
The key is that you’re looking for the main idea of the passage, and a quick summary of each paragraph if you can do it. The details only become important if you’re asked about the in the questions, and many details aren’t asked about. When they do ask about details, they almost always give you line numbers to go back to.
This doesn’t mean you should skim. Skimming is bad. You should read every word. It’s just that when you come across a word or a sentence you don’t understand, you shouldn’t reread it. Just keep going.
Does that help? I talk about this in different ways in these comments, in this post, and on the videos. Keep working on it and feel free to write back with specific questions that give you trouble.
Good luck!
Jeff
Hey Jeff. I have been practicing CR and scoring in late 600 range. I really need to get this up ! I find out tgat most of the mistakes i make , has the other answer of the two choices (afyer elimination) i am left with.any help will be appreciated !
Hi Ayush,
In almost every case when you’re down to 2 answer choices, the right answer is the one that’s most in line with the main idea of the passage. There are some questions where this isn’t the case, but they should be pretty obvious. If you’re working with official College Board material, feel free to send me some questions where you had this trouble, and tell me which answer choices you crossed out and which ones were left. I might be able to see what’s causing you trouble and give you a fix.
-Jeff
Hi Jeff
I will be taking my last SAT attempt in January. I’m getting a 600 in CR and I want to get it up atleast till a 700 or 730. I’ve completed the College Board book and have been practicing Barron’s. What do you suggest ? What should I practice next or should I simply continue with Barron’s? I always feel like I haven’t been learning from my mistakes as I’ve been struggling with my CR score for a long time. I would be really grateful if you could suggest something effective. Thankyou
Hi Saumyaa,
Sorry for the late reply. Between the holidays and a family issue, I couldn’t get to your question. I hope you get this in time to help you raise your score.
Don’t practice with Barrons and ignore all of your results from those tests. If you’ve run out of college board practice tests, you can find more at http://www.cracksat.net/sat-downloads/, and if you’ve used all of those, you might find more at scribd.com (search for “official sat practice test” and click the documents tab). You could also get the College Board’s online course, but you’ll find those 10 tests in the links I’ve just mentioned.
The reason to only use college board tests is that the Barrons (and other third party test makers such as Kaplan, etc.) have subtle differences from the official test, especially in the CR section. At your level, the subconscious pattern recognition you’ll develop from using the college board tests will help you a lot.
Do you know what you’re struggling with? Is there a pattern to the types of questions that you get wrong? It can be hard to learn from your mistakes in the CR section because all of the passages are different, but if you look closely there is a pattern.
The most important thing to keep in mind is that everything in the passage either supports the author’s main idea or argues against another opinion. This will help you answer most of the questions, either by leading you directly to the correct answer or allowing you to eliminate incorrect answer choices.
Feel free to write back with specific examples of questions and passages you’ve had trouble with (as long as they’re from official College Board tests).
Good luck. Almost everyone who gets a 600 on CR can raise their score to a 700. Keep working at it.
-Jeff
Hi jeff
I almost always have 5-6 mistakes every critical reading section. I usually have a mistake in sentence completions, 1 mistake in short passages, and about 3-4 mistakes in long passages. My test is in 3 days and i really want to score +700
Hi Miriam,
To get a 700+, you want to keep your errors down to 2 – 3 per section. If you think of it that way, the job seems easier.
You’re already doing great in the sentence completions, so you might not be able to eliminate those mistakes (depending on whether your test has too many words you don’t know). If you scroll down the comments a couple of people to see my reply to Prince, you’ll find links to my posts and a youtube video about the sentence completions. Take a look at them and see if they help you.
For me to really help you get a few more answers right in the short passages and long passages, I’d have to know what kinds of questions you’re having trouble with, and how far you get with them, meaning do you have no idea about those questions, do you eliminate 3 answer choices but pick the wrong one from the remaining 2 choices, or something in between. And it will also help to have specific examples.
Please feel free to write back with that info. I’d like to help you.
Best,
Jeff
Hi Jeff,
I am getting around 730 in critical reading tests, but i always get the questions that ask about how author of one passage feels about author of other passage wrong. what should i do to get those questions right?
Hi SmartyP,
Let’s walk through this using an example from the College Board’s official 2014-2015 practice test. Download the test here and the answers here. We’ll look at questions 19 and 23 in Section 7. Read the passages and answer the other questions first before you follow along with me. (It’s important to do the other questions because they’ll help you sharpen your understanding of each author’s argument, which is the key to helping you answer these types of questions.)
19) The author of Passage 2 would most likely characterize the view of King expressed in lines 38-42 of Passage 1 (“The annual . . . America”) as
(A) contradictory
(B) insightful
(C) atypical
(D) simplistic
(E) arrogant
To answer this question, we first have to ask ourselves what is the view of King that the author of Passage 1 expresses in those lines. This is the easy part of the question because the author’s view is fairly clear. In these lines, he says we owe King an immense debt for saving the soul of America.
The next part of this question is harder. We don’t have line numbers to refer to, so we have to ask ourselves what is the author of Passage 2’s argument about King. In the first paragraph of Passage 2, the author says of King, “He believed that his early views on race failed to challenge America fundamentally.” In the 2nd paragraph, the author talks about what he sees as King’s strengths and weaknesses, and speaking about the famous words, “I have a dream,” the author says, “But those words survive, too, because they comfort folk who would rather entertain the dreams of unfree people than confront their rage and despair.”
Does pointing out those lines in Passage 2 lead you to the answer? If it’s still not clear, you might ask yourself why the author of Passage 1 say that we owe King an immense debt for saving the soul of America. The answer is, “King’s dreams of an America free from racial discrimination are still some
30 distance away, but it is astounding how far the nation has come since that hot August day in 1963.”
We could sum this up by saying that the author of passage 1 says that King’s accomplishments were great (although there’s still some work left to be done to fulfill his dream), while the author of passage 2 implies (in those lines I point out) that America’s views on race have not been fundamentally challenged, and that people are still unfree, still have rage and despair. Essentially, the author of passage 2 would most likely characterize the view of King expressed in lines 38-42 of Passage 1 as not painting the full picture.
The best answer is D, simplistic.
23) The author of Passage 2 would most likely argue that commemorations focus on “Martin Luther King the dreamer” (line 7 of Passage 1) because people find this aspect of King to be
(A) courageous
(B) unpretentious
(C) reassuring
(D) provocative
(E) unexpected
When the author of passage 1 refers to “Martin Luther King the dreamer” (line 7), he’s referring to the “I Have A Dream” speech (see lines 1 – 5). So we have to look what the author of passage 2 says about the speech. This leads us to lines 72 – 82. The key is the last sentence in lines 79 – 82, “But those words survive, too, because they comfort folk who would rather entertain the dreams of unfree people than confront their rage and despair.”
According the the author of passage 2, he words “I have a dream” survive because they comfort people. The best answer is C, reassuring.
Essentially, you need to find the each author’s argument, and use them to answer the question.
Let me know if this helps!
-Jeff
Hi am an international student and am scoring between 700-750.i could never get an 800,am using the princeton review book and i have a challenge with the sentence completion because i find it difficult to memorize vocabs.i will be writing on 5 december.thanks
Hi Prince,
Don’t use the Princeton Review book (or any other 3rd party book). Only use College Board tests. Scroll down a couple of comments to my reply to Prabhat, where I share links to College Board tests and the reason it’s important to practice with them.
These are the blog posts where I share the method to make the most of your vocabulary on the sentence completion questions:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-%E2%80%93-part-2/
Here’s the video version:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkKNrlz6ULQ
You’re score is very high, so you might be doing these things already and there may be a few questions you can’t answer because you don’t know enough of the words. If that’s the case, there’s nothing you can do about it except to accept the situation, relax about it, and do your best.
Good luck!
-Jeff
Hi Jeff I need an advise I’m going to take SAT less than 1 week and this is my last try . I been score around 300 because English is not my second language. Even though I practice again and again but my CR still poorly. What can I do now to score around 500 -550 ? Thank you a lot
Hi Annie,
I hate to say it but that’s a really low score. It reflects a raw score of about 3. The raw score is calculated by giving you 1 point for every question you got right and subtracting 1/4 point for every question you got wrong. For example, you might have gotten 10 questions right, 28 wrong, and skipped 29.
If you’ve been answering a lot of questions, try to answer only those that you’re pretty sure you’re right about, and those where you can pretty surely cross off 3 answer choices. Some questions will be easier for you. Answer them first and skip the others until you’ve looked at all the questions in the section. Then go back and try the harder ones. Study this method I teach in this post and practice it on college board practice tests until you see improvement.
Good luck!
Hey,
English is not my first language but i am pretty okay at it because i read a lot of books. The thing is i have my sat this Saturday and in all of my college board and barrons practice tests i always get a 680 to 730 in CR. That hasn’t changed since the first practice test. Do u think you could specifically give me some tips so that i can improve my score by atleast 30 points? I always mess up in the long reading passages and paired ones. Not exactly mess up but i lose most of the points in those passages only.
Hey Prabhat,
Nice job getting that score! The most important thing is to feel good about how you’re doing so far. That will help you feel relaxed and confident when you take the test, which will help you do your best.
The first and most important point is to stop practicing with Barrons and ignore all of your results from those tests. If you’ve run out of college board practice tests, you can find more at http://www.cracksat.net/sat-downloads/, and if you’ve used all of those, you might find more at scribd.com (search for “official sat practice test” and click the documents tab).
The reason to only use college board tests is that the barrons (and other third party test makers) have subtle differences from the official test, especially in the CR section. At your level, the subconscious pattern recognition you’ll develop from using the college board tests will help you a lot.
The only general tip I can point out based on what you’ve told me is that in the paired passages, the questions that compare and contrast the passages always boil down to the author’s argument in each passage. You can cross off any answer choice that doesn’t fit.
Because you’re at a high level already, you should let me know which CR questions you missed from the most recent college board tests you’ve taken, and I’ll probably be able to give you some very specific helpful tips.
Good luck! You’ve done a great job so far and I’m sure it’s going to go well for you.
-Jeff
Hey, I am not sure if my comment posted or what. But I really need help with CR. I have done the SAT twice and My score has still not improved from 490, despite all the other sections mincreasing. My test is DEcember 5 can you please help. This is my last shot of getting in to a good college by the way I am an international student if that helps
Hey Sam,
Once in a while someone posts a spam comment or a disrespectful one, so I have to check them all before I approve them.
It looks like you’re from Jamaica, so your English is fine, and you indicate in your other comment that your Writing section score went up 200 points so if there’s anything different about the American style of English, you’re good enough at that, too, to substantially raise your CR score.
The method that I teach in this post is the most important CR tip. It’s the one thing, for the reading passage questions, that will make the biggest difference in your score once you understand and apply it. I also explain this concept using videos. You can get some free ones if you sign up for my email list, and on my youtube page. Some people learn better by watching videos so you should definitely check them out.
The other thing that will help you the most with just a short time to go before you take the test is to practice your time management and educated guessing. I explain how to do that in my comments to Tanpong, a few comments below yours.
Lastly, you might consider getting my ebook, the SAT Quick Fix Study Guide, or my video course, the Critical Reading Quick Fix (the ebook comes free with the course).
You can definitely raise your CR score by a lot even with only a short time to go before the test. Here’s an email I someone sent me the other day:
Good luck! Let me know how it goes.
Regards,
Jeff
Hey Jeff,
I have done the SAT twice and got a score of 490 in october then 490 in november but all my scores went up 200 points except CR. I need help. and exam is December 5. This is my last shot. HEEEELPPPP!!!
Hi Sam,
See the other version of your comment for my reply. I’m just keeping this one here because it’s funny. Thanks for making me laugh!
-Jeff
Hey Jeff. I really appreciate the way you have layed out these tips and I sure will use them on my next SAT (January 2016); though I am having some trouble on my CR section which I really want to improve. I’ve taken my SAT 2 times already. Oct – 420 CR and Nov – 450 CR. (scores). Although I have improved my score by 30 points, I want to increase my score by a lot more; my goal is 600+ but for some reason I can’t get to that score. English is not my first language and although I do understand the main idea of the paragraph, I can’t seem to get my dream score. If you could help me by giving me any tips to reach my 600+ score, I would really appreciate it.
Regards, Daniel
Hi Daniel,
Thank you. You’re comment is written pretty well for someone who’s first language isn’t English, so that’s a good sign.
You should re-read this article until you understand how to apply the concept I’m teaching there. You should also read the comments, because some people ask really good questions that I answer, get on my email list (if you’re not already) to get some videos that explain these concepts, and you should practice with official College Board material.
If you have specific questions about specific things you’re having trouble with, feel free to write to me and ask them.
Good luck!
Jeff
Regards Jeff,
I loved the way you take the time to read each of the queries and give some really great advice.
However, I have got my test in 3 days and my scores are really low. I get 480 and sometimes even less. Please suggest me how should I work on it to get better on my CR portion.
Thanks.
Hi Shac,
Have you signed up for my email list and gotten those CR videos? If you have, they explain the most important concepts and techniques that can help you raise your CR score fast. If you haven’t gotten them (and even if you have), go to my youtube page for other videos about the same things.
The other thing that will help you the most with just a short time to go before you take the test is to practice your time management and educated guessing. I explain it in my comments to Tanpong, a few comments below yours.
Lastly, you might consider getting my ebook, the SAT Quick Fix Study Guide, or my video course, the Critical Reading Quick Fix (the ebook comes free with the course).
Good luck! Let me know how it goes.
Best,
Jeff
HELLO. I AM GETTING CLOSE TO 600-620. SOMETIMES I EVEN GET 700 IN CR. BUT THE SCORES ARE FLUCTUATING . I HAVE IDENTIFIED MY MISTAKES. THOSE ARE QUESTIONS RELATED TO TONE WORDS. HOW CAN I IMPROVE ?
Have you identified why your scores fluctuate? Make sure you’re working with official College Board material. Make sure your testing conditions are as close to the same as possible each time, and even better, think about what’s happening, in your environment and in your mind, when you get the higher scores, and what’s different from when you get the lower scores. Then do your best to make sure your conditions are always like they are when you get the higher scores.
If your scores are generally in the low 600s, then you are making more mistakes than just those few questions that are about tone words. For those that are about tone, here are some suggestions:
1) Some of the tone questions test your understanding of vocabulary as much as your understanding of tone, because some of the answer choices are often difficult vocabulary words. For example, the if choices are “magnanimous” or “diffident” you might not be able to answer the question, but if answer choices were “generous” or “lacking confidence” you could more easily figure out which one was right.
2) Most of the time, tone means how does the author (or sometimes the character) feel about something, and the answer will fall somewhere on a continuum between good and bad, positive and negative, liking and disliking, depending on what’s appropriate in the context. It’s often helpful to draw a line with a P on one end and an N on the other and put a mark on the line where the author’s feeling lies. If the question asks you to compare the tone of passage 1 to the tone of passage 2, draw that line for both passages. Or you could just ask yourself, does the author feel good (or likes it), bad (or dislikes it), or neutral.
3) Sometimes, tone means strongly does the author feel about something. Use the same technique, but ask yourself whether to author cares a lot, or not so much.
4) Once in a while, the answer choices will have two words. For example, “openly critical” or “nostalgic and uncertain”. These can be confusing because they lead you to think that you have to be very precise, and you might think, “I know what critical means, but what does openly critical mean?” You can almost always test these answer choices using only one of the words. For example, if you thought the author was being critical but you weren’t sure about “openly”, you should be pretty sure “openly critical” is the answer. Or, if you weren’t sure what “nostalgic” means or weren’t sure if the author was being nostalgic, but you were pretty sure the author was not “uncertain”, then “nostalgic and uncertain” is probably not the answer.
-Jeff
english is my second language and i am stuck at 580-620. i really need the raise my score up to a 650-700 and the sat is in a month. i have to always omit the last 3-4 question on both 25 min sections because i don’t have enough time. can you guide me on how to manage my time. by the way i found that for me reading as i do the questions works better for me than read first then answer.
Hi Tanpong,
You’re really close to your goal; you need about 3 more correct answers on each section.
Here’s the key: You’re not answering all the questions you have time for correctly. If you could skip some of the questions that you’re currently getting wrong and use that time to get to those last 3 – 4 questions that you now have to omit, and answer most of them correctly, you’ll be well on your way to your goal.
Here is the process for working on your time management. You’re probably doing some of this already, so that gives you a head start:
Time management is closely tied to making the best educated guess that you can make, and quickly skipping questions when you don’t have an educated guess.
Here are the rules for guessing:
1) You should make educated guesses, but you shouldn’t make uneducated guesses.
2) If you can cross of three answer choices but you’re not sure which of the remaining two is the best answer, you should always guess on the question, because you’re making an educated guess by virtue of knowing that three answers are wrong. Just go with your gut, and if you’re totally not sure, just pick whichever one you feel like.
3) If you can cross off two answer choices, guess on the question if you have a gut feeling that one of the remaining choices is correct, but skip the question if you have no idea about the other three.
4) If you can’t cross off any of the choices, or only one of them, then skip the question.
5) There’s no minimum or maximum to the number of questions you should skip.
These are strict rules and you should always follow them on the CR and Writing sections.
Now for time management…
1) First of all, always practice this using College Board material; the Official SAT Study Guide, their online course, and a search of scribd.com for “official SAT practice test” (then click on the “Documents” tab). You can’t work on this accurately unless you use official material, which means don’t use Barron’s, Kaplan, etc.
2) The next thing you should do is take a couple of CR sections while you specifically practice the guessing rules that I just described. Don’t force yourself to finish in the time allowed for the section, just keep track of how long it takes you, and how many questions you answered after the time was up.
3) You’ll probably notice that some questions take longer than others (mostly because they’re harder for you), and that you get more of those questions wrong, or skip more of those questions, than you do for the questions that take you a shorter time to answer.
4) The goal is to make sure you have time to answer all of the questions that you’re more likely to get right. So as you get better at recognizing the harder questions that take you longer, practice skipping them quickly and moving on to the questions that you’re more likely to get. This will solve most of your time management issues and significantly raise your score.
5) If you still have trouble finishing the sections in time, practice reading a little bit faster. Most people can read a little bit faster and still understand the passage almost as well as they can at their “normal” speed. You might have a tendency to rush at first, which you don’t want to do, so you might have to practice this a little bit.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes for you!
Best,
Jeff
Hi, I know this is not really the perfect place to ask a question like the one I am about to, but you can probably still help, I am someone with an SAT score of 2020, and I HAVE to score much more than that, if I want to go to my dream college…How do I balance between school and SAT, considering the fact that I have to score well in both, thank you in advance!
Hi Alexandra,
That’s a great question, and I’m glad you asked it. The answer depends on whether you’re currently a senior or a junior.
If you’re a senior, you MUST prioritize the SAT.
When the colleges look at your application, they give approximately equal weight to your grades and your SAT score. That means ALL of your grades in ALL of your classes since your started high school, all put together, have approximately equal weight as your SAT score. So if it’s the fall of your senior year, the one place where your efforts can make the biggest difference is preparing for the SAT.
Do your SAT prep while you’re feeling your best and squeeze in your regular school homework after that. If you only have time for one and have to choose between SAT prep and regular school homework, do your SAT prep. Of course, you have to do well on your major papers and tests that contribute a lot to your grades, because you don’t want bad grades, but skip the busy work that teachers like to give and realize that there is always some school work that doesn’t have to be done, and much that doesn’t have to be done to perfection.
Sometimes it might feel like you have to make your school homework your priority, because your teacher might yell at you if you don’t do it, etc. Here’s a link to my blog post about this topic. I think you should read it because it might help you stay strong about this very important issue: http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/overwhelmed-set-priorities-for-a-higher-sat-score/
However, if you’re currently a junior then the picture is a little different. Your SAT goal should be to first break 700 on every section, and then to break 750 on each section (any higher than that doesn’t really make that much difference), and you have until the fall of your senior year to reach that goal. That’s a whole year from now. Since you’re doing very well already, I’m sure you’ll reach it without sacrificing your school work, so if you’re a junior now just keep doing what you’re doing and let the balancing take care of itself.
Good luck, and let me know how it goes!
-Jeff
Hi,
English isn’t my first language I took 490 and now I am getting about 650 how can I raise that to 700 I am doing it in October.
Thank you
Hi AR,
Great job so far. Without knowing what’s still giving you trouble I can’t say for sure how you can raise your score another 50 points or so.
Here are some possibilities, depending on what might be happening…
Do you sometimes eliminate 3 answer choices and then pick the wrong answer from the remaining 2 choices? In most cases, ask yourself which of the remaining choices is closest to the main idea of the passage; that one is most likely to be right.
Do you have trouble with certain types of questions? Search through these comments and my replies and you might find the help you’re looking for. If not, write to me again and tell me what types of questions you need help with.
Do you have trouble finishing the section in time and get the last couple of questions right after time expires? There are probably certain questions that take you longer to answer and that you’re more likely to get wrong. Recognize them and skip out of them early, saving the time for those last questions.
Do you have trouble with the sentence completions? Read my sentence completion posts:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-%E2%80%93-part-2/
Do you feel like you’re reaching the upper limits of your score because of your English vocabulary? You might not be able to do much about that with only 1 week to go before the test. However, if you put your mind to studying vocab, you just might get an extra question or 2 right, which will help you towards your goal.
If it’s anything I haven’t covered here feel free to write back.
Good luck!
Oh and I am not a native English speaker, it’s more like my second language.
So I am getting a score around 650-700 and my test is in October which is barely a month away, and I really need around 750-800, would I be able to do that in just a month’s time?
Hi Kartikeya,
Getting around 650-700 when English is more like your second language is a really good job. Not that you should be satisfied with that and stop working, but know that you’re doing well and trust your ability.
The truth is that I don’t know if you can raise your score 100 points in a little under a month. Some people will be able to do it and some won’t. It depends on what you’re having trouble with and how fast you can learn and apply the “fix” to whatever is holding you back.
I hope you can. Feel free to write back with specifics things that I might be able to help you with.
Good luck!
-Jeff
Keep getting 600-640 and could use a boost to around 700. What keeps on happening is that the ones that I get wrong are always the ones in the answer explanation that go “although this is true (my answer), this one is more true (not my answer)”. I hate it because I’m always so close. So should I skim the passage and get the idea and author’s opinion first, and then go for details afterwards? I haven’t really been doing that.
Hi Kabir,
I wonder if you’re practicing with official College Board material, because I’m not familiar with answer explanation that say that sort of thing. If you’re not using CB material, it’s messing you up, and you should start using CB material immediately. And if you are using CB material, please send me a couple of examples of what you’re talking about because it might help me to help other students.
To answer your question, don’t skim. I suppose I might have to revise this post to make that clear. Skimming is death, meaning that it will kill your chances of getting a higher score. You have to read the passage. If you have trouble finishing the sections in time, you might have to read it slightly faster than you’re comfortable with, but that’s not skimming. What I mean by focus on the main idea and don’t get bogged down in the details as you read is that if you don’t understand something when you’re reading it just keep reading. Don’t go back to re-read it. Chances are that if you don’t understand some details in the passage it won’t matter, and if they ask you a question about it then you can go back and re-read it then.
To get the score increase that you want at the level that you’re already at, you have to answer 3 more questions correctly on each section. In those cases where you’re down to 2 choices but pick the wrong one, try to see if you can understand why the correct answer is correct and your answer isn’t. In most cases, the correct answer is more aligned with the main idea of the passage.
I hope this helps. Let me know!
Best,
Jeff
It’s september right now and my Critical reading score is about 380-410 and I know it’s really bad English is not my first language and I’m taking it in Oct. 3 it’s my last chance to take it
Help how to increase to 500-530 before october? I know it’s impossible………..
Hi Jenny,
I have great respect for everyone taking the SAT whose first language isn’t English. It must be really hard.
It might be helpful to look at what your score means in terms of how many questions you correctly answered on the test.
When they figure out your score on the 200 – 800 scale, the first thing they do is calculate your raw score. To get that, they give you 1 point for every question that you answer correctly, and subtract .25 point for each question you answer incorrectly. If you leave a question blank, it doesn’t count towards your score. Then they use some fancy math to turn that raw score into a scaled score in order to make sure that if the test is a little bit harder than usual one day the students who take it that day don’t get penalized.
A CR score in the 380 – 410 range is a raw score of approximately 12 – 19, depending on the test. A CR score in the 500 – 530 range is a raw score of approximately 30 – 37. So in order to increase your score to the level you want, you’ll have to answer about 5 – 6 more questions correctly in each of the 3 CR sections on the test.
Is it impossible? I don’t know. It’s helpful to know concretely how many additional questions you have to get right. The best way to do it is to find the questions that are easier for you to answer, and that you can answer more quickly, and skip the harder ones.
Keep reading English and getting better at that, keep focused on the lesson that I teach in this post, keep learning English vocabulary, and give it your best shot.
Good luck!
Jeff
Hey. I stumbled upon this blog and I think this is a truly great advice! Finding main idea is the best strategy out there for the critical reading. However, if there is one thing I have to disagree, it’s reading the passage before the question. What I do is I read one paragraph and then go to the questions to look for any questions related to that paragraph. That way, my perception of the passage doesn’t get jumbled up as I go back and forth to the questions and passage. Then I continue reading the rest of the paragraphs and going back to the questions. I find that it helps a lot.
Hi Kate,
Doing it that way can help some people. I’m glad it’s working for you.
-Jeff
Hi, Jeff
First of all, my first language is not English. In order to get into the university in my country i need to get 450 CR and 450 Writing. Is there any advice for me on how to get the required score? I am taking the Sat in October.
Hi Meena,
Have you taken practice tests? What scores have you been getting on them? If you’re far from your target score, what are you having the biggest trouble with? If you can answer these questions I might be able to give you more specific help. Otherwise, keep reading this post until you really understand it, and sign up for my email list and follow along with the videos and tutorials that I send you in email.
Good luck! Let me know how it goes!
-Jeff
please I have been practicing the critical reading session and I have answered about 20 passages so far I am taking the October SAT I have problem with understand some complete sentence errors questions I also have problems with the vocabulary questions, inference questions and understanding the passage themes of the passage please your help will greatly be appreciated
Hi David,
I can’t really understand much of what you’re asking. What do you mean by “complete sentence errors questions”, “inference questions”, and “understanding the passage themes of the passage” questions? Are you using official College Board material? Can you give me some examples of these types of questions? That way I’ll be able to help you.
For the vocabulary questions, you should look at the answer choices and decide which word best replaces the word they’re asking about. Here’s an example from the SAT given in January of 2011.
In line 11, “sign” most nearly means
A. symbol B. gesture C. image D. indication E. omen
Here’s the sentence:
In everyday medicine, doctors see pain in Descartes’s terms – as a physical process, a sign of tissue injury.
When you replace the word “sign” in the sentence with each of the answer choices, you’ll see that “indication” is the best answer.
If that’s not clear to you, you should get a set of SAT vocabulary flashcards and learn 25 words each week. Keep at it and you’ll see that in a few months you’re doing much better on these types of questions, as well as on the sentence completion questions.
Thank you ever so much for this illuminating guide! I was tested by the critical reading section for years, as I took three PSATs since freshman year, and I never quite understood what the College Board expects from students. I always have assumed that we are supposed to analyze – instead, the solution is as simple as finding the main idea. My only regret is that I stumbled upon your tips sooner. The instant I followed your advice, I automatically received a 750 for CR, which I never dreamed could be possible.
You’re welcome, Jade, and thank you! I’m glad it helped you so much.
I looked at your blog, by the way, and I really enjoyed it. Nice job!
Best,
Jeff
Hi, when you say read the passage before answering the questions, do you mean read the whole passage?
Yes. Read the whole passage first. Almost everyone will do better this way. It’s also important to know that if you’re capable of doing very well (720+), it’s much harder if you don’t read the whole passage first.
There are a couple of exceptions, so I’ll mention them in case you fall into one of these categories.
1) Some people (very few) have a serious attention problem. If you typically read the whole passage but can’t remember any of it when you get to the questions, you might do better going question by question.
2) Some people are very low scorers (low 400s or lower) who answer very few questions correctly. If this is you, you might do better searching for those questions that you think might be easier for you and then reading what you need to answer them.
Hi Jeff,
I am taking the SAT’s in October and currently I am scoring 1660 (510 CR, 660 Math, 490 WR). I know my writing score and critical reading score are not that great, but I would like advice on how to improve my CR and WR section to atleast a 650 and my math score to 750+?
Thank you
Hi Tanvi,
You’re at the score level where focusing on the main idea should help your CR score a great deal. Read this blog post again and again until you really get it, then practice this method on other passages. Also remember that you’re looking for the best answer, not an answer that’s exactly correct. You want to cross out the answer choices that are clearly wrong and then ask yourself which answer of the remaining 2 or 3 choices is better? There will always be a reason why one is better or that one is worse. Also, honestly decide whether you need to work on your English vocabulary and if you do then get some flashcards and learn 25 new words each week.
For more help with the CR and also the Writing section, you might want to check out my ebook and / or online CR course. There are links to them on the blog if you’re interested.
And last but not least, to raise your math score you want to identify whether your errors are “careless” ones where you know how to do the problem but still get it wrong, or whether there are problems you don’t know how to do. If you’re having trouble with careless errors, there’s a great post on this blog that will help you eliminate them. If there are problems you don’t know how to do you might want to check out khanacademy.org. They have answer explanations that might help you.
Jeff
Hey Jeff,
I appreciate all the time you’ve taken to help us out. The information you’ve provided for us to attack the SAT portion is great!
Though, i took my SATS back in March and my reading section was the section i scored the lowest on. I scored a 400 on Critical Reading which i’m very ashamed of. My goal is to range from at least 600-700 on CR. Though, i have a hard time understanding the material. I’ve never really done a lot of reading in the past which i believe is a reason why i scored really low. What can i do to improve? How can i improve? I’ll read the passage about 3 times and not understand anything which can get really frustrating. And if i do think i’ve understood something, when doing practice tests i get all the questions wrong. What do you advise me to do? I’m taking the SATS again in November and i’ll be a senior which doesn’t give me that much time anymore due to the fact that ill start applying for college, Please help, would really appreciate it. thanks
Hi Roxaine,
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but if you really can’t understand anything I don’t think you can reach the level you want. However, if you can get the basic idea of what the author is trying to say, then you can do fairly decently.
For at least the next month, don’t worry about your score when you practice and don’t worry about how long it takes you for each section. Also, don’t worry about what you can’t understand in a passage. For now, just focus on what you can understand. See if you can summarize each paragraph in one sentence. That should help you a lot, so after 1 to 2 months of this, see if you can score above 500. Then write back to me and we’ll see if you can raise it up from there.
Hi Jeff,
I’m working hard to increase my critical reading score, but I only range around 630-650. On the other hand, my math scores are consistently 790-800, and my writing scores are around 690-740. I’m not that much of an avid reader, but I’ve read many novels such as the Harry potter series, the Alex rider series, the Percy Jackson series, and a couple of drama books. I realize that reading from a young age makes a tremendous difference to the CR section, as interpreting what the author says, and understanding the underlying meaning is easier if you read a lot. I need some help to boost both my reading speed and retention, and my SAT CR score. Can you please assist me in achieving my goal? Even though I doubt i’ll be able to make my CR as strong as my Math, I would still like to work towards it!
I particularly wanted your advice on things I should do apart from just solving CR sections. I’ve realized that just solving over and over gets frustrating. I’m working hard on the vocab for my sentence completion, so I can at least get a full score on them.
Thank you for your time Jeff. I hate to brag, but I’ve always been a topper in school. Aced at Math, Science, etc. But the SAT is an impediment in my path to a good college, so I really need to prove myself here.
Regards,
S.O. D’Souza
Hi S.O.,
It sounds like the most important thing you can do is start reading nonfiction. Go back to the reading passages from a few of the practice SATs you’ve taken and use Google to find out what books they’re from. Read a few of those books. Also start reading columns from the Op-Ed section of either the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times. Then go back to doing CR sections from official College Board material. Don’t worry about your score at first, just focus on reading and understanding the passages and the questions, and identifying which types of questions are still giving you trouble at that point.
Best,
Jeff
Hey Jeff,
I average anywhere from 700-730 on the CR section, but I want a 2350 total on the October SAT. I’d need about 750-770 on CR for that to happen. Tips–and is that possible within 1-2 months?
I find that I usually struggle with passage questions involving tone and fail sentence completion (miss usually 1 or 2 per section) thanks to my lack of vocabulary knowledge. Thanks so much!
Hi Jenn,
Nice job so far. I hope you feel good about your current CR score level, even though you want to raise it even higher. It is possible to reach your goal by October, though it will take some work on your part. To get a 750 – 770, you can only get 3 or 4 questions wrong, or leave 5 blank, something like that. You’re goal should probably be to get 1 more question correct on each of the 3 CR sections.
At your level, if you’re really missing questions because of lack of vocabulary knowledge then there’s no substitute for learning more vocabulary. If you get a good set of SAT vocabulary flash cards (I have my students use Barron’s) and learn 25 new words each week, you should able to get 3 more sentence completion questions right when you take the test in October.
Also, some of the tone questions test your understanding of vocabulary as much as your understanding of tone, because some of the answer choices are often difficult vocabulary words. For example, the if choices are “magnanimous” or “diffident” you might not be able to answer the question, but if answer choices were “generous” or “lacking confidence” you could more easily figure out which one was right.
Here are some other guidelines to help you with questions about tone:
1) Most of the time, tone means how does the author (or sometimes the character) feel about something, and the answer will fall somewhere on a continuum between good and bad, positive and negative, liking and disliking, depending on what’s appropriate in the context. It’s often helpful to draw a line with a P on one end and an N on the other and put a mark on the line where the author’s feeling lies. If the question asks you to compare the tone of passage 1 to the tone of passage 2, draw that line for both passages. Or you could just ask yourself, does the author feel good (or likes it), bad (or dislikes it), or neutral.
2) Sometimes, tone means strongly does the author feel about something. Use the same technique, but ask yourself whether to author cares a lot, or not so much.
3) Once in a while, the answer choices will have two words. For example, “openly critical” or “nostalgic and uncertain”. These can be confusing because they lead you to think that you have to be very precise, and you might think, “I know what critical means, but what does openly critical mean?” You can almost always test these answer choices using only one of the words. For example, if you thought the author was being critical but you weren’t sure about “openly”, you should be pretty sure “openly critical” is the answer. Or, if you weren’t sure what “nostalgic” means or weren’t sure if the author was being nostalgic, but you were pretty sure the author was not “uncertain”, then “nostalgic and uncertain” is probably not the answer.
4) Last point. I often say in these comments that you have to practice with official College Board material. That’s even more true at your score level.
I hope this helps. Let me know. And I really, really hope you reach your goal!
Jeff
Hey, very nice tips here. I just have a quick question. I have noticed that when I’m doing the CR section, I don’t understand the reading passage AT ALL sometimes. I believe it is a comprehension problem. Is there some activities, plans, books, or techniques you’d recommend to help me improve this? Thanks a lot!!!!
If you sometimes don’t understand the reading passage at all, it’s definitely a comprehension problem. Read as much as you can and study vocabulary. That’s the best thing you can do to improve.
Hi Jeff
I am a Zimbabwean student who took his SATs last month. I scored a 560 in the Critical Reading section and I am looking to increase it to a 650 at the very least. Prior to taking the SAT my general score range would fluctuate between 560 and 630, sadly though I scored the very minimum. How best can I curb these fluctuations? I have two months before I retake the SAT and I would really like to attain this score as it is of paramount significance in my getting a scholarship to study in the US.
Kind regard
Astley
Hi Astley,
Let me suggest a different question. Ask yourself, how can I score as high as possible on the CR section.
First of all, make sure you only practice with official college board material. If you’ve taken all the tests in the Official SAT Study Guide, you can find more on scribd.com and/or get the College Board’s online course. If you’re taking practice tests made by a company like Kaplan, Princeton Review, Spark Notes, an online test prep company, or any other company like that, then you can’t trust your results because the real test will be different.
Second, after you take the test and check your answers, do your best to make sure you know why you know why your answer is wrong and why the right answer is right. If you’re not sure, keep looking for the pattern. It’s a lot harder to do this on CR than on Writing or Math, so stay patient and keep at it.
Third, the conditions in which you take the test can have a big impact on your score. These could be external conditions such as taking it in a quiet space with no interruptions, or internal conditions such as whether you’ve had enough rest, the degree to which you were focused or distracted, etc. When you take a practice test and score particularly well or particularly poorly, note the conditions. If you scored well, try to replicate them the next time you take a practice test. If you score poorly, see if you can figure out what went “wrong” and fix it for the next time.
Best,
Jeff
Hello,
Thanks for these advices. Since English isn’t my first language and about one year ago I couldn’t say anything but “My name is..”, my CR score is very low. My average score is 460 but I want to improve it… I read some articles which say that it’s better to focus on passages rather to memorise words. What do you think? Can I improve my score at least by 100 in 3 months? I’m taking my SAT in November.
If a year ago the only thing you could say in English was, “My name is…,” then a CR score of 460 is not bad at all. I’d guess you’re a pretty hard worker and fast learner, so I’m pretty sure you can improve that score by 100+ points by November.
There are 48 reading passage questions and 19 sentence completion questions, so you should spend more time on the reading passages. However, you should also learn more vocabulary, at least 25 new words per week.
Hello,
I took the SAT May and I plan on retaking it October. I got 460 0n the critical reading section but my preferred score would be at Least 700. I get scared and easily bored during the passage based part of the CR. Do you have any advice on how I can get an higher score or on how I can increase my confidence level because I feel smaller and more intimidated by that section. It just seems heavy and incomprehensible to me. How can I increase my confidence level so I can attack these questions correctly? Thank you and I hope to get a reply soon!
Hi Naomi,
Your comment and questions are good. I feel a little surprised that your score isn’t higher, although I don’t know you so it’s just an impression I get from reading what you wrote. You have to handle the bored part yourself. Since I’m a guy, if I had to read a passage about makeup or women’s shoes I would be bored. However, if I had to answer questions about it and I had to answer most of them correctly in order to get something that I really wanted, I would make myself be interested and wouldn’t let my mind wander. That’s what you have to try to do. You want to get at least a 700 in order to give yourself the best chance you can to get accepted into the colleges you want to attend. Use that as motivation to keep yourself interested and keep your mind from wandering when you read the passages. Does that make sense? Then, as you practice and get better, you’ll naturally gain confidence.
Also, read what I just wrote to Arun, sign up for my email list if you haven’t already, and watch those extra videos on youtube.
Good luck! Let me know how it goes!
-Jeff
hello to everyone….
can somebody help me….??
i am getting a score of 500 in critical reading, 750 in mathematics and 600 in writing…
i want to increase in critical reading score….
how do i increase my score…??
please tell me…..
Hi Arun,
Sorry it’s taken so long for me to reply to your comment.
First of all, reread this blog post and try to internalize the key concept; knowing the main idea of the passage is the key to answering most of the questions correctly. It also let’s you work faster because you don’t have to be concerned with what every single word or sentence means.
Also, sign up for my email list. You’ll get emails and videos that are the best tips and techniques that I can give you for raising your score. If you haven’t signed up for it yet, you can sign up here. And here are a couple additional videos about the critical reading section that I recently put on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5-ZDvVD9UE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhDgCmoLiP0
Good luck!
-Jeff
hello,it is a great post, CR is very difficult for me not because of time management because my English is not so good because i came from Asia and I keep on getting 300 in my practice test which is very bad.
I totally understand. If I had to take the SAT in your language I would worse than that!
If it’s important to you, keep working at it. You probably saw my replies to some other people that if you can manage to get about 7 questions right in each of the 3 CR sections you’re score would be around 450. See if you can set that as your first goal.
Hi, i got 320 on my critical reading, which i know is very bad. i am really bad in reading because i hate reading book thus i found it hard to read quickly. on the reading section, should i read all the paragraphs? if i read all the paragraphs i will not have any time left to answer the questions..
Hi Amanda,
Since your score is so low, you probably shouldn’t read everything. To raise your critical reading score to the mid 400s, you’d have to answer about 7 questions correctly in each of the 3 critical reading sections. The best use you can make of the time they give you for each section is to figure out which questions you can answer. Leave the rest of the questions blank.
Of course, if you want to improve more than that, you’ll have to practice reading and get better at it. That takes a lot more work, especially if you hate doing it. You have to decide what’s best for you.
Good luck!
Hello, Jeff!
I just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to type up the tips and to link the passages to follow along. Actually, following the passage with you, I ended up getting every question right…I was kind of amazed haha. It really makes sense to go ahead and skip questions that cause time to linger because then the stress on time about completing proceeding questions causes an unclear mind and inability to analyze as efficiently as just skipping more difficult questions and moving along to the questions with better honed skills.
One thing I may suggest is to go into a bit more explanation as to why some questions are wrong; such as when you said “A, C, D, are wrong….so E is the answer” ; it would be nice if we could see why, whether it’s a word of the answer, the idea, or even the incorrect parallelisms between choices (I’ve come to notice that 3/4 of the choices are incorrect because they all share a common factor, whilst the correct stands out).
Thank you very much once again! I look forward to delving more into your tips!
Hi Nicoru,
You’re welcome, and thank you! I appreciate your suggestions. Since they’re changing the SAT next spring and I’ll be making a new set of articles and videos, I’ll certainly make use of them.
In case you’re interested, here are a couple additional videos about the critical reading section that I just put up today:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5-ZDvVD9UE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhDgCmoLiP0
Best regards,
Jeff
Hi,
Jeff I’ve you helped a lot of people, that is just great, keep up the good work.
I had a question regarding the three reading sections. I would describe myself as a slow thinker and analyzer, not necessarily a slow reader. I’ve taken the princeton review course fundamentals and they suggested that when we answer long passages we read only the blurp and some introductory and conclusion sentences. Unfortunately this strategy is not quite helping me get more answers correct although I do answer more questions. For the section of 2 short passages and 2 long passages of the SAT, would you recommend me using the princes ton strategy or reading at my own pace (answering less but getting a higher percent correct). I get similar scores on my practice tests (470-550) . thanks
Hi Gerardo,
Thanks for the kind words. I really appreciate it!
Read the passage first, then answer the questions. The strategy you got from the princeton review is only helpful for a small percentage of people (for example if they have adhd or some other condition that makes it hard for them to pay attention and remember what they’ve read), and if it hasn’t helped you until now then you’re not one of them.
Also, remember that you’re looking for the best answer, not an absolutely correct answer. If it was a fill in the blank test, then there could be many different ways to write a correct answer for many of the questions. However, one of the answer choices is always better than the others. The key is to quickly identify the 2 or 3 answers that couldn’t possibly be correct, cross them off, and then ask yourself which one of the remaining choices is best. There will either be a reason why one is better than the others, or a reason why one of them can’t be right. In most cases, the better answer is the one that’s more closely related to the main idea of the passage.
If you’re on my email list then watch the videos you’ve gotten again to see how this works. If you’re not, then you can sign up here. And here are a couple additional videos about the critical reading section that I just put up today:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5-ZDvVD9UE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhDgCmoLiP0
Good luck! Let me know how it goes.
-Jeff
Hi Jeff!
I really hope you can answer this in time since I’m taking my second SATs on June 6th.
My first language is not English, since I’m from Argentina. But I’m applying to a design school in New York and, although I don’t need the highest score (I’m not applying to medical sciences or chemistry, I’m going for photography), I would like to have a good score in order to compete with those who are actually really good in their language. On May I had a 1610 score, 550 in both maths and critical reading and 510 in the writing section. Are there any tips you can give me? Is my score way too low? Thank you SO much!
Nicole
Hi Nicole,
First of all, sorry about not being able to respond before you took the test. Hopefully you’re able to take it again in the fall. I don’t know if you’re score in May was too low, because different schools are looking for different scores. You can probably get an idea by looking at their website.
Have you signed up for my email list? If you have, the emails and videos you’ve gotten are the best tips and techniques that I can give you for raising your score. If you haven’t signed up for it yet, you can sign up here. And here are a couple additional videos about the critical reading section that I just put up today:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5-ZDvVD9UE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhDgCmoLiP0
You’re going to love NYC!
-Jeff
I am getting a score around 600 in all the practice tests for both writing and critical reading. How can I improve?
Hi Ashna,
A 600 is a fairly decent score so general advice might not help. Think about it; how can I tell you how to improve unless you tell me what you’re having trouble with?
So perhaps the first thing you should do, if you haven’t done it already, is to analyze you’re current performance to determine what you’re having trouble with.
(When you do that, make sure you’re practicing with official college board practice tests. It’s the only way you can accurately gauge your performance and your sticking points. They have a book and an online course, and you can find more by searching on scribd.com for official sat practice tests and then clicking on the documents tab.)
For Critical Reading, look at these areas:
1) Are you having trouble with the sentence completions and/or passage questions that require you to know the meaning of “difficult” words? If you are maybe you should work on your vocabulary.
2) For the passage questions, on the ones you’re getting wrong are you usually able to eliminate three answer choices but pick the wrong one out of the remaining two? In that case, for almost every question that doesn’t rely on your knowledge of difficult words, the correct answer is the one that’s closest to the main idea of the passage.
3) Are you having trouble finishing the section in time, without feeling rushed? If so, perhaps you’re spending too much time on questions that are harder for you and that you’re less likely to answer correctly. If you’ve practiced a fair amount, you can probably identify these questions by now. Get in the habit of skipping these questions as soon as you recognize them. You can go back to them if you have time at the end of the section.
For the Writing section (the multiple choice part):
1) See if you can figure out a pattern to the questions you’re getting wrong. Are there grammar rules you don’t know that you have to learn?
2) Are you overanalyzing every answer choice? If you are, stop. Learn to identify the grammar rules that are consistently tested and focus on those. A handful of questions don’t fit the “normal” pattern but don’t worry about them until you’re consistently getting all of the questions right that test your knowledge of regular grammar rules.
3) Are you getting every question correct that tests regular rules but missing the ones that just seem random? If so, then the only remedy is to read more well written English than you’re currently reading.
See if this helps. Feel free to write back with more specific questions.
hello, iam not good at critical reading because i am not an american and i from asia and my english is not good at all . my question how can i improve my score and i have a low score of 350 and i confuse between reading question firsts or reading the passage … please answer in the nearest time because i dont have time and i have exam on june 6
Hi Ahmed,
A 350 is a pretty low score. It reflects a raw score of about 8 or 9, which mean that you only answered about 3 questions correctly on each reading section (or you answered a few more correctly but a large number incorrectly.
So there are 2 major areas for improvement. The first, as you realize, is to keep better at reading they kinds of English that you’ll find on the SAT. That will help you the most long term, but not for taking the test on Saturday.
The second area for improvement is better management of his time and better decision making about which questions to answer. A raw score of 21 – 24 will place your score in the 450 range, a substantial improvement from what you’re scoring now. To get that score, you has to answer 7 or 8 questions correctly in each of the 3 sections (assuming you gets none wrong). Try to identify those questions and to be able to answer them in the time allowed for each section.
Also, when you do this, make sure you’re working with official College Board practice tests. They have a book and an online course that you can purchase. You can also find many additional practice tests on scribd.com. Search for “official sat practice test” and choose the documents tab.
Once you’re helping scoring in the mid 400’s my specific methods can be of more help to you.
I hope this helps! Let me know how it goes!
Best regards,
Jeff
I have trouble of time management in my critical reading section and also my score in this section is very low, what can I do to improve because am soon doing the June test.
Hi Jacob,
Time management in the critical reading section can really be a challenge. There are a couple of things you can do.
1) Answer all of the questions that are easier for you first. Don’t worry about saving time for the questions that are harder and that you think you probably won’t get right anyway.
Some questions take you longer than others, and if you’ve practiced for a little while you can probably tell which ones they are as soon as you read them. Skip these questions. Make sure you have time to answer all of the questions that you can answer correctly. If you have time left, then you can go back and try the ones you skipped.
2) Focus on the main idea of the passage and don’t worry about the details the first time you read it.
When you come across words or sentences that you don’t understand, just keep reading. They don’t ask questions about everything. So if you spend a lot of time trying to understand a sentence, or whatever, and they don’t ask you about it, then you’ve wasted all of that time. On the other hand, it’s very helpful to know the main idea of the passage when you’re answering the questions, and you can’t simply go back and find it later.
Most importantly, re-read this blog post until you really get it, and keep practicing this method. Also read the posts about the sentence completion questions too. Understanding and applying these concepts is the biggest thing you can do to improve your score over the next two weeks.
I hope this helps! Good luck in June, and please let me know how it goes for you!
Best,
Jeff
Hello…great information
my test is in two weeks time but my CR is not improving .i had a 580 on my first test and this is going to be my second and last try on the Test.Its difficult for me to choose between two answers and the double passages is also not good , i run out of time and the questions about what can be inferred and those between the two passages are a challenge.What can i do?….i normally underline the line references so that i know when to Answer a question.Thanks.
Hi May,
Thanks for the kind words!
When you’ve eliminated 3 answer choices, and you’re choosing between the 2 that remain, pick the one that is more closely related to the main idea. This will guide you to the correct answer about 80% of the time. Of course there are a few questions where this advice doesn’t apply, such as a question about a vocabulary word in the context of the passage, but you’ll be able to easily recognize those few times when that strategy won’t work.
In the double passages, all of the questions that compare the two passages relate to the main idea of the passages.
I recently answered a question about the inference questions, using a specific example from this year’s official practice test. Just look through the comments and you’ll find the help you need.
There are a few things you can do to help with managing your time. Here’s the most important one:
You probably notice by now that there are some questions that take you longer than most of the others, you can probably tell which ones they are pretty quickly, and it’s probably true that you’re more likely to get these questions wrong (and more likely to get the other questions right). The most important thing you can do to help you with time management is to recognize the questions that take you longer to answer, and are harder for you, and to quickly skip those questions. You want to make sure that you have a chance to answer all of the questions that you’re most likely to get right before you run out of time on the test. If you have extra time after doing that, then you can go back and try those other questions that you skipped.
The second most important thing you can to to help with managing your time is to focus on the main idea of the passage, rather than getting bogged down in details when you read. I’m not suggesting that you skim the passage. What I am suggesting is that if you encounter words, phrases, or even whole sentences that you don’t understand, just keep reading, knowing that the most important thing you have to do is to have a fairly good idea of the author’s main point. This helps with time management because it should help you read faster while still allowing you to get the most important information from the passage.
I hope this helps! Good luck on May 2, and please let me know how it goes for you.
Best,
Jeff
Hi, I’m having trouble with the type of questions that asks about the indication or implication of the authopr to say this. How can I improve it? and also the one who asks you about the meaning of the words. I find it sometimes difficult first, because I don’t know the meaning; second, most of the choices are suitable.
Thanks.
Hi Phuong Do,
Do you implication or inference questions? The first thing to know is that there aren’t very many of these on the test. That means that you don’t have to worry about that type of question too much. For example, I’ve just looked through this year’s official practice SAT by the College Board.
The only question like that is question 14 in section 7. (Download the test from the link and follow along.)
The question says:
It can be inferred that, for Julian Bond, a portrait of “the complete Martin Luther King” (lines 10-11) would
(A) celebrate King’s influence both within and out- side the United States
(B) acknowledge the logical lapses in some of King’s later work
(C) compare King with other significant figures of his era
(D) achieve a balance between King’s earlier concerns and his later ones
(E) reveal information about King’s personal as well as his public life
Here’s how you answer it. First find the complete sentence that contains those lines in the passage:
Former Georgia state legislator Julian Bond said in 1986 that commemorations of King seemed to “focus almost entirely on Martin Luther King the dreamer, not on Martin King the antiwar activist, not on Martin King the challenger of the economic order, not on Martin King the opponent of apartheid, not on the complete Martin Luther King.”
In that sentence, “Bond said that commemorations of King seemed to focus almost entirely on MLK the dreamer… not on the complete MLK.”
We can infer that Bond thinks the commemorations should focus on the complete MLK, the one who did all of those other things listed in the sentence (the opposite of what he says is happening now).
Once we know that, we can look at the answer choices to see which ones don’t match at all, and which one is the best match.
It’s easy to see that answer choices A, C, and E are wrong. They have nothing to do with that sentence. Answer choices B and D mention King’s later work or later concerns. The word “later” isn’t in the sentence we read. That means we have to look at the rest of the paragraph to clear this up. But we don’t need to clear it up too much, because if we know that the phrase “logical lapses” in answer choice B criticizes King’s later work, we only have to see if Bond criticizes King’s later work or not. And we can see that Bond likes King’s later work so the best answer choice is D.
That’s just one way to answer that question, but if you’re having trouble fully understanding the passage it’s probably the best way.
So I hope that helps with that type of question, but most importantly remember that those types of questions don’t come up too often.
Now, for the questions that ask about the meaning of the words, they are almost always asking about the meaning of that word in the context of the passage. Some of the other answer choices give other meanings of the word they’re asking about, but those meanings wouldn’t work in the passage. You should read the sentence containing the word and substitute the answer choices until you find the one that works best. If you’re doing that and still having trouble, it’s just a question of needing to learn more English vocabulary.
Let know if this helps, and feel free to write back to me directly at jeff@satsuccesssecrets.com
Best,
Jeff
Hi,
This is a great post on the Critical Reading Jeff. I have my SAT next week but I am Really Struggling on CR a lot. Its probably the focus that makes it quit when I’m still in the middle of the passage and also without understanding it fully. Is there any other recommendations that you could provide? I did a lot of practices but it had not gone well.
Thx a lot
Hey Tim,
There’s a couple of things you can try. When you’re reading the passages, see if you can summarize each paragraph in one sentence, or even just a few words. Usually that’s all you’ll need. If you can do this, you’ll read faster and understand it better. I just made a new video showing how to do this. It’s not ready for youtube yet, but if you email me privately I can send you a private link. It’s jeff@satsuccesssecrets.com.
If you simply can’t finish reading the passages on time, or if you just can’t focus on what you’re reading no matter what you do, you could try reading just enough to answer each question as you go. You can’t get a great score that way, but if nothing else helps you and you’re just looking to do average or a little better than average, it might work.
In case it’s not clear what I mean, let’s say the first question for a passage mentions lines 11-12. Then you would read from the start of the passage until you’ve read enough to answer that question. If the next question asks about lines 23 – 25, then you’d continue reading from where you left off until you’ve read enough to answer the second question, and so on.
Try it and let me know how it goes.
Best,
Jeff
Greetings,
I hope you are doing well.
I have made my SAT more than a couple of times and in each time I get the same critical reading mark. I am clueless about why do I keep taking the same mark, and how can I improve it.
your help please!!
Regards,
Leena
Hi Leena,
Are you able to apply the method I talk about in this post, and the sentence completion method that I talk about in those posts? If so, and you still keep getting the same mark, then you’re doing as well as you possible can given your current ability to read and understand American style written English.
I’m not saying that’s definitely the case for you. But if you think it might be true, then you should back off the SAT for six months and just focus on reading English and learning vocabulary. Then try it again.
Dear Jeff,
I have my SAT exactly next week.
I’m scoring 640-50 in Maths and 670-680 in Grammar.
The problem is with my CR, I score round 460-500.
I seriously want to take it to 550 in just a week,
I know I’m late but you can help me, I know.
The problem is that I have my Vocab very weak which makes me do 4/8 correct in the sentence completion questions.
Secondly, whenever I’m on the Long-passage questions, the worst thing which happens with me is that whenever I use the POE, I get stuck between 2 choices and guess what, whatever the option I choice, is the wrong one.
I read your tips but I need personal response from you to improve my accuracy.
for instance, if I get stuck between (A) and (B), I chose (B) and mostly the answer is the other choice.
Kindly reply soon, I have my SAT next week
Hi Wajeeh,
Sorry I wasn’t able to get back to you before the test. As you can imagine, I was super busy that week. I hope it went well for you. I have great respect for everyone who takes the SAT who didn’t grow up speaking English.
For the sentence completions, read my posts on them: (and also part 2): http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/ http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-%E2%80%93-part-2/
They’ll show you how to make the most of the vocabulary that you already know. And of course, if that doesn’t get you far enough, you have to learn more. There’s no substitute for that.
If you use the process of elimination to get down to 2 answer choices, and almost always choose the wrong one, then you might be second guessing yourself. It’s important to ask yourself which one is better and then go with your gut answer. If you say to yourself something like, “Well, if you think about it this way A is best, but if you think about it this other way then the answer is B,” you’ll almost always be wrong.
For the very, very few people who go with your gut and still almost always pick the wrong one, do a couple of practice sections picking against your gut and see if that gives you better results.
Hey Jeff,
I need some serious help if you can offer it. I’m really good at Math and Writing and can easily score 650+ on those sections. However, my CR score is ranging between 470-540, and I’m trying to increase it. It may be because my vocabulary isn’t as strong as I want it to be, but the major causes are the long reading passages. It seems that whenever I try to read them, I read words without understanding truly what they mean, and just simply end up gaining nothing from that paragraph. Also, sometimes I just start going through the texts, trying my best to focus as much as I can, which I guess stresses me out too much, and causes me to fail to grasp necessary ideas and details. Can you help me please? Thanks.
Hi Khalil,
The key is to really internalize what I’m talking about in this post: you want to focus on the main idea of the passage and not worry about the details while you read the long passages. You don’t have to understand what every word means. You do have to understand the point the author is trying to make. Also, it’s very helpful to go paragraph by paragraph and be able to give a one sentence summary about each paragraph. This changes what you focus on, so it might help you focus better.
As far as the stress, it makes it harder for you to understand what you read, and the challenge of understanding what you read causes stress, so these two “things” reinforce each other. For now, don’t worry about the score, just practice understanding the passage and using the main idea to answer the questions. This can lower the stress and improve your understanding, which will then lower the stress, and so on.
I hope this helps. Write back if you have more questions, and also later on to let me know how it goes.
Best regards,
Jeff
Hy Jef
I am good at math and writing,so i have a more hope to get the score avove 650 each..But when it comes to Critical reading section I loses my tranquility…Till now i must had tried nearly about 5-6 mock test .Finally i realized CR is the toughest one.. How will u recomend me at this contexT?
Hi Nikesh,
Read this post over and over until you really get how knowing the main idea leads you to the correct answer to most of the questions. Then read my replies to some of the other comments for advice about guessing, time management, what material you should practice with, etc. This stuff really works, and it’s helped a lot of people raise their CR scores. Also check out my posts about the sentence completions.
Lastly, check out my answer to Deux Leux about pressure and fear. It might help you a little bit with keeping your tranquility. You’re totally right that it’s in important part of doing your best.
Good luck!
Jeff
Hi Jeff,
I took the sat on the 6th of December 2014.I had 380 in CR 570 in math and 530 in writing.jeff,anxiousness killed me.I panicked from the day before till the time I got to the exam center.i got to number 18 on my first CR section.I was able to complete the grid-in part.Can you imagine I couldn’t tackle one whole CR section?I couldn’t also complete two of the math sections.what helped most was that I didn’t guess.My main problem is fear.please help me I want to retake it again.From Ghana
I’ve experienced fear with certain things like this in my life, so I have an idea of what you’re talking about. You could really think of it as two different types of fear.
The first is the fear comes when we have to do something important and we’re not familiar enough with it, and/or we know we’re not good enough at it to do as well as we’d like. We could say that this is fear that comes from a lack of confidence. It’s pretty common for people taking the SAT. Practicing and improving usually takes care of most of it, because when you know you’re able to do better, you feel more confident and the fear lessens or goes away entirely.
The other kind of fear is the kind that comes from feeling a lot of pressure. It’s when you feel that the outcome matters a tremendous amount and if you fail the consequences will be really bad. Those consequences could be external, like not being able to go to university you really want to go to, or internal, like feeling a great deal of shame because you failed. This kind of fear is harder to deal with.
There are several things I do that help me. First, I try to lower the stakes. It almost never matters as much as you think it matters, especially in the long run. The second is to come to accept that everything happens for a reason and is perfect in it’s own way. And the third is to accept that you’re perfect in your own way, too. Come to accept that if you don’t get the score you want it doesn’t mean that you’re a bad person or that you failed in some way.
Of course, you could say that it’s easier said than done. I agree. These issues deserve their own blog. But if you can lower the pressure that you feel, your practice and preparation will go better, and you’ll score higher, too.
Good luck with it. I wish you the best.
-Jeff
I am having trouble staying focused while reading long passages. I tend to mindlessly read the passages, I see the words and say them in my head but don’t actually think about what they mean or what the author is trying to say and as a result I am clueless by the time I have finished the passage. Any suggestions on how to stay on track while I am reading or study tips to improve my score? I am taking the SAT in March so I still have time to prepare. Thanks!
Hey Fares,
On the one hand, it’s an issue of maturity and will power. Most of us have more control over our ability to focus than we sometimes thing. However, we often have to practice in order to strengthen our ability. You can think of it as a muscle that has to be exercised, and if you do it gradually and regularly you’ll see results.
Since you have about 10 weeks to prepare, don’t worry about your score for now, or how many questions you’re getting right when you practice. Just try to think about what the author is saying in each paragraph as you read. In the beginning, you should even practice writing down a one sentence summary of each paragraph, and then a couple of sentences for the main idea when you get to the end of the passage.
Also, when you find your mind wandering, practice noticing it as soon as possible and just gently place your attention back on what you’re reading, just before the last thing you remember.
I hope this helps! Let me know how it’s going and feel free to write back in a month or so if you have more questions.
-Jeff
thanks Jeff for your striking points, i m sure it will help me alot to raise my score, but i m new and have got around 1 and half months left for my exam, but i m weak in vocabulary , can u suggest me about vocabulary, what should i read and from where shall i begin? please…
You’re welcome, Aasu.
I hate to say it, but the only way to increase your vocabulary in a short period of time is to use flashcards. I always recommend the Barron’s SAT Vocabulary flashcards, but you can also find good lists on the internet. You should probably try Sparknotes first.
Good luck!
Hi .Actually i am planing to write my sat exam in few day and i am somewhat bad in critical reading .I can score good in maths and writing .But when it comes to reading i score very less can u please help me with the critical part .
Hi Zeba,
This post has the best help I can give you, especially in a short period of time. Also check out the posts about the sentence completion questions.
Good luck on Saturday!
-Jeff
i have a trouble in my critical reading score i don’t know what shall i do i lost hope and i don’t know what to do as well , i can’t even get the main idea of any passage and if i do get it i usually understand it in a wrong way . i really need help my exam is within a week and i need to get a higher score in critical reading
Hi Nehal,
Unfortunately, if you can’t even get the main idea of a passage or usually understand it in the wrong way, there’s not much you can do in a short period of time. This post has all of the best tips and techniques for making the most of what you do understand. After that, you have to focus on getting better at reading English.
Best,
Jeff
I just got a bad mark in this last trial (October 11) I just got disappointed . Could you Jeff advice me how to study in a way that would lead to a good score my next trial I’d on December 11 … thank you
If you mean advice for the CR section, read this post over and over until you really get how knowing the main idea leads you to the correct answer to most of the questions. Then read my replies to some of the other comments for advice about guessing, time management, what material you should practice with, etc. This stuff really works, and it’s helped a lot of people raise their CR scores.
If you want advice on the whole test, including the other sections, that’s a little too much to get into here. You might want to check out my ebook which has great tutorials for all the sections, and a step by step study plan so you can do exactly what’s needed to raise your score in every section, without having to figure it out yourself.
Keep working at it and I’m sure you’ll improve. Good luck!
This is a really cool post, the ideas are amazing, just from reading it I feel more confident!!!
Thanks, Vishal! I really appreciate it. Let me know how it goes for you. And good luck!
Hi
Im facing alot of problem in time management. Every time i give a mock atleast 1 section always gets left out. Also my CR section is really bad, i am just not able to read the passages…..they are so boring and confusing that i always get distracted and end up doing really badly.
Could u pls give me some useful tips? It would be gr8!
Thanx
Hey Avik,
For time management tips, look at my reply to the previous comment. I go into it in depth there.
Now, when you say that the passages are boring and you get distracted…
Just don’t! If they’re boring, so what. Pretend to be interested it them if you have to. Just keep practicing at paying attention and keeping your focus on the passage. That’s the most useful tip I can give you.
Hi! I’m having trouble with critical reading. My score never exceeds 600. I’m always down to two answer choices, and I always choose the wrong one, even though I go with my gut feeling. I’m particularly weak at dual passages. I also have trouble completing within the time limit. Could you share some tips with me on how to finish within the time limit, and how to tackle the dual passage questions? Thank you so much!
Hi Tash,
First, let’s look at the issue of what do do when you’re down to two answer choices:
It’s not uncommon for people to say that when they’re down to two answer choices they always pick the wrong one, even when going with their gut. My first question to you is whether you’re honestly going with your gut, or are you second guessing yourself? I ask this because some of my one on one students have recently shared that they’re not really going with their gut. So take a look at that.
The next thing to look at is whether, when you’re deciding between the two remaining answers, you’re asking yourself which answer choice is more in keeping with the main idea of the passage. In about 80% of the questions, that will guide you to the correct answer.
Lastly, if you’re really going with your gut and always choosing the wrong one, try always going against your gut.
Now let’s look at time management:
Time management is closely tied to making the best educated guess that you can make, and quickly skipping questions when you don’t have an educated guess.
Here are the rules for guessing:
1) You should make educated guesses, but you shouldn’t make uneducated guesses.
2) If you can cross of three answer choices but you’re not sure which of the remaining two is the best answer, you should always guess on the question, because you’re making an educated guess by virtue of knowing that three answers are wrong. Just go with your gut, and if you’re totally not sure, just pick whichever one you feel like.
3) If you can cross off two answer choices, guess on the question if you have a gut feeling that one of the remaining choices is correct, but skip the question if you have no idea about the other three.
4) If you can’t cross off any of the choices, or only one of them, then skip the question.
5) There’s no minimum or maximum to the number of questions you should skip.
These are strict rules and you should always follow them on the CR and Writing sections.
Now for time management…
1) First of all, always practice this using College Board material; the Official SAT Study Guide, their online course, and a search of scribd.com for “official SAT practice test” (then click on the “Documents” tab). You can’t work on this accurately unless you use official material, which means don’t use Barron’s, Kaplan, etc.
2) The next thing you should do is take a couple of CR sections while you specifically practice the guessing rules that I just described. Don’t force yourself to finish in the time allowed for the section, just keep track of how long it takes you, and how many questions you answered after the time was up.
3) You’ll probably notice that some questions take longer than others (mostly because they’re harder for you), and that you get more of those questions wrong, or skip more of those questions, than you do for the questions that take you a shorter time to answer.
4) The goal is to make sure you have time to answer all of the questions that you’re more likely to get right. So as you get better at recognizing the harder questions that take you longer, practice skipping them quickly and moving on to the questions that you’re more likely to get. This will solve most of your time management issues and significantly raise your score.
5) If you still have trouble finishing the sections in time, practice reading a little bit faster. Most people can read a little bit faster and still understand the passage almost as well as they can at their “normal” speed. You might have a tendency to rush at first, which you don’t want to do, so you might have to practice this a little bit.
Last, let’s look at the dual passages:
The dual passages rely on knowing the main idea of each passage even more than the single passages do, because all of the questions that compare the passages rely on the main idea. Review this post again and keep practicing until you really get what I’m sharing with you about how to use the main idea of the passage to answer the questions. Then try some double passages again. Remember to read the part in italics at the beginning, and then the first passage, and answer the questions that are only about the first passage. Then read the second passage and answer the rest of the questions: those that are only about the second passage and those that compare the passages. After you finish each passage, it might be helpful to jot down it’s main idea in just a few words. That might clear things up for you.
Feel free to write back with a specific double passage and the questions that gave you trouble.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes!
Best,
Jeff
Please answer a question for me. It confuses me a lot.
In between school days, we gathered hazelnuts, fished, had long deer-hunting weekends, went to powwows, beaded on looms, and made quilts. I did not question the necessity or value of our school education, but somehow I grew up knowing it wasn’t the only education I would need. I’m thankful for those experiences of my Anishinaabe heritage, because now I know by heart not only the national anthem, but the ancient song of the loon. I recognize not only the alphabet and the parts of an English sentence, but the intricate language of a beaver’s
teeth and tail.
10.
The author’s overall tone in this passage is best described as one of (A) jubilation (B) frustration (C) curiosity (D) appreciation (E) uncertainty
I think its D but why not A?
Jubilation means great happiness or joy. The tone here isn’t that strong. Appreciation is a better answer.
Try this when a question asks about the author’s tone:
1) Draw a line that represents a continuum from negative to positive, with neutral in the middle. Something like this:
______________________________________________________________
Neg ———————————- Neutral ——————————– Pos
2) Then decide where on the author’s tone falls on the continuum. You should draw a line. Since I can’t do that here, I put an “A” where I think it is. You don’t have to be exact.
3) Look at the answer choices and pick the one that best represents where you put the line.
Hi Jeff!
im planning to take the SAT in November and i am struggling with the critical reading section. My main problem is that i get stuck between two options and just cant pick the correct one. I go with the ‘gut feeling’ but it doesnt work
Hi Nauman,
If you’re one of those rare people whose gut is almost always wrong in this situation, then try going against the “gut feeling”.
In general, for about 80% of the questions, when you’re in this situation pick the choice that’s most in keeping with the main idea of the passage. There are some questions where that doesn’t work, such as tone questions and vocabulary in context questions.
I’ve discussed how to handle tone questions in the other comment. There is no general rule for vocabulary in context questions; you just have to see which answer choice works best in the sentence.
Try it and let me know how it works.
Best,
Jeff
Hi Jeff, that was indeed a helpful post. I applied your method last time I took a practice SAT and found it much easier to answer the questions as I had an understanding of what the passage was all about. I’m taking my SAT in November and my current score is about 670 in CR. But I want to jump a bit to 720-730s. My vocabulary isn’t that huge which makes me miss that last 1 sentence completion. Also, I have little trouble with dual passages. You see that it’s a matter of about 5 more correct responses for me! So, what would you suggest? ~Ayush( India)
Hi Ayush,
Here’s a couple of thoughts:
1) Make sure you practice with official College Board material. If you need more, go to scribd.com, search for “official SAT Practice Test” and click the “Documents” tab.
2) Don’t give up on vocabulary. If you learn 100 new words before the test, you’ll get another 1 or 2 questions correct.
3) If you usually miss the last sentence completion, skip out of it quickly. Use the time on the passages.
4) The dual passages rely on knowing the main idea of each passage even more than the single passages do, because all of the questions that compare the passages rely on the main idea.
Feel free to write back with a specific double passage and the questions that gave you trouble.
Best,
Jeff
Hello Jeff, I plan to take the SAT on October 11th this month. I have had very little time to prepare previously. I’ve been left with about 3-4 days and I’m concerned about my critical reading section. Do you have any last moment tips that would make a huge difference to my score?
Hi Nakul,
These are the bet tips. Study this blog post, and practice as much as you can in the remaining time you have before the test. Then plan to take it again and give yourself more time to prepare for it.
Jeff
Hey Jeff,
I’m having trouble with my CR: I’m stuck on 630, and its really bringing my over all score down to the 2000 bracket. I score around 700s in my writing, and 650s in math. In CR, I find that almost always I struggle with the questions that ask us what the specific word means in the passage. My vocabulary is strong, but sometimes its really difficult to infer what it would mean. In a particular passage for example: ” a riot or colors” was stated and “riot” was asked about. I selected the option: ” interaction of many colors” while the answer was ” profusion”. Do you see what I mean?
Also, I have trouble in questions where there are two passages with different authors and questions ask us to judge what author #1 would think about author #2’s opinions/particular lines/ etc. Often, author 1 has no specific stance, which makes things confusing. For example, in a passage about medical ethics author 1 stated that ” ethically opposed individuals, while well intentioned have inappropriate standards” and author 2’s passage talked about how human testing is unethical. We were asked to comment on author 1’s stance regarding author 2, and the answer ” disapproving” seemed extreme and inappropriate, as opposed to what I chose: deferential ( because well, he WAS sort of respectful to them by recognizing their intentions).
I’m giving my SAT on October 11, and am cutting it pretty close. Is there anything I can do in such short a time?
Regards,
AIR
Hey AIR,
The first thought that comes to mind is whether the practice tests that you mention are from the College Board or from some other company like Kaplan, Princeton Review, etc. If it’s from some other company, these questions will be slightly misleading, and often trickier, relative to what you’ll see on the SAT. In that case, you should get some official material and try a couple of tests and see if you’re still having a little trouble with this stuff.
By the way, the quickest source for official College Board material is scribd.com. Search for “Official SAT Practice Test”, then click the “Documents” tab.
If the questions and passages you mention are from College Board material, feel free to send them to me and I’ll see if I can give you more specific help.
Good luck on the 11th!
Best,
Jeff
Hi Jeff,
I’ve learned a lot from reading your tips but still have a few questions. The reading portion of my SAT has always been the worst and I’m almost positive it’s because of my time management. How long should I spend on each question so that I am able to make it through the whole section? Also, what is your opinion on skipping questions? Is it worth guessing or dismissing it all together and moving on. I found that I didn’t skip many on the reading section and got a lot wrong. This lowered my score immensely and I’m not sure if there’s a max or min to how many you should skip or not. Thank you for your time!
-Olivia
Hi Olivia,
These are great questions; time management is an important part of getting the best score you possibly can.
First of all, here are the rules for guessing:
1) You should make educated guesses, but you shouldn’t make uneducated guesses.
2) If you can cross of three answer choices but you’re not sure which of the remaining two is the best answer, you should always guess on the question, because you’re making an educated guess by virtue of knowing that three answers are wrong. Just go with your gut, and if you’re totally not sure, just pick whichever one you feel like.
3) If you can cross off two answer choices, guess on the question if you have a gut feeling that one of the remaining choices is correct, but skip the question if you have no idea about the other three.
4) If you can’t cross off any of the choices, or only one of them, then skip the question.
5) There’s no minimum or maximum to the number of questions you should skip.
These are strict rules and you should always follow them on the CR and Writing sections.
Now for time management…
1) First of all, always practice this using College Board material; the Official SAT Study Guide, their online course, and a search of scribd.com for “official SAT practice test” (then click on the “Documents” tab). You can’t work on this accurately unless you use official material, which means don’t use Barron’s, Kaplan, etc.
2) The next thing you should do is take a couple of CR sections while you specifically practice the guessing rules that I just described. Don’t force yourself to finish in the time allowed for the section, just keep track of how long it takes you, and how many questions you answered after the time was up.
3) You’ll probably notice that some questions take longer than others (mostly because they’re harder for you), and that you get more of those questions wrong, or skip more of those questions, than you do for the questions that take you a shorter time to answer.
4) The goal is to make sure you have time to answer all of the questions that you’re more likely to get right. So as you get better at recognizing the harder questions that take you longer, practice skipping them quickly and moving on to the questions that you’re more likely to get. This will solve most of your time management issues and significantly raise your score.
5) If you still have trouble finishing the sections in time, practice reading a little bit faster. Most people can read a little bit faster and still understand the passage almost as well as they can at their “normal” speed. You might have a tendency to rush at first, which you don’t want to do, so you might have to practice this a little bit.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes!
Best,
Jeff
Hi Jeff!
I’m planning onto giving the SAT in December. I am having great difficulty in understanding the long as well as short comprehension passages. Almost all of my answers are wrong in the RC part. It weighs down to the score to a low of 1650-1700. I really need to get a good score at the first go only. As for maths, the score averages around 570-600. It would be great if you could help in improving upon the following.
Thanks!
Hi Shaurya,
Everything I teach requires you to be able to read and understand these passages to at least an average level. For example, in the passage that I talk about in this blog post, you have to be able to read it and at least understand that the author says that people who criticize TV as evil and dangerous are wrong, and that people have always criticized what the author calls the “dominant medium of the moment”, whether that was TV, radio, film, poetry, drama, etc., going all the way back to the time of Plato, and that the author thinks that those people who do that have always been wrong.
If you can read that passage and come away with something along the lines of what I’ve just said, then you can understand it well enough to do pretty well on the questions, if you practice the techniques I teach in this post and in the video course. However, if you read that passage and didn’t get that that was what the author was saying, then you have to spend some time getting better at reading the kind material that you’re likely to find on the SAT.
If that’s your situation, then my best suggestion is to find someone who can read with you and help you increase your English reading comprehension. Do that for the next six weeks, and then come back to practicing specifically for the test and see how it goes for you.
I hope that helps!
-Jeff
Hi Jeff!
Thank you for your great tutorials. Helped me dramatically. I scored in low 600s. Now I am between 700-800 (once hit 800 on a test from BB). But, I have a problem with timeing. I need like 5 more mins to finish most of CR sections. here are the reasons why it happen: 1. I spend too much time on initial reading for main point. 2. Sometimes have troubles with understanding detailed questions so stick too long contemplating . 3. Very rarely have troubles with summarazing.
What would be your advice on how to read faster? find idea more efficiently and be more focused? I feel that I can score 800 on the real test; however several minor flaws set me back from that feat.
Thank you in advance.
Btw, I am an international student (non native speaker), but I’ve spent about a year prepping. I have my test in October. And I definitely need 2250+
Hey Vlad,
You’re welcome, and thanks for the kind words. I’m glad I was able to help.
The question of how to read faster is an important one that many people are working on.
My experience is that most people can read a little bit faster than they’re comfortable with and still retain most of their understanding. You have to practice this, and you have to trust yourself and your abilities. If you keep in mind that the most important thing to come away with is the main idea of the passage (and you might think of this as finding the main point of each paragraph), and that you’ll have to return to the passage and reread the line references anyway, you’ll realize that you can speed up a little bit by not needing to understand every single word or phrase, or even every single sentence the first time through the passage.
When you encounter a phrase or sentence that you don’t quite understand, ask yourself if it’s new information or if it’s meant to be supporting details for a point the author has already made. If it’s supporting details for a point you already know, then simply note that and skim through it, not worrying about understanding it exactly unless you get a question that references those lines. If it’s new information, then say to yourself, I know this is new, and I don’t quite understand it yet, but I know that the author will give give some supporting details and if I get the gist of those details, then I’ll understand this sentence, too.
Remember above all that not all of the details will be asked about in the questions, so don’t worry about understanding all of them exactly the first time you read the passage. If you have to understand them the questions will direct you back to those line numbers and you can reread them then.
Trust and practice, and you should be fine.
Good luck, and let me know how it goes!
Best regards,
Jeff
Hey Jeff.
I just visited this page and found it pretty intresting. However, I do everything as you have said above. There are a few extra suggestions I recieved from Barron’s.
So I just wanted to ask you if it is wise to use these tricks:
1) Before reading the passage, check the line numbers in line reference questions and mark them. (This hardly takes 30 seconds)
2) Skip short passages if you’re a slow reader.
I am pretty doubtful if the second tip is worth applying. (I am a slow reader though)
I wanted your opinion. Should I skip the short ones?
Btw, I am pretty good in math (780+) and writing (680+) but find critical reading arduous.
I am stuck at 580 and trust me, I have done more than 11 full length tests but never seem to get a score more than 600. I am giving my first ever SAT on october 11 and really need to get more than 600 or the university I wanted to go to will reject me.
And I have even heard people say that on the real test, everyone gets a lower score because of the time pressure, it gets hard to focus on the passage. Is this true?
I think I will have only one shot for the SAT as I will be busy preparing for the Subject SAT later on.
So the problems I face are:
1) I am a slow reader (I find americans lucky because they are able to read quickly with understanding)
2) I face the two choices problem almost all the time. This is a huge reason for my score drop.
3) Because I time all of my tests, I usually dont read the actual meaning of the question.
4) On almost every line reference question, I return to the passage and reread. (Although this helps me spot the right answer, it consumes a lot of time)
5) I take a LOT of time in paired passages. (like 17 minutes).
Just to let you know, I’m perfectly okay with the sentence completion questions. (I have learnt 3400 words from Barron’s 3500 word list)
Is it possible to improve from like 560 to 620 in Critical Reading in just 20 days?
Sorry about the plethora of questions.
Thanks.
Hi Abdullah,
These are great questions. First of all, it’s very possible to improve your CR score from 560 to 620 in 20 days. Keep working at it, and if getting 600+ on the CR is make or break for getting into the university of your choice, make this your most important priority for the next 3 weeks.
Here’s the most important thing. Only practice with official College Board material. Hopefully you’re already doing this. There are 3 main sources for this material. The first is the “Official SAT Study Guide” by the College Board. That has 10 practice tests. Then there’s the College Board’s online course, which has an additional 10 practice tests. You can also go to scribd.com and search for “official sat practice test” and click on the documents tab. Only by working with official material can you trust your results when you practice.
Ok, now to address the Barron’s tricks…
1) If checking the line numbers in the questions and marking them in the passage takes only 30 seconds, try it and see how it works for you. If it helps you and makes you feel more comfortable, then you should certainly do it.
2) This is a very interesting question. Don’t skip the short passages simply because you’re a slow reader. Check your results on the short passages vs your results on the long passages. If you’re getting a lower percentage of short passage questions correct than long passage questions and you need to find some extra time, then it might make sense to skip the short passages.
The important thing you want to focus on here is that there are probably a few questions that take you longer to answer than most of the others, and most likely you’re getting a greater percentage of those questions wrong. What you really want to do is learn to recognize those questions as quickly as possible and skipping them and only going back to them if you have time left at the end of the section.
For example, take a typical CR section with 24 questions and 25 minutes to complete it. Let’s say there are 2 questions in a section that together take you 4 minutes to answer, and you get them wrong anyway. And let’s say that when time expires for that section, there are 4 questions that you didn’t have time to answer. And let’s say that you answered the other 18 questions correctly. Your raw score for that section would be 17.5, because you’d get 1 point for each of the 18 correctly answered questions, and lose .25 points for each of the 2 incorrect answers.
Now let’s say you skipped those 2 questions, and with the time you saved were able to answer those 4 questions that you otherwise wouldn’t have gotten to. And let’s say that you got 3 of those 4 questions correct. Your raw score would now be 20.75, because you’d have answered 21 questions correctly and 1 question incorrectly.
I hope that makes sense. It’s just a hypothetical situation, but it shows you how important it is give yourself a chance to answer as many questions as possible that you know you can get right and not be as concerned with the questions that give you more trouble. Trust me, this can make a huge difference in your score.
And your questions…
1) Most people can read a little bit faster than they’re comfortable with and still retain most of their understanding. You have to practice this. If you keep in mind that the most important thing to come away with is the main idea of the passage (and you might think of this as finding the main point of each paragraph), and that you’ll have to return to the passage and reread the line references anyway, you’ll realize that you can speed up a little by not needing to understand every single word or phrase, or even every single sentence.
2) Do you mean that you can almost always cross off 3 answers but have trouble deciding between which of the 2 remaining choices is best? Remember that you’re looking for which one of those 2 is the best answer, rather than looking for an answer that’s exactly right. There will always be something about one of the answers that makes it the better choice, or something that makes it the worse choice. And for approximately 80% of the questions, the better choice will be the one that’s more in keeping with the main idea of the passage.
3) You have to read the actual meaning of the question. For the next week, don’t try to finish in the time allowed. Just notice how long it does take you to finish, practice what I wrote earlier about learning to spot the questions that take you longer than the others, and keep track of which questions you answered after the allowed time expired. Then you’ll learn how to fine tune your timing to answer more questions that you’re more likely to get right.
4) You have to reread them. But that’s why you can let yourself read a little faster the first time through.
5) The main idea is even more important in the paired passages, because there are even more questions that rely on the main idea, or point of view, or the author of each passage. Focus on that, and see if that allows you to speed up by not worrying so much about the details.
Try this and let me know how it goes. And good luck, Abdullah!
-Jeff
Hello, I am Elen.
I am an international student and plan to take SAT in December. I am improving my math skills and think it will be ok. Also I’ve read essay examples and in my opinion I just need to practice more.
Sentence completing is really hard for me, because I’ve never seen that ridiculous words. What can I do to fix it?
Reading is also bad. I understand English well, but I am not being able to understand normally during writing test.
Please advise me what I need for doing well and provide any useful resources.
Thanks a lot !
Hi Elen,
I agree with you, some of the words on the sentence completions are ridiculous! Nobody would say some of them, and hardly anybody would write some of them. I have 2 blog posts about the sentence completions that show you how to make the most of the english vocabulary that you know. That link is in some of the other comments so you can scroll down and look for it, or look through the tutorial section of the blog. If you want to truly maximize your score, you’ll have to learn more english vocabulary. There are plenty of online resources for this, the best one might be Spark Notes. I have the link to their list in some other comments too.
For the reading, you just have to practice. Read this post several times and follow along until you understand the principles I’m sharing with you. Essentially, what I’m saying is that if you have the basic main idea of the passage, you can do pretty well, even if there are words, phrases, and whole sentences you don’t understand. Keep practicing and you’ll get better at it. You can also sign up for a free video mini course that I’ve created for you. Here’s the link for that: http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/.
Good luck! And let me know how it’s going for you.
-Jeff
Hi jeff,
I am good in math and in writing…In critical reading I do know how to deal with passages…so please tell me!!!
Hi Tarek,
I tell you in this post! Read it and try to apply it, and then ask me specific questions if you have them!
-Jeff
Hi Jeff,
I’m an International Student(from India) and am appearing for the SAT in october….
My math score is perfect, writing is around 750, but.. CR score is stagnant around 650-700 and is not improving… I really suck at long passages(both paired and Unpaired) particularly at tone, mood and attitude questions.. also i’m taking 2-3 min more in CR section in each practice test;
please suggest how can I increase my CR score …..
best,
Shivansh
Hi Shivansh,
For the tone, mood and attitude questions, you have to decide how positively or negatively the author feels about the topic (or whatever the question is asking about). I’d draw a picture for you if I could, so try to picture in your mind what I’m about to say, or even draw it on paper. Picture a spectrum running from negative to positive, with a line down the middle that means neutral. Now draw a line on the spectrum that shows where you think the author’s feelings about the topic lie. You don’t have to be exact. You want to decide on one of these 5 areas: Very negative, more negative than neutral, right in the middle (where the author is just reporting information), more positive than neutral, and very positive. Then pick the answer choice that corresponds to where you drew the line.
The 2 – 3 minutes is pretty easy to fix. First of all, see if there’s one or two questions that are taking you longer than the others, and that you usually get wrong. If so, learn to spot these questions and skip them until you’ve answered all of the other questions in the section. If you’re not getting to a couple of questions that you’d get wrong anyway, your problem is solved. The next place to look to save a little time is whether you know the correct answer to a question before you’re willing to commit to it. This is pretty common. If it’s true for you, practice committing to your choice sooner, and track your results. The last place to look to save a little time is whether you can read slightly faster and still retain the information you need to know.
Try these things and let me know how they work for you. And good luck! I have a strong feeling that you’re going to do very well.
-Jeff
I will give my SAT in december,so I have time. I took some practice tests and I am scoring around 1600 but I want it to be at least 2100.for maths I am scoring 700 plus and I know I can get 800 by overcoming silly mistakes but the problem comes in CR and writing, I am scoring around 450-500 in that. I figured out that I need to work on my vocabulary alot. So how should I do that?from where?I have alot of pressure of my studies so I cant give more than one hour to SAT practice daily. So actually I dont have alot of time for reading things. I hear people learning words daily. I googled it and there are so many websites for vocab words but which one should I pick? I will really appreciate if you help me.
Hi Salman,
For the next month, divide your hour of study between reading the passages (don’t answer the questions for the first month, just get used to reading them), and learning vocabulary. I recommend Barron’s SAT Vocabulary Flashcards to all of my private students. There are probably a lot of good vocab lists on line, but you should probably start with Sparknotes. Just google SAT vocabulary and you’ll see their link on the first page.
Write back in a month and I’ll tell you what to do next.
-Jeff
Hi Jeff,
I have given my all to the Passage and I am doing fine eliminating three answer choices. But I am not able to select between the two. Help me, I want to score above 750 in CR.
Hi Abinash,
If you can eliminate three answer choices, ask yourself which of the two remaining choices is more in line with the main idea of the passage. This will lead to the correct answer about 80% of the time. There are a few questions where that won’t work, but it should be pretty clear which ones they are.
Also, go with your gut and don’t second guess yourself. When you practice, keep track of these questions and note what percentage you’re getting right. It’s probably pretty high.
Feel free to write back with specific examples and I’ll see if I can help you with them.
Hello Jeff,
First of all I would like to say that your strategies are really helpful. Thank you for sharing it.
I have been practicing SAT for three months now and completed up to twenty five full length sets. But i seem to be stuck at 550 on CR, 750 on maths and 650 on the writing.
On the CR section I get up to 70% of the sentence completion question right and most of the passage question right( that is most of the question that I could finish and when I understand the passage and know the main idea). I know how to attack the questions, which I learnt from many SAT guide, but my problem is that I can’t finish the all of the question on time and most of the time because the passage seems to be difficult. So how can I raise my CR scores to 700 (and in about six weeks if possible)?
Similarly, on the maths section I make common errors. How can I reduce these errors?
Thank you.
Hi Bikalpa,
If you’re having trouble finishing the section, make sure you’re quickly skipping the questions that seem harder to you and that you feel will take you longer than usual. It might take a little practice to recognize which questions these are for you, but you’ll be able to identify them pretty soon. You want to skip them until you’ve gotten a chance to do all the other questions in the section that are easier for you. In other words, you don’t want to spend a lot of time on a question that you’ll get wrong and not be able to get to a question at the end that you can get right.
The next thing you should try is to begin to notice whether you identify the right answer earlier than you’re willing to bubble it in and stick with it. Once you think you know the right answer, don’t over think the question. Another way to say this is to think about the question only as much as necessary, but not more. That might sound a little strange, but it’s good advice. For example, if you’ve crossed off three answer choices and have two choices left, ask yourself which of the remaining choices is better and just pick that one. Don’t spend time thinking about which answer choice is exactly right.
After that, see if you can read a little faster than you feel comfortable with. You’ll have to experiment with this, because if you read it too fast you’ll do worse. But we often can read a little bit faster than we usually do and still understand what we’re reading.
The last thing is to practice getting better at reading English and learning English vocabulary.
Your question about the math section is a great one. I share what to do about it in these posts:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/how-to-raise-your-sat-math-score-without-learning-any-more-math/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/how-to-raise-your-sat-math-score-without-learning-any-more-math-part-2/
Good luck, and let me know how it goes!
Thanks a lot…but I find it really difficult to identify the main idea. And I also loose focus most times. Pls how can I correct this?
Hi Erika,
First try to pick up the main idea naturally by asking yourself, “What’s this passage about?” That’s really all you need to get started. You should be able to say what the passage is about in somewhere between 1 and 4 sentences. If you’re still having trouble, go paragraph by paragraph. Ask, what’s happening in this paragraph? Sum it up in a sentence. Go on to the next paragraph and do the same thing, and so on. That will help you a lot.
Now about losing focus…
I don’t really have anything special to tell you. You just have to keep practicing. Think of focus like a muscle that has to be exercised to be strong.
Hello Jeff,
I gave SAT in January, 2014 by working hard for three weeks and got 1270. Now I am planning to give it another try in December so I’ve got like WHOLE 3 MONTHS! But the problem is that I am not understanding large paragraphs like I am unable to sum it up, so please help me on this because I want to get a total score of 2200+ and I think everything is possible. I am learning 5 words a day and working hard for almost 5-6 hours daily. Please give me some suggestions. (I am from Pakistan and don’t have many opportunities so I am studying all by myself like I did for the previous SAT).
Hi Saad,
I love that you said, “I think everything is possible.” Spend most of your time getting better at reading English. Read a lot. When you read a word you don’t know and can’t figure out from the context, look it up. Spend 3/4 of your time reading nonfiction and 1/4 of your time reading fiction, because that’s roughly the proportion you’ll find on the SAT.
Also, practice understanding large paragraphs and summing them up in your language. There are plenty of Americans who have trouble with this on the SAT, so it’s not only a matter of being able to read English. You have to learn this skill, and if you can realize that it’s the same skill in your language as it is in English, it might make it easier for you to do in English and on the SAT.
If you have trouble with that, you might Google “How to find the main idea” and read some of the results. Do some of the practice examples if they give any. And if you’re signed up for my email list, you’ll be getting some videos that will help you with that.
Lastly, spend some time each day with official SAT practice tests. Go to scribd.com and search for “official practice sat”, then click on “Documents”. You’ll find a lot of them that way. Even if you just read the passages and don’t even bother with the questions at first, it will get you used to reading that material.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes. And good luck!
Thank you so much Jeff!
Thanks for the help! I’ll try using these strategies. I really need to improve my reading score quickly. I scored a 790 in math but I can’t seem to get above a 620 in reading. I really hope to get a 700 in reading when I take the SAT again.
Hey John,
Good luck with your goal of 700. The method I teach in this post is the absolute most important thing in the CR section, and the method I teach in the Sentence Completion tutorials is the absolute best way to maximize your vocabulary for those questions (you should also get some SAT vocabulary flashcards and learn more words, too.)
I have both a free video mini course and a full length video course that you can purchase that teaches these concepts in greater depth, and with more examples of how it works. If you learn well from videos, this course will help you a lot. You can check it out here:
Free mini course: http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/
Full length course: http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/solive/
-Jeff
Hey Jeff,
First of all, thank you for the great guide. I am taking the SAT in about three months. My writing and math is okay (writing 790 math 780) but I am currently finding CR section most challenging and ‘unstable’ section in the SAT. I am currently in the high 600s and low 700s zone. There seems to be always those two or three questions that I would get wrong each section? How can I improve my score?
Thank you so much.
Hey Mia,
You’re welcome. I’m glad it helped you. What kind of questions are you getting wrong? Are they always different types of questions, or do the same sort of things give you trouble each time? Also, if you can give me examples, I could probably help you even more.
Keep up the good work. You’re doing great!
Jeff
hi jeff, I just came from india before 1 year. I gave my sat in june and I got 350 on critical reading. I at least want to get 600 but i did not understand the paragraphs properly. I don’t know what to do. Can u please help me with critical reading sections? PLEASE PLEASE!!!!!!
Hi Meet,
There’s 2 things you need in order to do well on critical reading. The first is that you have to be able to read English reasonably well. Personally, I can’t read any other languages too well, so I wouldn’t be able to take a test like the SAT in a language other than English and do well. I have a lot of respect for you and everyone who does it. You have to figure out if you read it well enough to get the score you’re looking for. You have to read a lot and look up vocabulary that you don’t know, and find someone to help you understand what you read if you need help with that.
The thing about the SAT that can make it really though is that even if you read English well enough to get a good CR score, you have to understand what the SAT is really looking for and learn how to use your skill and ability on the CR section to get the best score possible.
The most important things to learn are the stuff I teach in this post about identifying the main idea and using it to answer the questions, and the stuff I teach in the sentence completion posts about how to analyze the sentences and make educated guesses to make the most of your vocabulary.
I have an ebook, an online video course, and some free videos too that can help you with that. And if you’re really serious about raising your score, nothing will help you as much as one on one tutoring. I might be able to help you with that, too.
Anyway, if you’re on my email list you’ll be getting more information about that stuff, including links to the free videos. And you should feel free to email me directly if you’re interested in some personal, one on one help.
The most important thing is to keep at this, and I’m sure you’ll get the improvement you deserve!
Hi Jeff:
I just came to US 8 months ago and I’m pretty new to here and also to the language. I have lots of problems with reading portion of the SAT and since I’m going to be a junior next year I don’t have much time. I did the practice test this summer and I got 300 for the reading and I want it to reach 500 for the next one that I’m going to take it in the October. I have read lots of articles and I’ve gone to SAT prep course bur that didn’t make any difference. I’m so worried about that. Can you tell me what am I suppose to do?
Hi Asal,
You write pretty well for being pretty new to English. That’s a good sign that you’ll get a good score on the reading section by the time you send in your college applications. You said that you don’t have much time, and it’s true that you’ll be taking the PSAT in October, but remember that you don’t have to have your final SAT score for college until the fall of next year.
The first thing you have to do is honestly assess how well you read English, and whether you read it well enough to get the score you’re looking for. Especially coming from a country where English isn’t the native language, part of getting better at SAT Critical Reading is reading a lot, looking up the vocabulary you don’t know, and finding someone to help you with how well you understand what you’re reading. I have a lot of respect for everyone whose first language is not English who takes the SAT. I couldn’t take a test like that in a different language.
Anyway, the first part of the process is being able to read English at least pretty well, and continuing to read and increase your English vocabulary. The second part of the process is being able to use that ability on the CR section to get the best score possible. The most important things to learn are the stuff I teach in this post about identifying the main idea and using it to answer the questions, and the stuff I teach in the sentence completion posts about how to analyze the sentences and make educated guesses to make the most of your vocabulary. If you’ve signed up for my email list, you’ll be getting some videos soon that will help you with all of that.
Also, I’m going to send you an email to the email address you gave with this comment with some exercises that I’ll personally help you with to see how well you’re able to understand the main idea of these passages and to improve that understanding if you need help.
Keep working at this. I think you’re going to end up doing quite well.
-Jeff
Hey Jeff,
My name is Pyae Sone Aung, but my friends call me Patrick. I am a student from Myanmar (Burma) who is looking to pursue an undergraduate degree in US. I was accepted into a couple of US universities for this fall term but I decided to stay a year back because I believe I can get into a better liberal arts college the coming year. I intend to major in Civil Engineering. So far, I have taken SAT I a couple of times and I scored 700 on my Math and Writing section. However, my highest Critical Reading score is 580. I have read your blog posts on how to tackle sentence completion sections and paragraph readings and I appreciate you for the invaluable ideas you’ve shared with us.
I am writing this email/message to seek your advice on how to enjoy reading for fun. Or, let’s just say, what to look for when reading a novel. It sounds preposterous to ask someone how to enjoy reading but truth to be told, I am not an avid reader. I am merely developing a habit to “like” reading, first with the intention of getting a great score on CR, but now to be a knowledgeable student. You strike me as a jack of many trades and I am sure your help would give me some insights to read meaningfully in life. May I know what you think is key to getting a near perfect grasp of difficult readings? How do I get accustomed to the varying sentence structures and abstract ideas, if any are entertained, in the readings?
I understand that sticking to the main idea and not getting distracted with the details are what you’ve suggested. But you, or any strong reader wouldn’t need to comprise the details over getting a better grasp on the main idea. So, in a nut shell, what I am requesting is your advice on how to become a really strong reader and thinker. SAT reading is merely a test. And I want to be a good reader for more than a test. The thing is, I was brought up in an environment way different that yours or that of anyone who come from an English speaking country . English is my second language. My parents aren’t good in English either. Also, Myanmar has only recently been free from the military dictatorship that has left the country isolated for more than five decades. It is not surprising that I was not taught to enjoy reading in English from an early age. That said, I would love if you could recommend me some of your favorite novels and authors. I look forward to conversing with you further about reading or of any topic of interest.
From a fast changing Yangon,
Patrick Liu
P.S. Call me crazy, but I just read about you and your career as a voice actor. People here, including me, are not so much exposed to the American movie industry. However, I do know Bugs Bunny and trust me, you are one hell of a character.
Hey Patrick,
Thank you. I really appreciate your note. Also, you write very well. If you didn’t say that English is your second language, I wouldn’t have known.
You ask some great questions. First of all, let me say that I might not be the best person to ask about reading fiction. There are so many works of fiction in the world that if you’re reading for pleasure, my primary advice is to pick a book that you think you might like and be completely willing to stop reading it and move on to a different book if you don’t like it. That’s because there are so many stories and themes and writing styles and it’s largely a matter of personal preference for each person. Sometimes if I don’t like the first 20 pages or so I’ll skip to page 50 or 100 and read another 10 or 15 pages to see if I like that better, and then if I do I’ll go back to the beginning and start again. I have no idea why that works, but sometimes it does. The other important thing I can share with you for reading fiction is to consciously imagine what the author is saying. We all do this unconsciously when we like a book and can understand it pretty well, but when a book is challenging for you, consciously imagining it can make it easier to understand.
You might think of it as a picture that’s gradually coming into focus. At first maybe you can only make out the most obvious details, but as you get used to it and it becomes clearer, you’ll find that the more details you can see, the faster you’ll be able to see others because everything has to fit into a coherent picture. I hope that makes sense.
My favorite novels of all time are two that I first read in high school: “Catcher in the Rye” by Salinger, and “The Great Gatsby” by Fitzgerald. Two of my more recent favorites are “Life of Pi” by Yann Martel, and “Girl with Curious Hair” by David Foster Wallace (this one is a collection of short stories).
Because this is an SAT blog, I have to remind everyone who reads this that 3/4 of the reading passages on the SAT are non-fiction, so if your main goal at the moment is to raise your Critical Reading score, you should spend 3/4 of your time reading non-fiction.
Last, I have to let everyone know that I’m not Jeff Bergman the voice actor. It’s a pretty common name in the US. I wish I was the voice of Bugs Bunny though. That would be awesome!
i have a problem with the critical reading section , i can’t finish it on time , and i can’t reach the main idea that the writer is talking about , so i selected answers randomly in june test and i get a bad score (390) , what do you think i should do to improve my skills , i did what you have written in that post but i still have the same problem
Hi Karim,
The first thing you should do is not select answers randomly. I can’t stress this enough. Get in the habit of only answering questions when you can cross off 3 answer choices with reasonable confidence that they’re not the correct answer.*
Next, I have a question for you. Are you a native English speaker? If not, honestly ask yourself how well you understand written English. Looking at the how you’ve written your comment, you understand it pretty well, but if you think you have room for improvement in that area, find a tutor or class in your area and get a little help there.
The next thing you should do is to practice reading a lot. Don’t even worry about answering questions yet. There are a ton of official practice SATs on scribd.com. You should read several long passages every day, and practice outlining the author’s argument. For each paragraph, write a sentence about what the author is trying to say. When you’ve done that for each paragraph, you should have a good idea about the main idea, what the passage is about. You can also do this for op-eds in a well written English language newspaper, such as the NY Times or Wall Street Journal, or go to this site: http://www.creators.com/opinion/authors.html.
That should get you started. You can also check out my other site, http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/
*For other people reading this, some people should sometimes answer some questions when they can only cross off 2 answer choices, but unless you’re already scoring above the mid 500’s, you probably don’t have the proper feel to know when to do it.
Hello Jeff!
My SAT scores are pretty decent, (720+ math, 700+ writing) but on the CR section I just barely get above 600. I read your tips on how to improve, but sometimes I have trouble finding the main idea on the long CR passages. Do you have any tips on how to quickly and effectively find the main idea? And also, should I read the passages before i answer the questions, or read along as I go through the questions?
Thanks!
PS: My parents want me to score above 2100 by my junior year
Hi James,
It’s easier to explain how to find the main idea on video, so check out these videos where I show you how to do it – http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com. When you enter your name and email, you’ll get emails every few days with a series of videos about the CR section. The second video shows how to find the main idea.
In the meantime, think of it this way: The main idea is the big picture. It answers the question, “What’s this passage about?” You want to answer that question for yourself in just a couple of sentences. Look for big general statements that the author makes that seem to sum up his point.
The overwhelming majority of people should read the passages before answering the questions. The only exceptions are people who have a really bad attention problem, and people who can’t really read very well. I’m pretty sure that’s not you!
hello!, well i am egyptian and my score in the critical reading is not good, i read and do a lot of stuff to improve my self, but nothing! what is your suggestion?, thank you.
Hi Mary,
My best suggestion is in this post. And if you’re signed up for my email list, you’ll be getting links to some videos that explain the concept, too. The concept that I talk about here, which is to focus on the main idea of the passage and not get caught up in the details while you read is the single biggest thing you can do to improve your CR score. I’ll be posting a link a new online course soon, too. So watch for that. And feel free to write again with specific questions that come up.
Hi Jeff,
I have been studying for over 4 months for the June SAT, and while my score has gone up in the math and writing sections ( 690-800 and 600-650 respectively), my CR score has remained fairly constant at a about 580.Can you give me some last minute tips. I would also appreciate it if you would give me some examples that I should read for the essay.
Thanks.
Hi Sambhav,
The method I describe in this blog post is the biggest thing you can do to raise your CR score, especially when the test is coming up soon. Using this method lets you maximize your understanding of American style English, and keeps you from getting bogged down by words and phrases that you might not understand. Keep in mind that everything the author does is meant to support his main idea, and lead you as the reader to understanding or agreeing with it. That’s why knowing the author’s main point, and how he lays out his argument, is so helpful in answering most of the questions.
I’ve just created a free online Critical Reading mini course (as of today it’s only about the reading passages). If you’re on my email list you’ll be getting emails about it. In case you’re not, here are the links:
http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/mini-course-apply-main-idea/
http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/mini-course-apply-main-idea-2nd/
http://satcriticalreadingquickfix.com/mini-course-find-main-idea/
You should also check out my blog posts about the sentence completions:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/ (there’s a link to part 2 at the bottom of that one)
Here are the links to some posts about the essay:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/mastering-the-sat-essay-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/mastering-the-sat-essay-part-2/
Finally, if you do this test: http://sat.collegeboard.org/practice/sat-practice-test, you’ll be able to read sample essays, the scores they received, and an explanation of why they got those scores. This is extremely helpful for learning what the College Board expects on the essay.
Good luck. Please let me know how it goes, and feel free to ask further questions, etc.
hi jeff
first i want to thank u about your great efforts ,second ” time ” is my biggest proplem how can i finish answering long passage , short passage ,and sentence complation in 25 minutes and making sure that my answer is right . I can do any thing to get a high score , please i want your advice
thanks
Hi Rana,
You’re welcome. It means a lot to me.
I could give you more specific advice if I knew how it was going for you now. Here’s what you should do first:
Do a practice section and keep track of your time, but don’t try to finish in 25 minutes. Take whatever time you need to finish it. However, mark everything that you answer before the 25 minutes are up, and note how much time it takes you finish the whole section. Also, don’t spend too much time on any question the first time through. If a question is taking you longer than most of the others, and it’s harder than most of the others, skip it until you’ve had the chance to go through all of the questions. Then you can come back to the ones you skipped afterwards. When you do a section this way, you get a sense of what you could answer if you had enough time, how much of that you can currently get to in the time allowed, and what you can’t currently answer even if you had unlimited time. This is important because it makes no sense to speed up to have a chance to answer the ones you can’t answer anyway.
Here’s another way to think of it: If you can currently answer 18 questions correctly, then treat the CR section as though you have 25 minutes to answer 18 questions rather than 24. That gives you enough time to correctly answer the ones you are able to correctly answer, rather than rush through them and possibly get them wrong because you were rushing. And you leave the other 6 questions alone because you wouldn’t be able to answer them anyway even if you had more time.
The other thing that’s very important is to keep practicing the method I teach in this post. It’s faster to read for the main idea, and slower to try to understand all of the details.
Try these things and let me know how they work.
When I look at my work on CR section, I find that I spoil last few questions every time. I do not know why but I cannot find myself with ample time to do those last parts effectively. I find myself simply skimming the last paragraphs of the passages and then ticking some abrupt answer. Please help me out.
Hi Siddhant,
There’s a couple of things to look at. First of all, are you getting all of the other questions right before those last few? If you are, you might be doing pretty much what you should be doing. You don’t want to rush and then get questions wrong. Now, if you are getting some of the earlier questions wrong, then you want to develop a sense of when a question is harder for you than most, and when a question is taking more time than most. You want to be able to recognize those questions as quickly as possible and skip them, so that you get to the other questions that you might be able to answer correctly if you have the time.
The bigger picture thing to do is to keep the tip in this post; read for the main idea rather than the details. That’s how you can read faster while still taking in all of the important information that you have to get when you read.
And the last thing to keep in mind is that when you go through the answer choices, you want to cross out the choices that you’re pretty sure are wrong, and leave in the ones you ‘re not sure of. Don’t spend too much time deciding whether to cross out an answer choice. Just leave it in, and save your decision until you’ve looked at all of the choices. Then, from the choices that remain, you want to ask, “Which one is better?” There will always be a reason why one choice is better, or a reason that one choice is worse.
Try it and let me know how it goes.
Hi,
Is there an answer key for the Official SAT Practice Test for 2009 – 2010 which you used as an example for this lesson? I would like to complete it and see how many I get wrong.
Yes, the link is in the post.
Hi Jeff,
I would like to thank you for all the great efforts you are doing to help us as students. I am an international student, I have been off school since very long time. Lately I decided I wanted to pursue my education in the US ( I’m 28 now), so I passed the GED test about a month ago, I’ve been preparing for it about 2 months. Now I am taking the SAT on May 3, and I have been studying on the offical SAT book (the blue book). My goal is to get a 550 on each section. For the math and writing, I think I’m ok, but my biggest problem is with the CR passages and sentence completion. My vocab is very poor because English is my third language and I’ve never studied in english nor read books.
I am motivated, but what are your suggestions? how should I practice? and how do I have to approach the passages ( I am very bad at managing time)?
I still have 9 full lenght practice tests from the book to do untill May 3.
Your help would much appreciated.
Regards,
Yassir
PS: email: yassir_tennis@live.fr
Since English is your third language, there are probably words and phrases that you don’t know. That’s why It’s even more important for someone who’s not a native English speaker to approach the passages the way I describe in this post. Focus on the main idea of the passage and don’t worry about the details as you read, because most of what’s confusing to you will be the details. Also, look at the sentence completion posts on this blog for my best suggestions about how to handle that part of the Critical Reading section.
hi, I have one month for May exam . My first trial was in Dec 7 last year ,but i got 1130 which is worst score.however, I got it without practicing that much. I’m doing all my effort in this month to get high score . Do U have any advice to get higher in math, writing ,and reading in same month?? I have 12 hours free I can learn in these hours. please I want any help.
Thanks
Hi Virginia,
That’s not a lot of time to get a higher score in all three sections. You might do it, but I would suggest that you put in at least 8 hours each week, and aim for 50 or more points higher in each section. There’s a lot of good advice here on the blog, and here’s a link to my SAT Quick Fix Study Guide, which is specifically designed to help you raise your score in a short amount of time (although it works even better if you have more time).
Hi, I’m an international student. I have a huge problem with CR. I’ve improved math (450-620) and writing sections, but unfortunately I am not able to get higher score in CR than 450. Do you have any advice how to solve that problem?
Hi Evelina,
Great job on the Math sections. That’s pretty impressive. This post is my best advice in a nutshell. You might also check out the posts about sentence completions if you need help with them. As I’ve been saying to others, if you have more specific questions, I can be more helpful to you.
Hi, I am a Korean student who is in junior studying SAT. Sometimes I struggle to get the main idea of the passage because the passage switches in a strange way but I cannot find the connection. (I write a small note on each paragraph) Isn’t there any way to improve how to get the main idea? Or any tips to get main ideas better?
Hi Sheldy,
You might think of the main idea this way. When you’re done reading the passage, you want to be able to answer the question, “What’s this passage about,” in just a couple of sentences. If you send me a specific example, I’ll be happy to help you with it.
Hey! I’m applying for sat in two months; the main reason I hate my sat score is because of the critical reading section. I REALLY NEED YOUR HELP!
Hey Habiba,
If you ask me specific questions I’m happy to give you specific help. Let me know what you need help with and what form would be most helpful (meaning a video course, an ebook, just exchanging emails, a class, whatever). Until then, there’s plenty of stuff here on the blog that has helped a lot of students raise their score. This page is the most helpful one, and you should also look at this one about the sentence completions.
Hey, I am applying for the SAT exam in 2 months or so, and I need to succeed in order to be accepted in the university, please give me some tips or anything that can help me because I am new for this type of exams. Thank you
Hi Hasan,
This really is the most important critical reading tip. Read it over and practice until you understand it and can apply it yourself. Then write back to me again and let me know how it goes.
Jeff
Hi I’m taking the March SAT and I was wondering if there are any tips for reading the long passages faster?
Hi Divya,
Don’t get hung up in the details. Read with the intention of finding the main idea, which is the topic of the passage and the author’s opinion about the topic. Another way you can think about it is to answer the question, “What’s this passage about?” That’s faster than trying to understand all of the little details. Try that and let me know how it works.
Jeff
Hi Jeff,
Is it better to read the whole passage before answering the questions, or is it okay to read according to the questions?
Hi Ivy,
Most people should read the whole passage first. You can get a pretty good score reading according to the questions, but there are some questions that are much harder to answer if you do that. That’s why the only people who should read according to the questions are those who have a really hard time reading the passage without spacing out.
So i was scrolling down and reading the questions asked and your replies and they helped me, but i have one more question, im applying for the sat on dec 7, which is like after 6 days. I guess i’m well prepared but the thing is that i dont score as high in the critical reading as in math and writing, so do you have any advicesand extra tips? That was about the passage based questions, while for the sentence completions i memorized a lot of words using the cards and the sat book of “hot words for the sat” but on the exam, words still confuse me..
That was all i guess, thankyouu!
Hi Lara,
Have you read these posts about the sentence completions?
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part–2/?
Hi,
I just moved to U.S 1 year ago and I did my best to get a good SAT score so as to be able to join the good colleges. My C.reading score is 400 and I did everything and I can”t raise it up. My main problem I think is vocabs. although I did flash cards but when I read the words in the SAT I feel like I don’t get them .
is there is A WAY I could raise my score.
Hi Raymon,
You have to be able to learn, understand, and remember vocabulary, and you have to be able to understand what you’re reading to at least a moderate level. At a certain point there are no more shortcuts. Keep working at this and do your best. Then wherever you go to college, do your best there and follow wherever that path leads you. I have a lot of respect for you coming to a new country where the language is not your native language, and I wish you the best of luck with everything.
Hi,
I have my sat on 7th December, my current high score is 570 in CR , I want at least 720 but strangely in my last 2 attempts my score was lower. I checked that while doing normally my most answers were correct but while being timed , many were wrong. I just have 20 days and I want to raise my scores :/ What do I do?
Timing can make some people a little bit tense, which lowers our critical thinking and reasoning ability. I encountered the same thing when studying for the LSAT a few years back. This is what worked for me: I practiced just by casually noticing my start time and end time, but not really timing myself with a stopwatch or timer. I gained confidence that I always did well in the allotted time. Then I started timing myself. When I felt that nervous or tense feeling of, “Uh oh! I’m running out of time,” I reminded myself that it didn’t matter, that I always finished on time and did well, as long as I wasn’t being officially timed. That way, I got used to that nervous feeling and it no longer had such a big effect on me. The scientific term for that is progressive desensitization. Try it and let me know what you think. Good luck!
Hey Jeff! I’ve been facing this rather unusual problem-I manage answers on the CR quite well,I usually get a 720+ but it is never higher than 740-750. There are times when I get a few level 3 answers wrong-I don’t know why that is.Even level 5 sometimes feels relatively easy to me, and whenever I make a mistake it’s always level 3-maybe I can’t think like a normal person.My exam is on the 2nd of November. Could you please reply before that? Thank you.
Hi Rhea,
I can think of two possibilities. The most likely is that you sometimes overthink a question or second guess your gut answer. Keep in mind that you’re not looking for an answer that’s exactly right, like you are in math, because if these reading passage questions were fill in the blank, there would be many different ways to phrase a correct answer. What you want to think about is which answers are definitely wrong, and of the remaining answers (usually there are only 2 which are even possibilities), which one is better. Also keep in mind that your own interpretation of the passage should never come into play. If you find yourself thinking something like, “Well, I guess you could look at it this way, and then the answer would be…,” that’s a sign that you’re overthinking.
The other possibility is that there is a type of question that’s giving you trouble, regardless of it’s level of difficulty. If that’s the case, post again and I’ll try to help you with it.
Good luck!
i really liked all your tips, but my friend here who has taken the sat does not quite follow the same way as you have taught,he first underlines the sentences in the paragraph and then answers them without reading the entire passage,( he has a score of 650 on the CR section) but when i try the same i get only around a score of 550. i also have trouble with the really long passages and waste a lot of time on them (I have the sat on nov 2 2013)… so what do i do ?
The method I suggest in this post is the best method for the large majority of people. The method your friend uses helps some people, especially if they have a hard time paying attention through the entire passage. Try them both and see what works best for you. Good luck on Saturday!
thanks a lot
Hii, I’m taking the SAT exam next year January and I’m hoping for a score of 1800 above, I have issues with determining the meaning idea/mood of the passage.I’m good at the sentence completion and other sections but having to determine the thesis of the comprehension passage is just so confusing, it never correlates with the ones or answers of the author.
This video shows how to figure out the main idea of a reading passage in an SAT that was given a few years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=–q9HEJLPwc
These videos show you how to use the main idea to help answer almost all of the questions correctly.
Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPV1bIbUvsU
Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzKBE8_Wpes
I hope that helps. Let me know what you think.
One more thing, when you practice make sure you only use official College Board material, such as their Official SAT Study Guide. Other companies’ material can subtly throw you off track. You don’t have to get the main idea exactly right, in fact, there’s no such thing as exactly right since many people could state essentially the same main idea with different words.
Hey I have the sat coming up in December and my critical reading score are not improving. I got a 450 last year and I really need a 650+. I have a hard time understanding what the main idea or details of the passages are and I always feel rushed on time. How do you suggest that I approach the critical reading section? How should I prep for it without a tutor or a class? And approximately how many questions can I get right or wrong.
This video shows how to figure out the main idea of a reading passage in an SAT that was given a few years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=–q9HEJLPwc
These videos show you how to use the main idea to help answer almost all of the questions correctly.
Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPV1bIbUvsU
Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzKBE8_Wpes
Practice these concepts. When you get questions wrong, see if you can figure out why the correct answer is better than the one you chose. And always practice with official College Board material, like the Official SAT Study Guide.
Good luck!
To get a 650, you can get about 12 questions wrong, or leave about 14 or 15 blank.
As far as feeling rushed, you probably have an idea of which questions are harder for you and therefore taking longer. See if you’re getting those wrong more often than the others, too. If you are, you should skip them, so you make sure you have time to answer the questions you have a better chance on.
What I do is read a paragraph and answer the corresponding questions, then read another and then answer its questions, etc.
I’m currently getting low 700s in CR. What should I change about my reading?
Hi Shiri,
The method I recommend in this post is the thing you might change. I think you should practice with this method a few times and see if you’re comfortable with it. I don’t say you should definitely change methods because a CR score in the low 700s is pretty good.
Hello
I’m non native English speaker, i took SAT many times and last time I scored 490, I got 12 questions out of 19 right on sentence completion (always panic when i don’t understand the given sentence but know almost every meaning of the choices), and my next goal is 600+. Sometimes i don’t understand many sentences in the passage, especially a passage about literature and fiction-like and I also freak out about time limit. Any advice for me, which part should i spend more time to improve ,sentence completion or passage reading? And i also already spent a year on preparing for SAT.
Thank you
Getting 12 or 19 sentence completions right and a CR score of 490 indicates that you should probably focus on the passages. This post shows you the single most important thing that can make the biggest difference in your score. Practice finding and using the main idea as much as you can. As for freaking out about the time limit, you probably know which questions are harder for you and taking more time than usual. As you practice, you’ll probably also notice that those are the questions you get wrong more often. That means you should skip those questions and focus on answering the ones that are easier for you. That will help with the time issue.
My score in the Critical Reading section really reduces my SAT composite score. I find it hard to concentrate while I’m reading the long passages. My thoughts always stray. Any tips on how to improve my concentration and ow to tackle inference questions?
Hi Ifeanyi,
Improving your concentration just takes practice. You have more control over your thoughts than you think. As soon as you realize that you’ve started to think about something else, go back to the last place you remember and read from there. You can practice this whenever you’re reading, not just with the SAT. As for the inference questions, find what the author is directly stating and think about what that implies. The answer closes to that will be the correct answer. For example, if the passage says, “This was the first job that George liked,” one implication is that George didn’t like his previous job, and the correct answer might say, “George was never satisfied with his previous employment.” That’s really all that’s happening in the inference questions.
I hope that helps.
Hey . Good post though, but I would like to know how I can be able to read a whole long passage in such a small period of time. I mean, the time is very short and its quite uneasy to read the whole long boring essay and answer questions within a short time. Its my first time taking the SAT and I’m really nervous about it. Sometimes, the whole timing makes me rush through the whole critical reading section. Is there any way I can slow down and answer each questions within the given time without making any errors? Thanks
Hi Jeff. I just want to ask you about hesitating between to answer or not when I didn’t get whole passage or main idea of passage. I mean should I skip all questions related to this passage if understand only 20-30% of it.?
You have to trust your gut. If there are any questions you can answer with a reasonably educated guess, you should probably give it a shot. In general, if you can only understand 20-30% of a passage, your score will be pretty low no matter what you do.
Hi Jeff,
I am confused about 1 thing. If the question is a “line reference”, say line 24-29, then will its answer be within that interval? I know you’ll say that rule of thumb is to also read few preceding sentences and few latter sentences but I want to be sure. I practiced from Barrons book and one time there were two different contradictory ideas in 2 adjacent paragraphs. Line reference was from one paragraph, but the answer came from the other
That got me stumped.
Hi Nebico,
First of all, don’t study with Barron’s or any other third party book. You should only use official college board material. Sometimes those other companies’ books will do something like that, but the college board never does. When the college board writes a question with a line reference, the answer might not be within that interval, but if it’s not it’s always close.
Hi,
i have tried out your technique in answering the passage-based questions and i’ve improved but not the way i expected. I have my SAT exam in october and this section is really a hell to me! May u help me out?
If you want more help, you have to tell me more specifically what you’re having problems with.
Hi mr. Berman, I would just like to know what I can do to really fix my problem with paying attention to all of the little details and not getting into the general mean idea I can never really understand the main idea without reading every word completely. Do you know anytips that can help me to be able to understand just the essential part of the passage? Thanks.
Hi Adam,
Here’s how the main idea works: It’s what the author wants you to think about the topic. Everything in the passage is either some new information that adds to the point that the author is making, or details and examples that support that new point. So you have to read every word. It’s just that if you can’t understand a word, a sentence, or even part of a paragraph, you just ask yourself if it’s new information that adds to the author’s point or if it’s details and examples of something the author has already said. If it’s just details and examples and you can’t fully understand it, you just let it go and move on.
Hi Mr. Bergman,
Should I read the paragraph and answer the questions related to that specific paragraph, or I need to read the whole passage and answer the questions all together? The CR section has always been a big challenge for me, I always gets about 490-560 and that’s kinda bad.
Most people should read the whole passage first. The only exception is people who really can’t pay attention to the whole passage. If your mind keeps drifting off, answering each question as you get to it will help keep you focused. However, doing it that way will make some of the questions harder, so you only want to do that if you really, really have trouble focusing.
I am currently around a 700 critical reading level. For some reason I always miss 1 or 2 questions from stupid mistakes. How do I stop overthinking these problems?
That’s a great question, Rakesh. Remember that in the Critical Reading section, you’re looking for the best answer, not an exactly right answer. One of the answers is always better than the others for a specific reason, and the others are wrong for a specific reason. Now, are you talking about the sentence completions or the reading passages? If it’s the passages, when you’ve eliminated 3 answers and you’re choosing between the other 2, on most questions you should pick the answer choice that is closest to the main idea of the passage. If you’re talking about the sentence completions, I’ve written a couple of posts about them that are linked to in my responses to some of the other comments.
Good luck with your efforts!
Hi Jeff
my critical reading score is really low and pulling down my composite score. I scored 800 on my math and 540 on my writing (need to improve my essay too) and just 390 on my critical reading. My vocab is weak as well.
Any advice u would like to go me so that I can boost up my CR and Writing score to get a really high SAT composite score?
Thanks a lot
Hi Sahil,
My best advice for the Critical Writing section is in this post, and in my posts about the sentence completions, here and here.
I also have posts about the Essay here and here.
You also might want to check out my Study Guide.
Good luck with your efforts!
should i read all questions first then the passage or whats the best way to attack that?
Most people should read the passage first.
First I thank you for posting all these tips for us SAT takers.
I’m taking the SAT in a couple of days. I have found this website yesterday and i’ve been reading it when i have a free time to myself.
This is first time for me to take the SAT and i am very nervous and curious of how well i will do on this most important test in my life.
Do you think it is possible for me to improve at this short amount of time?
Is it better to skip questions that you are not sure of or give it a best guess?
And I am not born in U.S. This is the 5th year of me living in here. Thank you Mr. Bergman.
well, I have only 10 days before sitting for the SAT Exams.
How can I score above 1800 in the exams?
A study plan?
Can you please help me in the Critical Reading Section in order to score above 600 ?
My best Critical Reading section advice is in this post, and the posts about the Sentence Completions, here and here.
Shefali: hey. Do i need to know any details in particular? Like about the subject being discussed? Im really nervous about my SAT score. Im giving my SAT for the first time
Well, you have to know the subject being discussed. When you combine that with the author’s opinion you get the main idea of the passage.
hey do you have any tips for the writing section? because I consistently get 10’s on the essay but i get 3-4 wrong in the multiple choice so my score ends up being in the low 700’s. Do you know how i could make this a 800? I’ve taken a lot of practice tests and i always feel like i did well on the multiple choice but still get a few wrong.
Hi Emily,
Right now, the only place I have tutorials for the writing section is in my ebook, The SAT Quick Fix Study Guide. I hope to have that stuff up on the blog some time soon, but no promises. If you email me using the contact form, I’ll try to get it to you directly. In the meantime, see if you can tell what they’re testing for on those few questions you’re getting wrong. See if they’re the same sort of thing each time. If so, feel free to email me with specific examples. Good luck!
Hey mr. bergman i have a few questions, what should i do for the double reading passages, those kill me especially the questions that ask to compare the both passages based on the author, i try to read the whole thing, but the passages are too long, so i stop midway because i feel like ill run out of time, and also for the questions that give line references, i usually can eliminate a few choices and get downed to 2 but then i get stuck between those 2 and sometimes i get those wrong, can you help me for that type of situation? some people told me its good to read 5 lines before and 5 lines after the line reference given in the question, but i still mess up sometimes
Hey Nahian,
For the double passages, read the very beginning part in italics and the first passage first, and then answer only the questions that are about the first passage. Then read the second passage and answer the rest of the questions. When you get down to 2 possible answer choices, choose the one that fits in best with the main idea of the passage, or passages (except for those few questions that have nothing to do with the main idea – you’ll know which ones they are). Good luck!
Hi, i took the sat exam on January 26 2013 . Unfortunately, I got a really bad score on my critical reading, which was a 390. I need some tips how to tackle the sentence completion and the longer passages. Thank you!
Hey Ahmed,
Read the advice I gave to Harsha. It applies to you, too!
Hi, Jeff,
I am really frustrated in my critical reading score. i took the SAT in Dec. 1 and got a score of 390 I am retaking it in Mar. I strongly need help. My goal is to have a score of 600 or higher on the CR section. Is that possible? Please help me in some way to increase my score.
Thanks I really appreciate it.
Study what I’m teaching on this post. It’s helped a lot of people improve their critical reading score. Also read my posts on how to do the sentence completions. You can find them by typing “SAT Sentence Completion Tutorial” in the search box and hitting enter. Good luck!
Hey Jeff,
Thank you sooo much for this article. All I did was read all of the questions and answers on you blog, and went according to it. It worked big time! I took a 510 CR on the October SAT, and a staggering 690 on my December SAT (after reading your blog that is). Great work Jeff, and I heartily thank you!
Jeff, I’m an international student, so I have only faint ideas about many universities, so do you mind telling me if I have a chance getting into iowa state or texas tech with a 2070 SAT? (690 CR, 710 Math, 670 W) (and my major’s engineering). Thanks again
You’re welcome, Shashank! And thank you for your note. I’m glad it worked so well for you.
I wish I could answer your question about Iowa State and Texas Tech. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about them. My educated guess is that you have a pretty good chance. My best advice is to contact their admissions offices.
Hey, i am taking the SAT on 26 January and in the mock test i scored 540 in the CR section. I always find myself stuck between two choices both of which seem equally likely. Also i am unable to manage my time and in a rush i tend to answer incorrectly. Please help me out.
Hi Jayati,
If you can get it down to two choices, that’s good. There are almost always three choices which can’t possibly be right. So when you get down to two choices, you want to ask yourself which one is the better answer. Usually you can ask yourself which one is more in line with the main idea of the passage. This will work for about 80% of the questions, and it should be obvious which ones it won’t work for (ex. vocabulary in context, author’s tone, and a few other rare question types).
It’s also the case in almost all questions that of the two possible correct answers, one will have something specific about it that makes it wrong. For example, I remember a question that was asking about something in the passage that happened in the 1700’s, and the wrong answer said, “In ancient times…” It was wrong because the 1700’s is not considered ancient times.
Thank you so much:)
hey, i’ve been getting high 600’s on college board material (690 on the actual SAT i took) but now when i use the princeton review books i get a lot more wrong is it harder or something? Also, I know a lot of vocab already but still get about 3 wrong on the whole test, is there anything i can do to perfect it? And in the actual passages, i get about 4 wrong, what can i do to perfect this?
Hey Rachel,
First, don’t pay any attention to your score on the Princeton Review books. Some of the questions are harder, but mostly it’s that it’s extremely difficult to make up practice tests that are exactly like the regular tests, especially in Critical Reading. The same is true for all test prep company books.
If you’re getting only 3 sentence completions wrong on the test, you’re probably approaching them as well as they can be approached. That means that the only thing you can do is to keep studying vocabulary. If you decide to do that, be patient. At your level, it’s a lot of work for the return of getting another sentence or two correct.
On the passages themselves, there are a number of things you can look at. Are you getting the first couple of questions for a passage wrong more often than the later ones? If you are, make it a point to go back and look at them after you’ve answered all the others. By then you’ll understand the passage a little better than you did at first. Another thing to look at is whether there’s a particular type of question that you’re getting wrong. There are a few types of questions that are only asked a couple of times in the entire test, such as inference, function of a paragraph, author’s tone, and questions with EXCEPT in them. Try as best as you can to pinpoint which question types you get wrong, and why you got the question wrong. Then see if you can understand why the correct answer is correct. Good luck!
I once took my test and i really got low score on my critical reading. I am planing to retake it on Jan 26. Can anyone help me how to get 550 within this remaining time? My previous score was just 400. Please guys help me i am in big trouble.
There’s a lot of help on this site. It’s all the basic, most important stuff that most people need help with, and it will help you get the most improvement you can in the least amount of time, if you can understand it and most importantly practice it. You have to work at this, there’s no way around it. If you need support and motivation, you could try to find a class near you.
However, in the end there’s no substitute for the help that a skilled private tutor can give, because every student is different an no good teacher takes the same approach with every student. You need a lot of improvement fast, so you should seriously consider a tutor if you can.
Good luck, Kamal!
Hello, thanks for posting the tips!! But i have a few questions though
When i start by reading the hole passage i usually miss the last few questions and it wastes my time, and if the passage was difficult i space out so any ideas what should i do? As for the sentence completion i regularly start by answering them but i don’t score much on them.
Any tips on how to improve my score because its not improving ?
Thank you.
The first thing I’d suggest you do is answer only the sentence completions you can do pretty quickly. They’ll probably be the first 3 or 4 because those are usually easiest. Don’t spend too much time on questions you’ll probably get wrong anyway.
With the passages, you can’t just read the questions and answer them without reading the passage. What you can do is answer the questions in order of the lines they appear in the passage, and save the ones that don’t have line numbers until last. So if the first questions references lines 5 – 7, read everything through those lines and answer that question. Then if the next question is about lines 14-15, read through those lines and answer that one, etc.
Also, try reading a little faster than you think you should, and also make sure not to take too much time on any particular questions. You want to make sure that you use your time to answer as many questions that you think you can answer. If you run out of time, you want the questions you didn’t get to to be the ones you didn’t really know anyway.
Hello.
excuse me, i have a problem in the SC section. When i practice at home, i get a 650 and i consider it a good score, but in the real test. My highest score till now is 550. In the real test, i feal that it’s difficult to really understand the passages. Do u have a good process that i could follow to improve my score??
Thanx.
Hi Merna,
When you practice at home, are you using official College Board practice tests, such as the ones in their Official SAT Study Guide? If you’re practicing with anything else, you’re not really preparing yourself for what you’ll see on the SAT. That might account for the lower score when you take it for real.
If you are practicing with the right material, then when you take the SAT for real you might be experiencing some anxiety or feeling the pressure of the test, and that may account for the lower score.
I have a lot of info about improving your score here on my blog. If you want something more in depth, you should check out my SAT study guide, here: http://satquickfixstudyguide.com/sat-quick-fix-study-guide/
Good luck!
Hi,
Iam a 12 grader and I’ve been taking SAT since one year and a half . My best critical reading score was 410 which shocks me everytime i remember it although i scored high in math ( 700)>> (The running time is not a problem for me) ….I want a helpful method for solving sentence completion questions because when I depend on memorizing, i don’t see like except 5% only from the words I had memorized( which could me more than 500 words ). I always have mistakes in short passages and i got very lucky if one question in this part had been right ! In long passages, either i understand the passages correctly and i solve most of them right, either i got confused and everything becomes terrible ! so plz help me ….. If you also have some good ideas about the essay, I’ll be very thankful if you provided me with them .
Hi RHTE,
The sentence completions aren’t just about memorizing vocabulary, although that helps. It’s about making the most of the vocabulary that you know. I explain how to do it here:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-%E2%80%93-part-2/
Here are my posts about the essay:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/mastering-the-sat-essay-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/mastering-the-sat-essay-part-2/
Now, for the reading passages, my best answer is in this blog post. In short, make sure you don’t get bogged down in the details. You have to get the main idea, which is the point that the author is trying to convey. Then use the process of elimination when you answer the questions, and choose the best answer that remains. It’s as much about eliminating the wrong answers as it is about picking the best one.
Good luck! My guess is that you’re not a native English speaker. Do the best you can and honor yourself for your efforts.
Thank you for amazing tips. It really works. Now that I understand how to work with CR questions, one problem I still have is the vocab-in-context questions.. I just don’t seem to get those correct consistently, while others tell me those questions are actually the easiest questions in the CR section.. Is there any tip you have for vocab-in-context questions?
You’re welcome, John. I’m glad it helped. There’s 2 things to keep in mind with the vocab in context:
1) There’s usually an answer that’s a common use of the word that they’re asking about, and it’s almost always wrong.
2) If you’re not sure of the answer, read the sentence and replace the word they’re asking about with the different answer choices and seeing which one works best.
I hope it helps. Good luck!
hey Jeff thanks for all this advice I keep getting bogged down on these details that the passages give me but I have 2 questions to ask.
1) What if the passages were persuasive passages? Those kind of passages have no main idea whatsoever
2)I have 3 years until my senior year ( currently freshmen) when I am going to take the actual SAT in the fall. My highest CR score is an awful 450 I always feel miserable about it and I want to improve my CR to a 700 that’s roughly 100 points a year. If i start to follow your method do you think I’ll go into the high 600s at LEAST?
First of all, honor yourself for starting so early. That’s not a terrible score for a freshman. At this point, don’t worry about the score at all. Focus on the process of getting better at this, and also read a lot. Kids who read a lot almost always do well, and kids who don’t read much often struggle. That’s the most important thing.
Your first question is a good one. If it’s a persuasive passage, you want to focus on the point that the author is trying to convey. What does he want you to think when you’re done reading? Another question you might ask yourself is, What’s this about? Those are all different ways of thinking about the main idea.
For your second question, my answer is yes. Follow these methods, read a lot, study vocabulary if you need to, and work on the sentence completions. My posts about them are here:
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-part-1/
http://www.satsuccesssecrets.com/sat-sentence-completion-tutorial-%E2%80%93-part-2/
Good luck! Keep me posted about how it’s going.
sir
i am taking the sat on oct 6 . i am getting a score of about 580 . i am very desperate to score anything above 600 . please help .
p.s i got all sc and short passages questions correct .
The good news is that if you get all of the sentence completions and the short passage questions right, you only need to get a little over half of the long passage questions right to break a 600. Since you got all of those questions right, you obviously read well enough to hit that goal.
Your trouble with the long passages probably is due to one or more of these 3 things:
1) You’re overthinking the questions. That means you’re probably looking for an answer that you consider exactly right, when you should be looking for the best answer among the 5 choices you have. Use the process of elimination to cross off answers that are clearly wrong (and there are always at least 2 answers that can’t possibly be right) and then ask yourself which of the remaining answers is best.
2) You’re getting bogged down in trying to understand and remember all of the details in the passage. Just read for the main idea; you want to finish the passage and be able to give a 3 sentence summary. That’s it. Don’t worry about understanding or remembering any details unless a question specifically asks about them. At that point, go back and re-read those lines again.
3) You’re having difficulty paying attention while reading the entire passage. For some kids, that’s the honest truth. If that’s your trouble, try answering the questions as you go along. For example, if a question directs you back to lines 10-12, read the passage through those lines and answer that question. If the next question asks about line 23, then continue reading through that line and answer that question, and so on. Skip the questions that don’t have line numbers and do them at the end. Since you’re not trying to get a score in the 700’s, that method might work for you.
Good luck on Saturday!
i am also preparing for October 6, 2012 sat but i really have a big problem with the critical reading passages. i find difficulty in understanding all passages in the sat. please help me out. i am really desperate and i feel like i’m losing. i really want to get into the university this spring. please help me make a good score on my sat.
Here are a couple of tips that might help.
1) You don’t need to understand everything in the passage. If a word or a sentence is giving you trouble, skim through it. They’re not going to ask about every line, so only worry about it if a question refers to it.
2) You need to know the main idea, or the point that the author is trying to get across. But you don’t need to know it exactly. Often, if you have an educated guess, some of the questions and answers will help you get a better idea.
3) Some questions are easier than others. Try to answer the questions that are easiest for you first. Often, they’ll give you some understanding that will help on the other questions.
4) Don’t worry about answering every question correctly. Your goal is to answer as many questions correctly as you can in the time you’re given. Sometimes, the harder questions frustrate us and that frustration makes us lose focus, and then the easier questions become harder. Don’t let a couple of hard questions ruin your score. Just skip them and move on.
5) Last, if you’re having trouble because you’re running out of time, or because it’s difficult for you to pay attention through the whole passage and remember the beginning by the time you finish, you might try to answer the questions that have line numbers first. For example, say there’s a question that asks about lines 5 – 7. You could read until you finish the sentence that those lines are in, then answer that question. Then read through the lines that the next question asks about, and so on. Save the questions that don’t have line numbers until the end, because by that time you’ll have read the whole thing. If you’re shooting for a score in the high 600’s or 700’s, that method probably won’t allow you to reach it, but those students who would be happy to break 600 sometimes do better this way.
I hope that helps!
hi,
i will be appearing for the SAT on october 6th… i am really good in the math section and i think i have improved on the CR but i have realised that when i get stuck on a question i read it over and over and end up even more confused. Also is it wise to skip questions or take a shot??
Those are great questions, Ketaki. In fact, they’re the key to your doing well on Critical Reading. The most important thing is to not get stuck. Don’t get bogged down! That will kill you.
First I’ll address how to handle the questions for the reading passages, because that’s what I assume you’re asking about. When you don’t get a question, skip it fast. Answer the other questions for the passage; often that will give you a better idea about the one’s you had to skip. Also, don’t get stuck on any of the answer choices. In Critical Reading, there’s no exactly right answer. You’re trying to pick the best answer from the choices they give you. That’s why the process of elimination is so important. Go through the choices and do a quick “yes, no, maybe.” Cross out the answers that you know are wrong. If you’re not sure, it’s a maybe. Don’t think about it. Then, if you’ve crossed out at least 2 answers, make an educated guess from the choices you have left. If you can’t cross out at least 2, skip the question.
Now, if you have the same questions about the sentence completions, know that they work the same way I just described, except that each question stands on it’s own, so if you skip it, leave it be, unless you have time left at the end of the section. Also, if you’re having trouble with the last sentence completion in a section, know that it’s usually hard and weird. If you’re pressed for time, skip it fast and don’t think about it. Unless you’re going for a 720 or greater, that is.
Hi Mr. Bergman,
I’d first like to say thank you for providing us with these tips and for answering all our questions. When I work on the Critical Reading Sections, I always find myself running out of time. When I approach each passage, I always read the blurb, then go paragraph by paragraph trying to understand all of the details. But what I was doing was wrong, right? I should simply read the whole passage and get a main idea of the entire passage. Should I annotate the passage in a paragraph by paragraph or something else?
Also, when I think/write down the main idea of the passage how long should it be? And what should the main idea contain exactly? I agree that understanding the main idea and what the author thinks is extremely important, but can you give us more tips on what the main idea should contain EXACTLY? Thank you!
You’re welcome. And those are great questions, David. Don’t annotate. If it’s a long double passage, you might want to write a phrase to remind yourself of the main idea of passage 1. You want to be able to think of the main idea in about 2 or 3 sentences. Here are some examples for some of the reading passages in the College Board’s Official SAT Study Guide:
The city is an ecosystem, just like a forest is. Like a forest, a city is natural in it’s own way, and good. Those who call cities unnatural, and therefore bad, are wrong.
Before the Civil War, Frederick Douglas, and abolitionist, worked with women’s right’s leaders to advance the rights of both women and slaves. While Douglas and the women leaders sometimes disagreed, they learned from each other and resolved their differences much of the time.
The young woman’s uncle wants her to marry the rich suitor, but the woman doesn’t want to marry him. She thinks the suitor is a disgusting oaf. The uncle doesn’t care and wants to bully her into marrying him, but he can’t.
In each case, the main idea and opinion are stated simply, and will help answer many of the questions that follow.
My SAT prep tutor taught me to read about half way through a passage and then answer the corresponding questions, assuming the passage is roughly a column length or more. This works for me sometimes, but I really like your idea. It makes sense to understand the main idea of the topic and play off that to answer the question. Which do you feel is the better method? Also, is there anyway to incorporate both methods?
Hi Danny,
That approach works sometimes, and I recommend it to kids who have trouble remembering what they read, and kids who space out while they read the passage and waste a lot of valuable time. What you lose that way, though, is the context and the main idea. It’s hard to answer all the questions right that way. So ultimately, answering the questions as you go along won’t work if you’re shooting for a top score. There’s really no way to use both methods in the same passage. If a passage was really boring for you and you’re not shooting to break a 720 or so in CR, you might decide to switch to the answer as you go method for that passage.
Hi,
I’ve been doing the sat practise and have found out that am better with the passage reading section than the sentence completion one.Is it best to start with the passage reading section or the sentence-completion section?
I was also wondering if you could tutor me in the writing section because I am practising and have nobody to tell me if am doing anything wrong.
Hi Rose,
If you’re better at the passages then the sentence completions and you have trouble finishing the Critical Reading section, then it’s a good idea to start with the passages. If you usually get the first few sentences completions correct, do them first, then skip the rest of the sentences and go to the passages.
If you decide to use this method, be careful when you’re filling in your answer sheet!
My parents spent over $1200 on SAT prep and i took the SAT in June 2nd and ended up with an overall score of 1550. I think i had a 520 in the reading section. When i was at my prep i was doing soo well and they predicted a score in the high 600s. I dont know what went wrong. I may have panicked and abandoned all my knowledge on the CR section. Anyways, I want to take the test again in October. Im shooting for anything higher than a 1700. Id like a 650 in the critical reading. Do you think this is a possible goal? If so How should i go about it and what would help/ what should i focus on?
Hi Tobi,
That’s a great question. If you were scoring in the high 600’s in practice, know that you can do it on the test as well. Here’s an analogy. Do you watch football? If you do, have you noticed that the really good quarterbacks run the 2 minute offense like they had all the time in the world? They might feel the adrenaline in their bodies that’s telling them to rush, but they’ve trained themselves to ignore it. That’s how you want to take the SAT.
I know that this is easier said than done. Get the Official SAT Study Guide, by the College Board. If you’ve already done all of those tests, get their online course (if you do this, make sure to print out the tests, rather than doing them on the computer). First do a reading section untimed, and just note how long it took you. Then practice again timed. You’ll feel the adrenaline and you’ll feel the urge to rush. Practice not rushing. Do it over and over until the fact that you’re being timed is meaningless to you.
Other than that, here are some additional tips:
The most important thing to know about the Critical Reading is that there is not an exactly correct answer. If the questions were fill in the blank, you, I, and 10 other people could all write a different, yet correct, answer. That’s why you’re looking for the best answer out of the choices you’re given. Sometimes you’ll know right away. That’s great, just pick that one. Other times you won’t be sure. In that case, you should cross out the answers that cannot be correct. There’s always 2 of those, and usually 3. Then, from the remaining answers, ask yourself which one is better. Pick that one.
Here’s another thing to keep in mind. It’s really easy to over think the reading questions and make it a lot harder for yourself than it needs to be. Don’t do this. If you’re not sure whether an answer choice is correct don’t spend too much time deciding whether it could be correct from one perspective of another, just leave it in and look at the other choices. When you’re down to 2 or 3 choices, just ask which one is better and go with your gut.
And last, if you’re having trouble with the sentence completions, get the Barron’s SAT vocabulary flashcards and learn 25 new words each week. Also review my tutorials on the blog about the sentence completions to learn how to maximize the vocabulary that you know.
If you have more questions, feel free to write to me directly using the contact form.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes.
Hi, I’ll be appearing for the SAT exam in December. Which means I have over five months to go. I just took a diagnostic test and got a 630. I want to aim for a perfect score. Which books do you suggest I should read?
I just can’t “learn” vocabulary unless I read it somewhere :/
Do you mean a 630 in Critical Reading? That’s great, gadgetprincess. If you want to learn vocabulary, any book that has words you don’t already know will do. You just have to look them up when you see them. If you want to get better at the reading passages, read books that are challenging for you, and make about 3/4 of them non-fiction and 1/4 fiction, since that’s the approximate balance on the SAT.
If you want tutorials specifically geared to the SAT, you could check out my ebook at http://www.SATQuickFixStudyGuide.com. It’s geared towards students that don’t have a lot of time to prepare, but it’s even more helpful if you don’t have to rush through it.
I hope that helps!
What is the best way to practice for this?
Is vocabulary something to worry about?
Use the tutorials here about how to do the sentence completions and the reading passages. Then practice on your own, or consider a class or a tutor.
Each question is worth about 10 points. So whether you have to work on vocabulary depends on what your score is now and what your goal is when you take the SAT.
In general, if you get a good set of vocabulary flash cards and learn 25 words each week for 3 months, you’ll do significantly better on the Reading portion of the test.
Do you really have to read the entire passage?Isn’t the sentence written in Italics beyond the passage throws light on the main idea of the passage? I will be writing in two days time and considering your explicit strategy will have my ultimate option.You are experienced,so i trust you completely.My highest score is 430.
You have to read it. There is only 2 exception, and that’s if you can’t read the whole passage without spacing out, meaning you can’t pay attention through the entire passage, or if you read really, really slow. Then you might try answering the questions that refer you to specific line numbers first. For example, if a question refers you to line 9, read up through that sentence and answer that question. The next question might ask about the second paragraph, so then you’d read that paragraph and answer that question, and so on. You’d save the questions that don’t have line numbers, and ask about the passage as a whole, for last.
Be aware, though, that this strategy is not as good for the overwhelming number of people taking the test.
Got an exam upcoming, pretty much screwed, unless I apply all of these concepts into my method, urm, could you recommend more stuff?
If you want my top 10 tips for raising your score in the least amount of time, you can download them for free here.
I find that skimming the passage helps a lot and has greatly improved my score from a 500 to the high 600s. I want to score a 700+ on my actual SAT.
I keep practicing but it seems I just have to miss at least 4 passage-based questions on each CR section.
Can you give me a handle on this?
Hi Festus,
If you’re not doing this already, try this method. Remember that you’re not looking for an exactly right answer, you’re looking for the best answer. First use the process of elimination to eliminate the answers that are clearly wrong. There will always be at least 2 clearly wrong answers, and usually 3. Then ask yourself, of the remaining answers, which one is better? If you’re not sure, ask yourself, which answer is more in keeping with the main idea of the passage. That will be the right answer in most cases, unless the question asks you what a word means, or what the author’s tone is, or a couple of other rare cases. Then just pick it, don’t over think, and then move on. If you can’t decide, go with your gut, your first instinct. Let me know if it helps!
Sir
What can be a time saving tactic in critical reading?
When you read the passage, read for the main idea and don’t worry about the details. If you can’t understand something, skim by it. That’s because not all of the details will be asked about, so if you spend time struggling through a sentence or a paragraph and there aren’t any questions about it, you’ve wasted valuable time. Whenever a question asks about a detail, it will direct you back to the line numbers in the passage and you’ll look at that part again. However, you can’t quickly find the main idea if you didn’t get that when you read the passage.
Here’s one more thing. Use the process of elimination to eliminate the answers that are clearly wrong. Then ask yourself, of the remaining answers, which one is better? Pick it, don’t over think, and then move on.
I hope that helps!
What can happen if I answered very few questions in each section that I know I have right and leave the rest blank???
That’s a great question, Marquis. The answer is different for the Critical Reading and Writing sections than it is for Math.
In the English sections, you want to make educated guesses. There are no “exactly right” answers in Critical Reading and Writing. You’re looking for the best answer. You might not know which answer is best, but you might know that a couple of the answers are wrong. If you can cross out 3 answers you should definitely guess; if you can cross out 2 answers you should probably guess. After you’ve crossed out the ones you know are wrong, decide which one that’s left is better.
Now in the Math section, don’t guess. The right answer is exactly right, and you can figure it out by solving the problem. If you can’t do that, don’t guess.
I hope that helps. Let me know how it works for you!
Thank you very much for these tips. I will surely consider them tomorrow, God-willing. I have a question regarding one of your valuable tips, do I have to ready the “entire passage” before answers? I think that would be very time-consuming. Instead, I usually read what is required in the questions first, and then I go back to the passage. My highest is 530 though, but I will do my best to have a 700 because I am a critical reader, naturally! ^^
You do have to read the whole passage. It’s the only way to really get the main idea of the passage, which is the most important thing. Don’t worry about the details, you’ll find them when you answer the questions. Good luck!