SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips

In every section on the ACT, there are some questions that are more difficult than the others. Science is no different. However, unlike the math section, where the questions progress from easy to hard in a linear fashion, each of the 7 passages tends to have 1-2 hard questions that can appear at any point in the passage (though they tend to be the last questions of the passage).

These problems may seem challenging at first glance, but they're really just slightly more challenging than the others if you use the right ACT Science strategies and tips that we'll be covering in this guide. 

Reading graphs is like reading in a foreign language. It comes easy to some and is very difficult for others. If you struggle to understand graph, tables, and other visuals for ACT Science questions, this article containing tips, strategies, and practice questions is perfect for you.

If you're a “fluent” pro, this article will be a good review to make sure your skills are on point. Even if you are a pro, the ACT Science section often tests the basic skill of reading visuals in new and challenging ways, so this article will make sure you have strategies for both easy and hard questions.

Not sure whether it’s a good idea to register for the next SAT or ACT test date? You should consider how many times you've taken the test before, how busy your schedule is right now, and how much you've prepared for the test before making a decision. We'll explain why.

Here are a few questions you need to ask yourself before signing up for the next date.

What can you do if you took the SAT already but you decide you want to cancel your test scores?

First, stop and take a step back. Ask yourself if you’re sure. Once you cancel your test scores, there's no going back.

Second, figure out - can you still cancel your scores? CollegeBoard has a very strict deadline about this and if you miss that deadline, then they won't budge.

So what can you do? Well, I'm here to help you 1) assess whether you should cancel; 2) know what steps you need to take to cancel; and 3) know what to do if you miss the deadline to cancel, but still need to deal with a poor score.

If you’re a sophomore or junior in high school, it's about time to start exercising your standardized testing muscles. This is especially true if you're hoping to get into very selective colleges or improve significantly from your PSAT scores.

Read on for advice on how to create an effective study plan for the SAT or ACT starting in sophomore and junior year.

You don't want to walk in the morning of the ACT only to find you have to take the test on a super-tiny desk.

If you're preparing for the ACT, you've probably spent a lot of time studying and getting ready for the test. But you probably haven't given that much thought to the physical location of your test (especially if you're taking it as a part of your state’s mandatory testing).

However, the place you take the ACT could definitely affect your performance. Read our guide to choosing the best possible ACT test location so you can knock it out of the park.

While you're doing a lot to prepare for the SAT, you probably haven't given that much thought to the physical location of your test. However, that location could definitely affect your performance.

Think about it – have you ever had to take a test in a cramped classroom or in room without air conditioning? It probably didn’t exactly help your performance. So why would you take the SAT in sub-optimal conditions?

Read our guide to choosing the best possible test location so you can do as well as possible.

Image via College Board.

The SAT was revamped in March 2016 in an effort to make it more modern and accessible. If you’re a current high school student, you’ve probably heard about this change.

If you’re a current senior (Class of 2017) or junior (Class of 2018) this raises some questions. What if you took the SAT before it changed last spring? Will colleges still accept scores from the "old" SAT? Or will they require you to take the new SAT? This has big implications for how you prep, when you take the tests, and possibly even whether you should switch to the ACT.

In this exclusive, first of its kind breakdown, we personally spoke to admissions counselors from dozens of colleges to get some real answers on how they will handle the transition. 

Are you an 8th grader curious about the SAT and ACT? You might be surprised that you already have a lot of the skills you'll need to do well on these tests, and you're capable of picking up many more.

Whether you're prepping to get a headstart for high school or taking the SAT/ACT to qualify for talent competitions, read on for some compelling reasons why you would benefit from prepping in 8th grade. First, why would you take these tests in the first place?

Subject-Verb Agreement may be the most tested grammatical rule on the SAT. Therefore, just by mastering this rule and its applications, you will be well on your way toward achieving a ridiculously good score on the SAT Reading and Writing.

While the rule itself is relatively simple, the questions related to it can be challenging and a bit tricky. In this article, we’ll teach you how to become a master of all things subject-verb agreement on the SAT.

The ACT Science section is basically the white and gold dress of the ACT. It's blue and black or white and gold. It's either really hard or really easy, depending on the viewer. In this article, I'm going to help you find a strategy that makes the ACT Science really easy always.

As I mentioned in a previous article, the ACT Science section is more reading than science. Therefore, to do well on the ACT Science, you need to have a good reading strategy. Counterintuitive, I know.

While using one strategy for the whole ACT Science section would be ideal, there is no single technique that works to read all of the ACT Science Passages. Your approach to reading the ACT Science Passages should vary based on the type of passage. If you're unfamiliar with the 3 types of ACT Science Passages, I recommend reading our other article first.

In this article, I'll outline all of the ACT Science reading techniques that I've personally tried and taught to students. I'll rank the techniques from best to worst. I offer all of the strategies (instead of just one) because my favorite strategy may not work for you.

The ACT English can be overwhelming. There are so many questions! And they're mostly just underlined text: what are they even asking? Of course, that confusion is the whole point: it's what makes this part of the test hard. 

What does that mean for you? Because the ACT test writers rely on your confusion about the format to confuse you, the questions themselves usually aren't that difficult. 

Because the ACT is designed to be taken by every high school student in the country, it can only test math concepts that every student has experience with. The way the creators of the test make it hard is by giving you questions on a wide range of subjects and sub-topics, presenting them in strange ways, and by putting you on a strict time crunch. 

Maybe you’ve taken the ACT before--whether practice or real--and found yourself only half way or three quarters of the way through the math section before your time was up. Maybe you just think it would be downright impossible to finish so many questions on time. Rest assured--you are not alone. And it is not impossible.

In this guide, I'll walk you through the timing of the test and teach you how to beat the clock and maximize your time on the ACT.

There are 3 types of SAT reading passages that you, as the test taker, need to be familiar with. The 3 types of passages mainly differ in length, but also somewhat in content. Therefore, the strategies for tackling them need to be different.

Below, we'll go over the different types of reading passages on the SAT and what you can expect from the questions that follow them. 

NOTE: This article was written about the old SAT Critical Reading section. For more information about passages on the current SAT Reading, we recommend instead reading this article.

One of the nice things about the ACT is that it doesn't change all that much from test to test. This is especially true for the Reading section: Reading is always the third section of the ACT, there will always be passages on four subject areas, and each subject area will have 10 questions.

So what are the 4 types of ACT Reading passages? Read on to find out!