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On Taking the SAT

 

I've spent several weeks practicing and thinking about the Scholastic Aptitude Test. It's not what you remember. The analogies are gone. The quantitative comparisons are gone.

The SAT has many, many pages of sentence-correction work. The math section will likely ask you about the polynomial remainder theorem. For reading comprehension, you might encounter Saki or Virginia Woolf or FDR. (And the writing will be really excellent!)

I think the SAT is generally very well-produced; I think the Kaplan fake versions of the SAT are less impressive. (One recent Kaplan faux-test sentence-fixing section asked the students to choose between "making saccharine commercially" and "producing saccharine commercially." I'd argue that either choice is fine--and, even if you believe there is a real distinction here, I'd challenge you to claim that the distinction is worthy of an SAT question. This makes my head spin.)

I think the SAT is a source of terror for some people, and I think it's popular to say, "I'm awful at that stuff." But I think the test can be sort of fun--and you can approach it as you would any skill (dance practice, clarinet lessons). You don't focus on the score. You imagine you're writing for Richard Yates, for a master class, and you address each question with respect and care.

This is a big part of what is getting me through Covid. For now, that's all I have to say about the SAT.
 
P.S. Some of the good advice Kaplan has: Relax the night before. Pack your bag the night before. Wake up after a full night's sleep and have a full breakfast. Exercise for ten minutes. All of this is sensible. And skip around within a section. All questions have the same weight. Math question #17 will actually be easier than math #14, in the no-calculator section.....This is my life....
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