How to Study for the SAT: Everything You Need to Make A Plan
- Here are our six steps to making an SATⓇ study plan. Step 1 - take a full-length practice test to identify what you want to work on.
- Set aside time to study - and stick to it everyday.
- Incorporate timing practice into your study plan as well.
- Set specific and achievable goals. The more specific you can get, the better.
- Consider a tutor if you have trouble focusing, aren't sure what to work on, or want outside accountability.
- Use the summer - or the time you're spending inside during stay-at-home orders - wisely. By putting together a study plan now, you're investing your time and will see it pay off in the future!
- Get more SATⓇ exam tips on our blog.
How to Study for the SATⓇ Exam: Everything You Need to Make A Plan
When you’re starting to think about applying to college, studying for standardized tests can seem like a huge, intimidating part of the process. Many students just end up taking the test blind and going with that score, because they have no idea how to study for the SATⓇ or where to start. But never fear! Making a study plan for the SATⓇ exam is much easier than it seems, if you’re ready to commit to increasing your score and getting the best possible result you can. Here are our six steps to crafting an SATⓇ study plan.
Step 1: Take a full-length practice test and identify what you need to work on!
This may sound obvious, but many people don't realize that it’s pointless to study if you don’t know what you need to study. The first step in starting your SAT Ⓡ prep, therefore, is to identify exactly which parts of the test are your best opportunities for growth.
Think of questions as falling into one of three categories: easy, challenging, or too difficult. Categorize each question by answering these questions:
Which questions can you nail without much effort?
Which can you understand part of, but you’re not sure how to finish?
Which have you simply not learned how to do in class, and would have to put tons of time into fully understanding?
The middle type - questions in your challenge range - are what you want to focus on. These offer the best opportunity to pick up points on the test with the least effort.
So the first step in studying is to take a full-length practice test, grade it, and sort questions as easy, challenging, or difficult. Then, look through your challenge questions and try to identify the concepts you struggle with but can improve on.
This looks different for each section. Here are some examples of challenge concepts to get you started.
Reading: is there a type of passage you struggle with, but can get some of the questions right? Is there a specific type of question that takes you a long time, but you can do it?
Writing: are you challenged by particular grammar concepts, like when to use a semicolon?
Math: what concepts have you learned in school, but haven’t perfected yet?
Once you’ve identified these challenge concepts, you can drill those types of questions and pick up lots of easy points!
Step 2: Block off time to study!
If you don’t plan a specific time in your schedule to study, you’ll never do it. If you can set aside 30 minutes a day, or an hour every other day, you’ll be able to put hours and hours into studying for the SATⓇ exam - without getting overwhelmed.Here is an example schedule:
Monday: 30 minutes of Reading practice passages
Tuesday: 30 minutes of checking answers from the previous day
Wednesday: 30 minutes of Writing practice problems
Thursday: 30 minutes of checking answers from the previous day
Friday: 30 minutes of Math practice problems
Saturday: full practice test
Sunday: check your practice test
You’ll see that in this sample schedule, we set aside significant time for checking your answers, not just doing practice problems. When we talk about checking your answers, we don't mean simply looking at the correct answers and seeing how many you got right. Instead, go through every question you got wrong, re-do it, and write out why you got it wrong. Was it a careless error? Do you need to brush up on quadratic equations? From there, categorize each question as easy, challenging, or too difficult.
It’s extremely important that you’re continuously checking your knowledge - the only way you will improve is by figuring out what went wrong and how to fix it the next time.
Step 3: Work timing into your study plan!
Go slow to learn and gradually give yourself less and less time. Work on recognizing when you need to speed up and when you’re going a little too fast. This will help you prepare for the timing of the test. Identify different goals for different days, and make sure that you’re leaving enough time to hit each of these three approaches:
Go slow to learn
When you are studying, you have the luxury of time to go slowly and thoughtfully. At Socratic Summer Academy, we frequently employ a method known as do/check/do/check, in which you do a problem and then check it right away - so that your learning becomes exponential, as you accumulate takeaways from each problem, rather than waiting till the end and getting one big takeaway.
That is the right way to study when you are going slow - identify specific concept areas on which to work, and immediately figure out the mistakes you’re making and why you’re making them.
Identify inflection points within the problem to help speed up
As you study more, you should eventually be able to identify how many seconds you should spend on each portion of the question, and at what point you need to move to a different question.
Slowly increase your speed as you practice - if you start by giving yourself 120 seconds per problem and you want to work yourself down to 60 seconds, move from 120 to 110 to 100 to 90, etc.
Go at a speed that’s a little faster than you should
If you practice so that you’re going a little faster than you really need to, when nerves kick in, you’ll be able to lose a little bit of time and be okay. And wouldn’t it be nice to be able to relax for five minutes at the end of a section while everyone else is rushing to get through it?
Step 4: Set specific goals!
It’s extremely overwhelming to just say “I want to get a 680” or “I want the best score possible.” Instead, set highly specific goals for yourself that you can achieve in a week.
It’s much easier to stay motivated when you have clear, achievable goals - and successfully meeting several smaller goals will add up to more of an improvement in the long run!
Here are some example goals:
Reading:
Don’t pick an answer until you’ve found the evidence in the passage
Spend less than 3 minutes skimming the passage so I can get to the questions faster
Bubble in an answer for every question, even if I’m guessing
Writing:
Memorize the rules for using commas
Math:
Avoid careless errors by paying attention to negatives
Get all the geometry problems correct
Box what the question is asking for so I don’t get tricked by the answer choices
Step 5: Consider a tutor!
While you can make great progress studying by yourself, there are lots of experts out there who have spent hours and even years working to understand the SATⓇ exam. It’s a long, complicated test, and tutors who have spent years learning the test will have strategies, tricks, and insights they can share with you that would be difficult to come up with on your own.
Another great reason to think about a tutor is if you’re having trouble focusing. Sticking to your study plan can be difficult if you don’t have anyone holding you accountable. A tutor can be a great way to stay accountable, and they will also cheer you on and help you celebrate your successes. Studying for the SATⓇ exam can make you feel alone, but working with a tutor will help you feel more control over the test.
Even a few hours with a tutor can set you on the right track in your studying. Socratic Summer Academy offers individual tutoring, in-person or virtually. Our tutors can work with students leading up to a test with a very targeted approach, work more broadly on all sections over a longer period of time, or help to diagnose what a student needs to work on and develop a plan of action immediately after a student has taken a test.
Step 6: Use the summer - or time spent social distancing - wisely!
It’s hard to fit SATⓇ studying into the school year when you have homework, extracurriculars, and other tests to worry about. The best opportunity you have to really dig into the SATⓇ exam and get the best score possible for you is therefore during the summer, when you don’t have as many other responsibilities. Learn how best to prep for college during the summer.
Attend the Socratic Summer Academy and you’ll get three weeks of uninterrupted focus and over a hundred hours toward improving your score, not to mention a caring staff and group of students who are equally motivated to succeed.
While you can make great progress studying by yourself, there are lots of experts out there who have spent hours and even years working to understand the SATⓇ exam. It’s a long, complicated test, and tutors who have spent years learning the test will have strategies, tricks, and insights they can share with you that would be difficult to come up with on your own.
Another great reason to think about a tutor is if you’re having trouble focusing. Sticking to your study plan can be difficult if you don’t have anyone holding you accountable. A tutor can be a great way to stay accountable, and they will also cheer you on and help you celebrate your successes. Studying for the SATⓇ exam can make you feel alone, but working with a tutor will help you feel more control over the test.
