Don't Get Overwhelmed

Students are overwhelmed when they think of school work in its entirety. For example, if you were assigned a 20 page research paper,the enormity of the project would freak you out. "How will I find the time to write 20 pages?" you will ask while getting all anxious and annoyed. The Key? Baby steps! Set out with a small but achievable goal--say to yourself, "I will write one paragraph per day" Soon you will find that your creative mind will show you that it's no problem to write a page or two a day, and before a weeks time your task is done!

Are Your Priorities Straight?

Many students fail to see the big picture. They claim they have "no time" for SAT prep. Amazingly, they have time for practice, games, rehearsal, recitals, shows, driver's ed, the mall, the movies and hanging out. How is this possible? Priorities! If there is time for play, there certainly is time for work. Allocate some of that play time for study time. If you do it early on the weekends when everyone is asleep, you won't be borrowing from time with your friends. Every Saturday and Sunday morning wake up early and prep for an hour. Start ten weeks prior to test day. That's a full 20 hours of prep in addition to any private tutoring or prep class. Everyone can do that math!

How To Avoid Being Fooled

The SAT is a tricky test because of its tricky answers. The answers are designed to lead the student astray with half truths and misleading detail. The best way to avoid falling into these traps is to avoid looking at the answers. Answer as many questions as possible without looking at the answer choices. After enough practice any student can answer 80% of the questions on his or her own.

Answer the questions, do not guess which answer is correct and your score will greatly improve!

Ways to Remember New Words

Play rhyme games in order to remember the meaning of new words. For example, one of my students was curious about the word "eke" which was the word of the day last week from dictionary.com. The standard dictionary definition of eke is to obtain with difficulty. But this is a tough concept to grasp just from a definition. So why not be creative and invent a sentence which will help such as, I eke by when I squeak by. When your sentence is short, original and to the point, you will always remember new words.