The SAT Reading and Writing section presents you with a challenge. Now that the digital SAT has been rolled out, this section contains over 50 passages you'll need to read and answer questions on! The passages will come from a wide variety of sources and test you on everything from critical reading to grammar.
How can you attack these passages to get a high SAT Reading and Writing score? This guide will discuss the best strategies for reading the SAT passages for each question type you'll see.
What Do SAT Passages Look Like?
There are 55 passages in SAT Reading and Writing on the digital SAT, one passage per each of the 54 questions, plus one cross-text connections question that includes two passages you need to compare.
That's a ton of passages to read through, especially since the Reading and Writing section is only 64 minutes (divided into two 32-minute modules, each with 27 questions).
Fortunately, passages on the digital SAT are much shorter than they were on older versions of the exam. Passages now range from 25-150 words. However, be aware that these shorter passages will be just as challenging, if not more so, than the older, longer passages in terms of the reading comprehension level required.
As with older versions of the SAT, the passages on the digital SAT cover a variety of sources from literature, history, social studies, the humanities, and science. However, there are now more questions that focus on the humanities, as well as a few poetry questions (often by authors from the early 1900s and before).
Reading and Writing questions on the digital SAT are organized into four main categories that test these skills:
- Information and Ideas (12–14 questions): Tests your ability to use details from brief texts, tables, and/or infographics to determine the main idea, choose the best evidence to support a claim, answer comprehension questions, or infer the most logical way to complete an excerpt.
- Craft and Structure (13–15 questions): Tests your ability to define words and phrases in passages, evaluate how passages are making arguments, or connect ideas presented in two excerpts.
- Expression of Ideas (8–12 questions): Tests your ability to select the transitional word or phrase that makes the author’s meaning clearer for readers, or use a short set of provided notes to decide which of the answers achieves a particular purpose (e.g., which answer represents a comparison, or which answer represents a contrast).
- Standard English Conventions (11–15 questions): Tests your ability to select answers that reflect your knowledge of conventional grammar and mechanics.
We dive into these question types further in the next section.
Types of Questions on SAT Reading and Writing
As mentioned above, there are four main skill areas tested in Reading and Writing, each with several question types, for 11 total types of questions. Each of these questions tests information in passages in a different way.
Below is a brief overview of each of the question types. To see official sample questions for each question type, and to also learn how many of each question type you can expect to see on the SAT, check out our article on the breakdown by percentage of every type of question on SAT Reading and Writing.
Information and Ideas Questions
- Command of Evidence (Textual): Introduce a claim and ask you to identify the piece of evidence from the passage that most strongly supports that claim.
- Command of Evidence (Quantitative): Contain a graph or table. They'll provide some context and ask you to complete a sentence by using the data from the graph/table.
- Central Ideas and Details: Ask you to identify the main idea of a passage or answer a specific question based on the passage.
- Inferences: Include an incomplete passage and ask you to select the answer choice that most logically completes the passage.
Craft and Structure Questions
- Words in Context: Ask for the most logical and precise word/phrase in a given context.
- Text Structure and Purpose: Ask you to identify the main purpose or overall structure of the passage.
- Cross-Text Connections: These questions will contain two passages! You'll be asked to compare the points of view of the authors of the two passages.
Expression of Ideas Questions
- Transitions: Ask you to select the most logical transition word or phrase to connect information and ideas within a passage.
- Rhetorical Synthesis: Include a series of bulleted notes and ask you to use relevant information from the notes to answer the question.
Standard English Conventions Questions
- Boundaries: Contain a passage with a blank and ask you to complete the text in a way that conforms to the conventions of Standard English. They focus on how phrases, clauses, and sentences are linked together in written English.
- Form, Structure, and Sense: Contain a passage with a blank and ask you to complete the text in a way that conforms to the conventions of Standard English. They focus on the rules surrounding various parts of speech (nouns, verbs, etc.) and their usage.
How to Approach SAT Reading and Writing Passages
Now you know what the passages will be like and the types of questions you'll be asked, but what's the best way to tackle these SAT passages? Below are the four steps to follow every time on reading passages for SAT success.
Step 1: Decide If You'll Read the Passage or Question First
First, you need to decide if you're going to read the passage first or the question. Some students like reading the passage all the way through then focusing on the question, others prefer to read the question first, then read the passage with the question in mind. Still others will skim the passage, looking for important information, read the question, then go back and read the passage more thoroughly. No method is inherently better than the other; it's all about choosing what works best for you.
Take this example of a rhetorical synthesis question:
Some students may prefer to read the bullet points of the passage first so they have a solid idea of what's being discussed before reading the four answer choices. Others may want to read the answer choices first so they know what to look for when they read the passage itself.
How can you decide which method is best for you? By answering a lot of practice questions! This is one of the many reasons we recommend practice SATs so strongly. There's no better way to learn which testing method you should use. You may even decide to use different methods for different questions, such as reading shorter passages before the questions but, if the passage is longer, reading the answer choices first.
Step 2: Get Clear on What the Question Is Asking
Whether you read the question before or after the passage, you'll want to make sure you understand exactly what you're being asked. The SAT is notorious for having tricky wording that can cause students to misread a question even when they think they've answered it perfectly.
Read through each question carefully, and be especially on the lookout for words like "except," "not," and "only" that can trick you into choosing the wrong answer. Taking a moment to pause and ensure you fully understand each question can significantly raise your score on exam day.
Let's look at this cross-text connections question:
This is a classic SAT question where it's easy to get confused on what exactly is being asked for. To conquer SAT passages, you'll need to be able to break down each part of the question. Let's do it for this one. The question is asking:
- For the author of Text 2's opinion…
- On the perspective of bluegrass purists based on Text 1
That's two pieces of information you need to sort out before you can answer the question. What does Text 1 say about bluegrass purists? From looking at the first passage, Text 1 states that the purists believe bluegrass must adhere to folk music influences.
However, the author of Text 2 believes that bluegrass was created by combining folk music with commercial genres of music. Because of those origins, there should be no restrictions on bluegrass musicians incorporating influences from other music genres into their work.
To sum up, Text 1: purists think bluegrass can only have folk music influences. Text 2: bluegrass can be combined with other music genres because it always has been. These are opposite perspectives, therefore, we'd expect the author of Text 2 to disagree with the bluegrass purists mentioned in Text 1. Answer Choice D correctly represents all that information, so it's the correct answer.
Step 3: Find the Key Information in the Passage
When you read the passage, you should read fairly quickly, even skimming for important features. Many passages begin with a brief introduction that explains who wrote the passage, when it was written, key characters, setting, etc. This often contains very useful information! If there's a chart/graph/etc in the passage, make sure to analyze that too for key information.
Also, look out for transitional words and phrases, like however, additionally, and despite, that might mark a shift in or continuation of ideas. This step is especially important for cross-text connections questions, where you'll see two passages and need to answer a question on both of them. The paired passages are always about the same topic. The most important thing to pay attention to when reading paired passages is the relationship between ideas about the topic. A great way to find the relationship between the passages is to ask yourself where they agree and where they disagree. Doing so will give you a good sense of what each passage is stating and key similarities and differences between them.
Let's look at this command of evidence (quantitative) question:
There's a lot of information to take in here. You'll need to understand what both the graph and passage are conveying.
Let's start with the graph. Make sure to read the title and the axis labels. The graph shows the line count of six ancient epics. The line counts range from about 3,900 lines (The Epic of Gilgamesh) to about 24,000 lines (The Ramayana).
Now the passage. It discusses the Ramayana and major similarities it has with other epics. All this information is important to correctly understand before attempting to answer the question. You'll need to be able to know how to read the graph to choose Answer Choice A as the correct answer.
Step 4: Always Backup Your Answer With Evidence
You've read the passage, you've read the question, and you have an answer choice you feel is correct. How strongly can you back that choice up? Don't just choose an answer that "feels" right—instead, make sure you can back up all your answers with direct evidence from the text.
None of the questions based on the passages require you to have any pre-existing knowledge of the topic. Instead, they're testing your reading comprehension. All your answers should be proven and supported by the passage.
This is an important point to remember for SAT passages, which will use texts you may be familiar with or that are especially relevant to history or contemporary life. To answer questions correctly, it's crucial that you turn off your personal opinions and base your understanding completely on the text at hand. You want to be able to point to the part in the passage that supports your answer choice. In the examples above, we could point to parts in the passage that fully supported our answer choice (as well as parts in the passage that ruled out the other answer choices).
Let's look at this central ideas and details question:
If you read the answer choices first, all of them seem like they could be possible. That's the point; the SAT will almost never include answer choices that appear immediately wrong without reading the passage. But you need to be able to determine what's being discussed in the passage.
Key points from this passage are:
- Portrait miniatures lost popularity at the same time photography became more popular
- Photography's impact on portrait miniatures may be overstated
- Portraits were losing popularity before photography became popular
From the answer choices, only Answer Choice D is supported by the text. Portrait artists and the career choices they made aren't mentioned in the passage, so Answer Choice A is incorrect. Answer Choice B is directly contradicted by the passage which states portrait miniatures were losing popularity earlier than thought. Artistic merit is never mentioned in the passage, so Answer Choice C is also incorrect.
Tips and Strategies for SAT Reading and Writing Passages
Beyond practicing your reading efficiency, you can use other strategies as you answer the questions and prep for this section. Read on for a few more useful strategies that will help you do your best on SAT Reading passages.
#1: Look to Eliminate Wrong Answers
None of the answers will be glaringly wrong. In fact, they're worded in such a way that they'll often all seem plausible!
This means you'll have to play interception with your own brain. You may be easily distracted by answers that seem sort of right, but you have to halt your distracted thought process. If you find yourself overly rationalizing or justifying an answer, it's probably not the correct one.
There is only one 100% correct answer, and it won't cause you too much overthinking.
Generally, wrong answers are too specific, too broad, describe a relationship in reverse order, or just present a totally unrelated concept. This article goes into further detail about how to eliminate wrong answers in order to land on the one 100% correct one.
A good rule of thumb is to avoid extremes. Words like "never" or "always" are not usually present in the correct answer. But to follow our own advice, never say never!
#2: Practice Data Analysis with ACT Science Questions
Those who consider themselves English buffs may not love the addition of charts, tables, and graphs in their SAT Reading and Writing questions. What's this data doing in a reading comprehension section, anyway? According to the College Board, the inclusion of data analysis is part of its attempt to connect the SAT with what students are learning in the classroom and with real-world skills.
If you run out of command of evidence (quantitative) practice questions, you can sharpen your data interpretation skills by practicing with ACT Science questions. The ACT questions may call for more specialized scientific knowledge, but they still demand the same skills of interpretation as will the SAT Reading questions.
By referring to charts and graphs for your answer and looking for evidence in data, you'll be better prepared for the data and evidence-based Reading and Writing questions on the SAT.
#3: Know Your Literary Terms and Techniques
SAT Reading and Writing is primarily concerned with understanding function (of words, sentences, paragraphs) and argument. Therefore, most of your practice for this section should focus on deciphering the logic and structure of a piece.
However, it's still useful to review the most common literary terms, like theme, style, tone, foreshadowing, and imagery, as well as some of the most common words to describe them. In addition to reviewing definitions, you should learn how to apply and find them in something you read. It's one thing to know that a tone can be somber, hopeful, or suspicious; it's another to determine the tone of a given passage.
Test prep will help you get better and better at this, along with reading and analyzing as much as you can in and out of the classroom.
Conclusion: How to Approach SAT Reading Passages
When you take the SAT Reading and Writing section, you'll be faced with over 50 passages to read and analyze. There are eleven question types based on SAT Reading passages, and they'll test you on a variety of skills, so it's important to know how to tackle those SAT passages. For each question, follow these four steps for how to read SAT passages.
#1: Decide whether you'll read the passage or the question first
#2: Get clear on what the question is asking
#3: Find the key information in the passage
#4: Always backup your answer with evidence
What's Next?
Want more information on the many passages you'll see on SAT Reading and Writing? Our expert guide explains exactly how many passages you'll need to read and what topics they'll test you on.
Practice tests are one of the best ways to prepare for the SAT. Find all the best SAT Reading and Writing practice tests in one place here!
For more information about the college admissions process, check out our complete guide to applying to college.
