I’m always stunned by the lack of clarity that people have about what test prep is and what test prep isn’t. Many people seem to believe that test preparation involves sprinkling pixie dust on a test-taker and waiting for the score to soar to new heights. Think about how often you’ve heard of “tricks” to “beat the test.” Now don’t get me wrong, I know it’s largely the test preparation industry that sold the nation this bill of goods (thanks Joe Bloggs), but the impact of this thinking is being compounded by the current atmosphere in education of over-testing, misuse of testing, and over-reliance on test results. This post will clarify “once and for all” what test prep is and what it isn’t. I hope after this post that I’ll never again hear the phrase “just a few tricks” combined with “get me a great score.”

“I just need a few tricks to boost my score.”

What test are we talking about?

First, let’s clarify what we’re talking about when I say test. I mean standardized admissions tests. These tests are very different from tests in class by the teacher and even from standardized statewide tests (which are generally “achievement” tests). Admissions tests are most often the target of those who hope for Tinkerbell’s Pixie Dust cures or the magical elixir of score improvements.

Admissions tests of this type (and there are a lot of them: SSAT, ISEE, TASC, COOP, SHSAT, SAT, PSAT, PLAN, ACT, GRE, GMAT, LSAT, and even the MCAT) are in a category by themselves with a unique purpose and thus specific predilections and foibles. Admissions tests are not primarily designed to show what you learned. Instead, they are designed to (help?) predict how well you’ll do in some future educational space (the SAT, for example, is supposed to predict FIRST YEAR COLLEGE performance). This means they are by nature going to be different than the test given in school. This also raises questions about exactly what these tests show (they do show and predict something), and how reliable that information is, but that’s a different post.

What is test preparation? 

So now that we know a bit about what we are dealing with, we have to learn how to deal with it. Test preparation is the act of preparing for a test. That’s it. Shocking, I know. Most people would give you that answer and, unfortunately not much more. Or you may get the ubiquitous answer that test prep is “learning the tricks of the test.” However, those answers, while correct, are too vague, overvalued, and generally unhelpful (except for marketing a test prep business, in which case they are awesome!). So let me break it down for you, with specificity, nuance, and accuracy.

Test preparation is (in no particular order):

1. Gaining familiarity with the directions, structure, question types, and timing of the test in order to build comfort and relieve anxiety on test day.
2. Learning to use the specific patterns and tendencies of the test in order to answer questions more quickly.
3. Reviewing the content that will be tested on the specific exam, in the way and to the extent it will be tested.
4. Developing content knowledge to ensure that the test-taker knows all of the information tested and the exceptions to and nuances of rules that usually lead to mistakes.
5. Learning how the specific test will present the information it tests, from wording of the question to level of subtlety to number of steps necessary to solve a problem.
6. Learning personal habits and tendencies so you can control, mitigate, and prevent unnecessary mistakes during a test.

How much of the above list do you ever hear about? How many of those items do you hear in the news? In the marketing materials of test prep companies? Probably not much. It’s just not sexy to say, “our test prep strategy is to teach you stuff you should have learned in ways you didn’t learn it.” But that’s often what test prep is. It’s teaching. It’s teaching rules, formulas, and facts that the test-taker should have already been exposed to and then teach them the way it will be tested that they have probably not learned, and if you’ve never learned those things than it’s teaching you the things you didn’t learn. It’s most certainly not “teaching a few tricks,” or if it is than those few tricks will probably give you just a few points. Doubt me? Then give the following SAT-ish question a try:

Many cultures seek to —- morals to their young by using apologues and parables .

 

(A) vitiate

(B) defenestrate

(C) inculcate

(D) dupe

(E) cully

When you consider why you might not have gotten the correct answer (which is the third letter of the alphabet), do you think it was due to some trick? Due to timing? Is it the multiple choice nature? Probably not. If you knew the meaning of all those words you’d probably get it right. Now clearly there are things you can do to improve your guess, but it would still be a guess. “Tricks” will often only allow you to make a better than 1 in 5 guess and for most people a 1 in 4 or 1 in 3 guess isn’t going to improve their score much (especially on a test like the SAT that specifically has a “guessing equalizer” built into the scoring).

The key to test preparation is figuring out what skills or knowledge the test-taker lacks and developing those skills, not measured against what you believe a student should be (so let’s not argue whether you think these tests should exist or are valued), but rather measured against a specific test and it’s limited knowledge base. The key to many of these tests is preparing, and preparing properly.

In parting I’ll leave you with this analogy.

Think of standardized tests as a round of competition on Dancing with the Stars. We’ve been dancing all our lives and some of us do it better than others. Most people will go on to live highly productive lives without learning to properly do an Argentine Tango, but if you want to go on Dancing with the Stars, you better learn to tango. And if you want to learn to tango so that the judges will call it a tango and give you high points for the tango, you better get a coach to prepare you. Not a person who’ll teach you what they think the tango is or what your parents have said the tango is, but for what the judges say the tango is. If you aren’t able to learn the tango it doesn’t make you a worse person or maybe not even a bad dancer, but it will probably keep you off of Dancing with the Stars.

Good luck and good prepping!

ACT is to SAT as Wedges is to Fries

In our continuing ACT vs SAT series (if you’ve not been following you might want to click this link and check out the others), we break down the difference in pacing on the two tests. We’ll help you make sense of pacing and timing on the SAT versus the ACT. You’ve probably already read or heard that the ACT is a faster test than the SAT, and we’re here to give that a little more context and help you figure out what that means to you.

Timing

When people say “The ACT is a faster test” what they really mean is that the ACT overall allots less time per question.  This means that it generally feels more like you are rushing headlong down a hill while taking the test. Let’s check that out a bit more numerically. Below is a breakdown of the time per question for each section. We’ve lumped all multiple choice questions for the SAT together in one block to make the comparison easier. Here’s what it looks like:

As you can see, the SAT gives quite a bit more time per question than the ACT does. This is probably even more drastic than it appears in Reading because on the SAT there are Sentence Completion questions (which take very little time) and Short Passages to go with the Long Reading passages, while on the ACT there are only long passages for all questions. In the Writing section, it’s a similar situation. ACT English questions generally have more words to read than do SAT Writing questions. If you’re a student who tends to work slowly but accurately, the SAT would probably be a better test for you. If you’re a quick confident student, then you should definitely give the ACT strong consideration.

Endurance

Another factor that will impact your SAT vs ACT test-taking experience is the endurance factor. The ACT has fewer sections, but each one is longer than any individual SAT section. If you have trouble concentrating for extended periods of time, you might prefer the SAT since its sections are a maximum of 25 minutes. Also, if you prefer variety, the SAT is probably for you, since it alternates back and forth between topics and you are not likely to be required to sit for an hour looking at the same kinds of questions.

ACT Structure

The ACT is a very rigid and predictable test. Its sections will always be in the same order.

SAT Structure

SAT sections are not only shorter than the ACT, but they are also in a less consistent order. In each grey area they will switch the order from one test to the next. So while on the example below the first section is math, this will not always be the case. For example, Section 2 could be a 35 question Writing section. The only predictable things about SAT section order is that the Essay will be first and the 10-minute Writing section will be last.

A student who is more comfortable with a predictable test would probably prefer the ACT. You should also see that the ACT will require you to focus more on the same topic for longer and thus might be harder to concentrate on.

Hopefully this helps you make this important choice. If you have questions, we’d love to hear from you, so just send an email to support at bellcurves.com and we’ll get right back to you. You can also click here and sign up for one of our free workshops and learn more about preparing for the ACT and SAT.

Some of the more difficult Sentence Correction questions for test-takers are those that have a lot words in the underlined portion, which can create confusion and indecisiveness. The difficulty can be compounded when the underlined portion doesn’t seem to have any obvious errors but nevertheless “sounds” bad. SC questions that have these characteristics can, however, be better managed with the right approach. Let’s take a look at an example and then outline how to tackle it:

Recent evidence has suggested that when communicating, people who have been deaf from birth and have consequently never heard anyone speak nevertheless utilize vocal cord muscles just as regularly and in the same manner as non-deaf individuals do, and that they will use vocal cord muscles even when communicating with another deaf person.

(A) have consequently never heard anyone speak nevertheless utilize vocal cord muscles just as regularly and in the same manner as non-deaf individuals do, and that

(B) have consequently never heard anyone speak but nevertheless utilize vocal cord muscles just as regularly and in the same manner that non-deaf individuals do, and

(C) have consequently never heard anyone speak, that they nevertheless utilize vocal cord muscles just as regularly and in the same manner as non-deaf individuals do, and

(D) consequently they never heard anyone speak, but nevertheless they utilize vocal cord muscles just as regularly and in the same manner that non-deaf individuals do, and that

(E) consequently they never heard anyone speak nevertheless utilize vocal cord muscles just as regularly and in the same manner that non-deaf individuals do, and

Now, you may be looking at this question and thinking, “this is easy” or that you see the correct answer. If so, kudos! Not every question is difficult for everyone, but for many people this question would present a challenge for a few reasons:

• Lots of words/long underlined portion
• The relatively uncommon “nevertheless”
• The awkward construction of “never…nevertheless” and “just as regularly and in the same manner as…”
• The actual content/subject matter of the sentence

For these reasons, and perhaps others, test-takers might read this three or four times to wrap their head around it. One thing that happens in questions like this is that with so much going on its hard to figure out where to start. Usually, when tackling SC you want to identify an error in the underlined portion, make a determination on what’s wrong, and then get to POE lickety-split (yes, I just used the word lickety-split). If you’re looking and looking and feeling overwhelmed to the point of inaction, here are some strategies to get moving:

1. Narrow your focus – instead of looking at the underlined portion in total, look for discrete recognizable error types among its parts. In the above example. looking at specific pieces reveals “do, and that” near the end, which is indicative of a list. Also, “just as…” should be a dead giveaway for a comparison. Both lists and comparisons are parallelism error types very common on the GMAT.
2. Look beyond just the underlined portion – if you focus too closely on the underlined portion, you may have missed that it actually starts with the second half of a list (“people who have been deaf from birth AND have consequently…”)
3. Don’t see anything wrong? Don’t despair – remember that about 1/5 of all SC questions are right as written. Your goal is to always use your knowledge to eliminate answer choices; whether one of those choices happen to be (A) is irrelevant.
4. Still stuck? Compare the answer choices. When you compare them either start with an obvious difference that you’re sure of (like in the example, where A, B, and C start with “have consequently” and D and E start with “consequently”) or just compare the choices 2 at a time and identify differences you can address with certainty.

So, back to our example. For our purposes here, we’re going assume that we’re still stuck on the long and confusing underlined portion, and tackle this example with strategy 4) from above. Let’s compare the answer choices a pair at a time.

Compare A to B

Differences: “nevertheless” vs “but nevertheless”; “just as…as” vs “just as…that”; “and that” vs “and”

Problems: “but nevertheless” is redundant; “just as…that” is not the correct construction for the comparison; “and” does not provide a parallel construction to end the list.

Winner: A

Compare A to C

Differences: “nevertheless” vs “, that they nevertheless”; “and that” vs “and”

Problems: The construction “, that they nevertheless” makes the sentence and meaning less clear.

Winner: A

Compare A to D

Differences: “have consequently” vs “consequently they”; “nevertheless” vs “but nevertheless they”; “just as…as” vs “just as…that”

Problems: “consequently they” creates a parallelism issue for the list; “but nevertheless they” also creates a parallelism issue and is redundant;

Winner: A

Compare A to E

Differences: “have consequently” vs “consequently they”; “just as…as” vs “just as…that”; “and that” vs “and”

Problems: take your pick.

Winner: A

As you can see, the focused pair-by-pair comparison gives us a way to more easily identify and deal with differences. If you focus on using what you know is wrong to eliminate choices you can feel good about choosing A, even though it probably “sounded” a bit weird at the beginning (and was confusing to boot). A few more important strategy points to take a away from this question:

Don’t Force It - often people find a difference and force themselves to make a choice based on it. Why? In each of these instances, there were multiple differences between the pairs of answer choices. Any one of them could be used to make the decision. If you can’t explain or don’t understand a particular difference, use another one.

Sometimes Grammar, Sometimes Not - Don’t feel like you always need to have clearly articulated grammar explanations for choosing one over the other. GMAT sentence correction is NOT a grammar test. Yes, it uses grammar as the framework, but it’s not a grammar test. Grammar is expansive, fickle, and rife with exceptions to rules. Very few people know enough about grammar to make all their decisions based on that. When you’ve gotten rid of all the answer choices you can based on rules you’re sure of, don’t try to talk your way into a making up rules for things you don’t know the grammar on. Instead, use meaning and clarity to make your choice.

Meaning – the correct answer should offer the most logical meaning. The most basic example of this rule is modifiers, which are not grammatically wrong but are logically unsound. If you can’t tell which choice is most logical than go with the one that’s closest to the original in meaning.

Clarity – the correct answer is the one that most clearly and logically expresses the thoughts of the author.

Very often at the end of SC POE, the “soft skills” (clarity and meaning) are far more effective than trying to engineer a grammatical reason for choosing one choice over the other. From our question above, a good example presents in nearly every comparison between two choices. There was a place where the differences could be explained by grammar, or you could look closely and see that, you know what, one of these choices does what its supposed to do more clearly than the other. For example, in comparing A to C, maybe you could provide a grammar reason for why “nevertheless” is better than “, that they nevertheless.” If not, ask yourself which one says what the sentence intends most clearly. The answer? A.

Again, use the rules where and when you can, but if you don’t know rules for the difference you’re looking at, give meaning and clarity a shot.

We hope that helps you over the hump on your SC.

Best of Luck,

-The BC team

If you need more advanced insights on SC, consider joining one of our classes or enlisting the help of one of our excellent tutors. They can show you all these and much, much more.

Darth SAT vs Darth ACT

In our continuing quest to put to rest the fruitless debate between the two college entry behemoths, we give you the definitive answer to which test you should take.

After all talk is over and after all the pros and cons have been listed, the one and only difference you need to worry about is which test you do better on!

No matter what the group statistics imply, no matter what your friends have done, no matter who was admitted with which scores last year, all that matters is which test provides you the best opportunity to demonstrate to colleges your ability to do well at their school.

How to find out which you’ll do better on

The best way to figure out which test you’ll do better on is to take a full length official practice test of each. I know it sucks and is a lot of work but there is no better way to find out how you’ll perform. The good news is that you can do it for free. The College Board posts a PDF of a practice test you can download here and ACT puts a free one in the registration booklet which can be downloaded here. You can also get a free registration booklet in the college office of most high schools.

If you really can’t bring yourself to take a full test and you’ve taken the PSAT, you can just take the ACT and compare your ACT score to your PSAT score (or do the same with the PLAN and the SAT). But remember that the PSAT and the PLAN are not exactly the same as their “older brother” tests, which makes the comparison a little more dubious.

Also remember to try to simulate the testing environment as much as possible or even go somewhere and have the test proctored if you can (if you’re in NYC you can arrange to come to our office).
 
How to compare the ACT and SAT

Comparing the tests should be a pretty simple process. All you need has already been provided for you in this post. Let’s just put the steps together:

1. Wake up early one weekend morning (hopefully in the summer before your junior year) and take that full length ACT you downloaded. Write down your scores. (You should go back to bed at that point).

2. Wake up early a week or two later and take your full length downloaded SAT. Now you know how you did on each test and all that remains to do is compare them.

3. To compare the tests, just click here to view the “concordance” chart developed by the makers of the test themselves.

When you compare the scores, look at them in terms of the test you know best. Since we’re based in NYC, we’ll look at SAT numbers. My ACT score is 1030 and my SAT score is 950. This tells me that if I do no additional preparation, I can “expect” to do 80 points better on the ACT and that the ACT is clearly the “better” test for me.

Decision made! Prep for and take the ACT.
 
Other factors to think about

Since its not always that cut and dry, we do have to point out a few things to consider:

1. If your scores are less than 50 points apart on the two tests, you don’t really have a performance difference. You should just take the test you like better and feel more comfortable with.

2. If you have no access to prep. Some areas still only have prep for one of the two tests available (or available in your budget). It’s usually better to go with the test you can get help prepping for, unless you have more than 200 points difference between your two scores. If we assume that you’ll get about 50 – 100 points out of a typical SAT prep class (or 120 – 180 from one of ours), then if your initial SAT score is 100 points lower than your initial ACT score, I’d still plan to take the SAT (along with the prep).

3.  If you have to take a particular test anyway, then just prep for and take that test. Some school districts give one of the tests to all high school juniors and seniors free of charge and during the school day. If your school district does this, it will be more convenient to just take the test the school gives.

4. Finally, if you are applying to schools that require SAT Subject Tests, you might be better off taking the ACT. Some of those schools waive the subject tests requirements if you take the ACT.

Good luck!

Questions that involve the summation formula, whether on their own or one component of a more complicated problem, often trip test-takers up for the simplest of reasons: figuring out “how many items” are in the set can sometimes prove tricky. One way to avoid the headache of trying to remember the rule for each different kind of limitation (consecutive even/odd/other, inclusive vs. exclusive, whether the set starts/ends with an even/odd), is to simply employ a strategy that will quickly and consistently allow you to determine the number of items in the set: patterns.

Before we delve into how, let’s review the summation formula and when it’s used. The summation formula:

 ∑ = (# of Numbers in the Set)(Largest Number + Smallest Number)/2

 The formula is used to quickly calculate the sum of a relatively large set of consecutive integers. It is important to note that the formula only works for consecutive numbers, and that you need to be able to determine the total number of numbers for which you’ll be finding the sum.

That calculation, the number of numbers in the set, is usually the trickiest part. I’ve seen students try to memorize a specific rule for each different kind of permutation that can arise. There’s a better, more consistent way:

1. Use a much smaller, though representative set.
2. Count the number of items that would be included based on the parameters of the problem.
3. Create a simple formula or equation using the first and last numbers in your small set (usually some combination of subtraction, division, and addition/subtraction) that can be applied to the larger set.
4. Apply to larger set.

Let’s use an example to see how it would work:

If p is the sum of all the even integers between 91 and 499, what is p?

To solve this question using the summation formula we would need to know how many even integers there are between 91 and 499.

To determine this we’ll figure out a quick, easy formula using a smaller representative set.

1. The parameters in the question are two odd numbers. So, let’s say 1 to 9.
2. We need all the even numbers, which would be 2, 4, 6, and 8. So 4 numbers in total.
3. Using the end numbers 1 and 9 we could take the difference and divide by two to get the number of numbers in the set. 9 – 1 = 8  8/2 = 4.
4. Doing the same with the original end numbers we get 499 – 91 = 408  408/2 = 204. Thus, our original set has 204 numbers in it. We can now use this in the summation formula to determine the sum.

This method is effective for any situation whereby you need to find the number of numbers in a consecutive set of numbers. For example, in a problem that requires you to find the probability of selecting a number from a set of consecutive numbers:

Raffle tickets numbered consecutively from 60 to 405 have been put into a bin for a raffle. What is the probability that the number of the ticket selected will be divisible by two?

In order to find probability, we need the number of items that satisfy the condition (divisible by 2; i.e. even), and the total number of items. To find the number of evens, you could count them (Not!) or you could use the strategy we used above (Ding-ding-ding!).

Patterns are one of the keys to GMAT success. Developing efficient, applicable methods to expedite calculations or avoid tedious memorization also help to sharpen your higher order thinking skills, the hallmark of a high scorer.

Best of luck!

If you think your higher order thinking skills could use a boost, consider signing up for a course or tutoring with us. Our materials and instruction not only teach you the rules you need to know but help you recognize when and how to use them!

Not too long ago the College Board hired David Coleman as the new president and his first few months can be summarized by the Wu Tang Clan  – “Kaboom, guess who stepped in the room!” In just a few short months, Coleman has kicked up enough dust to make notoriety seekers like  Lady Gaga and Madonna proud by speaking of the failures of the College Board and its programs (notably the SAT and AP).

“I have a problem with the SAT writing” – David Coleman, president of the College Board

After critical and somewhat cryptic public statements in the fall,  Coleman sent a letter to College Board members (which includes colleges, high schools, and other educational organizations) in February of this year declaring:

 ”We will develop an assessment that mirrors the work that students will do in college so that they will practice the work they need to do to complete college. An improved SAT will strongly focus on the core knowledge and skills that evidence shows are most important to prepare students for the rigors of college and career.
- David Coleman

Read more

With this one small statement he sent college counselors, parents, and the media into a proverbial tizzy. Media outlets rushed to interview everyone from students to admissions officers to get their take on the “changes to the SAT,” and this has in turn increased the hoopla surrounding what should have been a mildly interesting warning. Well, lucky for you, you have me as the voice of reason to help you cut through the hype with a few facts.  I want you all to calm down about the “changes,” and here are the reasons why:

Changes take years

Changes to major admissions tests generally take years from announcement to implementation. Not only did Coleman mention talking to various interested parties around the country before making specific recommendations which will take time, historically no change to a major admission test has been quick. The grid below shows the time between the first found news announcement of specific changes and the first administration of the test which reflects those changes:

No specific changes have been announced

If the first reason isn’t enough, we should keep in mind that no actual changes have been announced to the SAT. Coleman has merely stated his opinion that the SAT is in need of changes, which include alignment with the Common Core Standards. An assessment will need to be done about the current test structure and possible areas of change, and those suggestions will need to make their way through the psychometricians (folks whose job is to design tests), lawyers, and policy makers before new specifications can be delivered to item (question) writers.

What should you do?

Given these major considerations, now is not the time for high school students to even begin thinking about changes to the SAT. If you are a parent or a high school counselor, the best thing you can do is make sure your students who are in 10th grade or lower are focused on building a strong academic and social profile based on their skills, interests and talents. Leave the speculating and worrying about what the next SAT will look like to the test prep people, who will be blogging and tweeting as soon as we know anything.

Good luck and good studying!

With a growing number of schools accepting the GRE for the MBA, we constantly get questions about which test people should take, so here are a few considerations to help students answer that question of GMAT or GRE:

1. The Advantage of History. The GMAT is the gold standard for the MBA application. Institutions have no questions about what GMAT scores mean and how to compare them retrospectively to students in their programs both current and past. Only recently (the last half-decade) has the number of schools accepting the GRE increased significantly. Advantage: GMAT.

2. The Advantage of Information. When looking at admission statistics for MBA programs it’s easy to find averages, ranges, and median scores of admitted students who submitted GMAT scores. For the GRE it’s much more difficult to find statistics on admitted students. Schools are starting to share this data, but many schools, particularly some tops ones like Harvard and Berkeley, don’t release any info, even the percentage of GRE applicants. Part of the reason for this is that many schools just recently started accepting their first groups of students with GRE scores. In the fall a Cornell admissions officer told us they just took their first group of 10 students with GRE scores. Since the numbers are so small it’s going to be a while before statistically significant numbers accumulate and data are widely released/available. Interestingly, comparing the GMAT and GRE scores from admitted candidates at schools that do release GRE info reveals that many of them accept generally lower GRE scores than GMAT scores. Interpreting this as an advantage or disadvantage is difficult (in part because there’s still so little data), but this Poets and Quants article does a good job of providing some information and context on the matter. The key factor, however, that scoring and admissions data on the GMAT is widely available, sways this consideration one way. Advantage: GMAT.

3. The Advantage to the Test Taker. The GMAT and the GRE test the same math concepts, but the GRE is less complex and requires less mental gymnastics to get to most answers. The GRE has a ton of vocabulary (think SAT verbal on steroids) and more dense reading. They are both computer adaptive, though in different ways (section adaptive vs question adaptive). So depending on your preferences one test might feel better or allow a student to perform better. The GRE generally has harder verbal because its tougher to improve vocabulary in a short span, and the GMAT generally has harder math. Advantage: Push.

From these three criteria, the answer for the overwhelming majority of folks should be pretty clear. Certainly there are other factors that would sway someone one way or another, but if you’re pursuing an MBA, particularly one at top-tier schools or lower tier schools (many of which don’t yet take the GRE), the choice is obvious.

Regardless of which test you choose, know that you can – and should – prepare for it. Scores can be improved with dedicated instruction and practice.

Best of Luck!

In recent years, students have increasingly faced the challenge of deciding which college admission tests to take. They are receiving conflicting, vague, or incorrect advice from counselors, parents, blogs, internet experts, admission officers, concerned citizens, and busybodies of all varieties. Instead of solving the problem and making the decision easier, this information overload can often increase the confusion. To help you make a decision (and hopefully not just add to the noise), we’ve started this “ACT vs. SAT” series, which will provide specific points points of comparison and clear (hopefully) unbiased information that will help you create your ACT vs. SAT scorecard. To kick things off, we’ll dispel a few of the most egregious myths we’ve heard in the ACT/SAT discussion.

5 Common Misconceptions

1. The ACT is easier.

Not true. Which test is easier depends on your personal strengths and weaknesses. It’s much like the difference between baseball and softball, where some will find one game easier than the other. In theory softball is easier that baseball, but not in practice and not for everyone. Also, if the ACT actually is easier for one student, it’s probably easier for everyone. Thus your percentile rankings, compared to other test-takers, would still be roughly the same. It’s like asking whether to have a race on a straight or curvy racetrack. For most runners the race track won’t make a difference since everyone will be on the same track. You can also think of it as the difference between plain and peanut M&Ms. There seems to be a big difference, but health-wise they are almost the exact same thing.

2. The ACT Math tests harder topics.

Sort of true. The SAT and ACT are both primarily Algebra and Geometry tests, though the ACT includes some Trigonometry. The SAT does not contain any Trig, however the ACT only has 4 Trig questions out of the 60 math questions. So for everyone but the test-takers who are striving for a perfect score, those 4 questions are not going to make any real difference in the final score. If you skipped all 4 Trig questions (though we should all know that you should never leave a question blank on the ACT) you could still get a 34 on the ACT.

3. You should take both tests.

No. The shotgun approach to testing is inefficient and often ineffective. A student should only take a test when they have prepared for it. If you just take the ACT, without preparation, because you didn’t like your SAT score, odds are you won’t score in a higher percentile than you did on the SAT. The best approach is for students to take a practice test of each early (like summer before 11th grade or in the fall of 11th grade) and then decide which test is better suited to their skills and then prepare fully for that test.

4. Colleges prefer the SAT (or ACT).

Nope. At our last check all US colleges don’t care which test gets submitted, so students should take the test that suits them best and submit that test.

5. The ACT is better for African-Americans, women, first generation college students, low income, or any subgroup you choose to name.

Unproven. We have yet to find any research to support that the ACT favors one particular subgroup that the SAT disadvantages. Overall, groups perform about the same on each test. Individuals might have a preference or a performance advantage on one versus the other, but there have been no large group preferences found yet.

Hopefully this helps dispel some of the myths. To truly determine which test is better for you, take a practice test of each and then compare them using a concordance chart.

Good luck with your studies. If you want to learn more about the SAT or ACT join us for a free session by clicking here.

It has always been a love hate relationship with the GMATPrep software.  Every version of it has had some major flaw, but at the same time you have to love the thing because it houses the only official GMAT CATs available.  In any event, each revision of the software has come with incremental improvements (happily 2.1 brought GMATPrep to Apple computers! woot!), and the new GMATPrep 2.2 continues the slow crawl forward.

Installation was a snap.  I downloaded it, double clicked the install package, agreed to the terms and conditions, and entered my log-in information and within minutes I was exploring the new GMATPrep software.  I have had many install and functionality issues with the last version so this smooth sailing was a nice surprise.

What’s new?  There have been some solid organizational improvements in Question Pack 1, as well as a very critical functionality upgrade. While most of the changes affected the general practice component of the software, the most important change occurred on the practice test side of GMATPrep. When GMATPrep v2.0 came out, I was astounded that you could no longer review questions from the full-length practice tests after you exited the program. Thankfully, they’ve changed that. You can now review questions whenever you feel like it.

Yes! Review test questions after you exit!

While that’s the only significant change to the practice tests, more changes happened on the practice content. In the old software the reading comprehension practice was a mess.  The software would give one question from one passage and then move on to another passage.  A frustrating flaw which made the reading comprehension practice almost unusable.  Well, I can happily report that this issue has been addressed.  The software now groups passages and questions properly if you select all of the difficulty levels.  Of course, if you only select easy (or medium or hard) the software will skip around as it omits the other difficulty levels.  Even if you choose random, the reading comprehension question will stay grouped.  Thank you, GMAC.

Speaking of difficulty, in the new version you can select not only the level of difficulty of the question type in Question Pack 1 but how many questions you would like at each level of difficulty.  That could be somewhat helpful if you want to build a practice set that might resemble a real exam.  After you finish a practice set you can access the same statistics (right/wrong, time spent per question) but the new software has a dropdown menu that allows you to access statistics from your old sessions.  It is a nice little touch.

Create sets by Question Type, Difficulty, and Number

Perhaps the most striking feature of the new software is (drum roll):  you can exit a completed CAT exam and the software will save your results for later review.  If you are unimpressed by that I completely understand.  It is like a baby’s first steps:  not impressive in the grand scheme of things, but pretty awesome to go from crawling to walking.  Thank you lords of GMAT for answering our prayers.

Guess what? You can Now Review your CAT Exams After Exiting Program!

The last major change:  the new software has a store where you can purchase official GMAT study products.  Woohoo!!  I wish that they had taken the time, effort, and cash used to develop this store into developing an app for the iPad or for android so that we can have our GMATprep on the go.  Also, would it be so difficult to allow us access to the question banks?  And would we be asking too much for that access to allow grouping of questions by not only question type but by content type?  Let us be thankful that the software has been updated and improved.  We are better off today than we were yesterday and that’s not too shabby.

Pimp your GMATPrep!

A few notes on how to use GMATPrep for maximum effectiveness:

1.  Do not leave practice tests just for the end of your preparation.  Use them throughout your practice so that you can gauge where you are and what you need to work on.  You can take them 3-4 times and have somewhat valid scores (especially if you are improving and therefore seeing more difficult questions)

2.  As you take practice tests go ahead and take a screenshot of any question that you are struggling with (and take screenshots of anything wrong once you see your results).  This only takes a second.  Yes, the program saves your tests results but it is easier to have a folder with these screenshots.  And you can put them in a dropbox folder so that you have them with you on the go for review.  You can apply this same method to the question pack (or any other software based resource).

3.  Once you have exhausted the GMATPrep keep taking it just so that you can see all of the hard questions.  Again, you guessed it, take screenshots of these toughies so that you can review them.

As always, stay positive, stay organized, and keep your goals in site.  Good luck with your studies!

Often, confusion exists about the uses and benefits of practice tests, and the role of practice tests in preparing for the GMAT. Let’s try and offer some clarity to the situation:

Practice Tests

Practice tests are evaluative tools and should be used as such. They are NOT learning tools. You use tests to assess what you have learned and your ability to apply that learning under conditions as similar to the real exam as you can make them. As such you should only be taking practice tests at most once per week (unless you are not working), and should seek to simulate the conditions of the actual test as much as possible when doing so (especially in the last few weeks before the real exam). In the larger preparation picture, you should take a practice test at the very beginning of your preparations to establish a baseline and determine your areas of strength and weakness. After that, it would be advisable to hold off on doing another practice test until you’ve had a chance to do some content review and focused, small-scale practice. Once you’ve gotten a sizable chunk of material and practice behind you, you should start incorporating full-length practice tests into your preparation regiment.

Key points for simulating practice tests:

• Do the practice test at the same time of day as your official test is scheduled for.
• Simulate the erasable notepad or use 10 sheets of yellow grid paper fastened at the top.
• Use tests that are as similar in look and feel to the actual exam as possible, which means use GMATPREP.
• Accurately simulate conditions: the room should be quiet but not silent (libraries are probably better than your house).
• Accurately simulate test rules: no snacks or drinks during the test, take exactly 8 minutes between sections (remember the GMAT just went to 8-minute breaks), complete the essays, and do each section straight through without pause.

Review your practice tests in detail

The only way to improve your next performance is to spend significant time reviewing your last performance. You must analyze what you did well and what you did poorly. More importantly, you must develop a plan to correct and prevent what you did poorly. Because you must give yourself enough time to review the test and potentially find your teacher to answer questions you don’t understand, taking a test in the last week before your exam is not a good idea (it often does not allow enough time to act on any problems or issues you find).

Your review should include two essential components:

1) Holistic Concerns – these speak mostly to how well you implemented your pacing strategy (assuming you had one in mind; if you don’t you need to develop one). Every test taker will be approaching and working through the test in a slightly different way. While we all have to answer the questions in the order they come, knowing where you’re at in the test, and how much time you should be spending on questions in those respective areas is an imperative. You should know approximately how many questions you usually answer (i.e. need to answer) and roughly where in your test your pace should be faster or slower. Reviewing and implementing your approach will allow it to eventually become second nature, so you won’t have to think about it anymore.

2) Localized concerns — these speak primarily to individual questions or types of questions. However, localized concerns pertain both to how well you accomplished the question and the time needed to do so. When you review you should go over every question that you didn’t get right and any that you had to guess on (whether you guessed correctly or not). Understanding these questions are the key to improvement. You’re also looking to review questions that took you an inordinate amount of time to do. If you generally average or are shooting for 2-3 minutes per question and you have several on a test that took you 4+ minutes, you need to find out why, and find a strategy to expedite solving similar questions the next time around.

The bottom line with practice tests is that you’re trying to further your own understanding of how you react in a testing situation. This means both locally and holistically, and usually involves identifying testing patterns you exhibit. Without review a practice test is almost worthless.

GMAT Prep

GMATPrep is the practice test software published by GMAC, the people who produce the GMAT. GMATPrep is the best possible diagnostic tool available to you. It utilizes almost the identical scoring algorithm as the real test, and uses questions produced by the same people as those for the real test, so it contains the most consistently reliable practice tests. The only problem? There’s only two of them. That’s right, only two. What does this mean? A couple things…

1) Use them wisely – while you can retake the two tests in the software, the question pool is limited, which means you’ll almost always see many questions you’ve seen before if you use it more than twice. You’ll want to use them at the times when you most need to know precisely how you’re doing (or how you would do) on the GMAT.

2) Save one – Generally, you’ll want to save one of the GMATPrep tests for nearer to the end of your preparation period. You’ll want to take it after you’ve done the overwhelming majority of your preparation, but while you still have time to review it thoroughly, get your questions answered, learn from it, and practice further what you learned.

3) Take it again…with a grain of salt – if you repeat either of the tests from GMATPrep, know that your scores may be inflated since you would have seen some of the questions before. However, it can still be an effective tool in that case because you’ll still see some questions you hadn’t seen before, and you can focus on your pacing and question management through the test.

The bottom line is that effective use of practice tests will help you get the most out of your preparation efforts. Don’t unduly focus your efforts on practice tests, but rather use them as part of a comprehensive approach to improving your GMAT score.