10,99 €
Fast, focused test prep that will help you sail through the ACT
ACT 5-Hour Quick Prep For Dummies will calm your test-day jitters. Gain confidence with an overview of test content, what to expect on the day of the exam, and a short-form practice test with detailed explanations of the answers. This one-of-a-kind study guide is broken down into study blocks that you can tackle in 5 hours - all at once or over a few days. When you’ve finished practicing, you’ll find a section full of tips and reminders that you can review the night before, so test day will be a breeze. You’ll be on the fast track to ACT success with this book.
ACT 5-Hour Quick Prep For Dummies is perfect for high schoolers preparing to take the ACT and looking for a fast, focused study guide that won’t take months to work through.
Sie lesen das E-Book in den Legimi-Apps auf:
Seitenzahl: 296
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Start Here
About This Book
Foolish Assumptions
Icons Used in This Book
Where to Go from Here
Block 1: ACT Overview in 20 Minutes
Registering for the ACT
Identifying What to Bring to the Test
Knowing What to Expect During the Test
Identifying Strategies for Test-Taking Success
Understanding Your Score
Block 2: Preparing for the Test!
Punctuating the English Test
Sizing Up the Math Test
Comprehending the Reading Test
Peering into the Science Test
Organizing Your Writing Test Essay
Block 3: Working Through Some Practice Questions
English Practice Questions
Math Practice Questions
Reading Practice Questions
Science Practice Questions
Writing Practice Question
Block 4: Taking a (Shortened) Practice Test
Answer Sheet
English Test
Mathematics Test
Reading Test
Science Test
Writing Test
Answers and Explanations
Block 5: Ten Tips for the Night Before Your Test
Know Your Time-Management Strategies
Review Strategies for Analyzing and Answering Questions
Review Your Practice Test Materials
Practice Your Stress-Coping Strategies
Plan for Arriving on Time
Lay Out Comfortable Clothes
Have Your Picture ID and Admission Ticket Ready
Check Your Calculator and Batteries
Visualize Success!
Get a Good Night’s Sleep
Index
About the Authors
Connect with Dummies
End User License Agreement
Chapter 1
TABLE 1-1 When to Take the ACT
TABLE 1-2 ACT Breakdown by Section
Chapter 2
TABLE 2-1 Mathematical Symbols for Inequality
TABLE 2-2 Finding the Probability of the Occurrence of Multiple Events
Chapter 1
FIGURE 1-1: Signing up for the ACT online.
FIGURE 1-2: An example ACT score report.
Chapter 2
FIGURE 2-1: Prime factorization.
FIGURE 2-2: Check out these angles.
FIGURE 2-3: The rules of measuring triangles.
FIGURE 2-4: Some elements of a circle.
FIGURE 2-5: A line connecting points with the same
x
- and
y
-coordinates.
Cover
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Begin Reading
Index
About the Authors
i
ii
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
131
132
133
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
ACT® 5-Hour Quick Prep For Dummies®
Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774, www.wiley.com
Copyright © 2024 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published simultaneously in Canada
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without the prior written permission of the Publisher. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748-6011, fax (201) 748-6008, or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.
Trademarks: Wiley, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, Dummies.com, Making Everything Easier, and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and may not be used without written permission. ACT is a registered trademark of ACT, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.
LIMIT OF LIABILITY/DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY: WHILE THE PUBLISHER AND AUTHORS HAVE USED THEIR BEST EFFORTS IN PREPARING THIS WORK, THEY MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES WITH RESPECT TO THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF THE CONTENTS OF THIS WORK AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. NO WARRANTY MAY BE CREATED OR EXTENDED BY SALES REPRESENTATIVES, WRITTEN SALES MATERIALS OR PROMOTIONAL STATEMENTS FOR THIS WORK. THE FACT THAT AN ORGANIZATION, WEBSITE, OR PRODUCT IS REFERRED TO IN THIS WORK AS A CITATION AND/OR POTENTIAL SOURCE OF FURTHER INFORMATION DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE PUBLISHER AND AUTHORS ENDORSE THE INFORMATION OR SERVICES THE ORGANIZATION, WEBSITE, OR PRODUCT MAY PROVIDE OR RECOMMENDATIONS IT MAY MAKE. THIS WORK IS SOLD WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT THE PUBLISHER IS NOT ENGAGED IN RENDERING PROFESSIONAL SERVICES. THE ADVICE AND STRATEGIES CONTAINED HEREIN MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR YOUR SITUATION. YOU SHOULD CONSULT WITH A SPECIALIST WHERE APPROPRIATE. FURTHER, READERS SHOULD BE AWARE THAT WEBSITES LISTED IN THIS WORK MAY HAVE CHANGED OR DISAPPEARED BETWEEN WHEN THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN AND WHEN IT IS READ. NEITHER THE PUBLISHER NOR AUTHORS SHALL BE LIABLE FOR ANY LOSS OF PROFIT OR ANY OTHER COMMERCIAL DAMAGES, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR OTHER DAMAGES.
For general information on our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax 317-572-4002. For technical support, please visit https://hub.wiley.com/community/support/dummies.
Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2023947198
ISBN 978-1-394-23163-8 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-394-23165-2 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-394-23164-5 (ebk)
Welcome to ACT 5-Hour Quick Prep For Dummies. The goal of this book is to show you exactly how to survive the ridiculous situation called the ACT. No one wants to deal with a standardized test for too terribly long. This book has one goal: to help you prepare for the ACT as quickly and painlessly as possible.
You likely can’t escape the ACT. Many colleges require you to take this entrance exam before they’ll even look at your application. Virtually every college accepts scores from either the ACT or the SAT. (Wiley just so happens to publish SAT 5-Hour Quick Prep For Dummies as well, should you choose to take that exam.)
In ACT 5-Hour Quick Prep For Dummies, you find five study blocks that add up to five hours. Depending on how much you know about each subject and how fast a test-taker you are, each block might take a little more or a little less time than promised, but the time promise does give you a good idea of how much time to set aside for each study block so you pace yourself and show up for the ACT as sharp as a no. 2 pencil.
Some study blocks are short and others are long, depending on what you’re trying to accomplish. Here’s a rundown of what you’ll find in each block and about how much time it takes to complete:
Block 1
(20 minutes):
Find out what you need to know about registering for the ACT, exam rules and tips, the topics covered, and ACT scoring.
Block 2
(1 hour, 15 minutes):
Discover the question types you find on each test and content-specific knowledge you’ll need to know.
Block 3
(45 minutes):
Take closer look at the question types you find on each test and review detailed explanations of the answers.
Block 4
(2 hours, 30 minutes):
This block contains an abbreviated practice test. By taking this practice test, you’ll understand how to pace yourself, what content you need to review, and so on before you take the real ACT.
Block 5
(10 minutes):
The shortest block in the book offers quick tips to review the night before you take the ACT.
We’re betting you picked up this book because you have to take the ACT. (Isn’t it good to know at the outset that your authors have a remarkable grasp of the obvious?) And because we weren’t born yesterday, we figure that
You’re taking the ACT in anticipation of applying to college. How exciting for you!
Getting the best ACT score you can is important to you and you care enough to sacrifice some of your free time to achieve that goal. Good for you!
You’re busy and you don’t want us to waste your time with a bunch of stuff that isn’t on the ACT. For instance, we don’t share vocabulary flashcards with you in this book because you don’t need to memorize word meanings to ace the ACT.
You’ve spent some years engaged in a secondary school curriculum and you’ve written an essay or two. Therefore, we don’t bore you too much with elementary stuff but do cover the basic math and grammar concepts that you may have forgotten.
Some information in this book is really, really important. We flag it by using an icon. Here’s a list of the icons we use and details about what they mean:
Follow the arrow to score a bull’s-eye by using the tips we highlight with this icon.
Burn this stuff into your brain or carve it into your heart; it’s the really important material. If you skip or ignore the Remember icons, you won’t get your money’s worth out of this book.
Pay heed to this advice and avoid the potential pitfall.
We suggest two ways to use this book:
Fine-tune your skills.
Maybe you’re already a math whiz and you just need help with the English grammar. Go right to the English review in
Block 2
.
Start from scratch.
Grab a sack of food and some sharpened pencils, lock yourself in your room, and go through this book word for word. It’s not as bad as it seems, and starting from scratch is the preferred method. Many students make what we call the “mediocre mistake”: They’re good at one section, mediocre at a second, and dismal at another. They spend all their time in their worst section and barely look at the sections that they’re mediocre or good in. Big mistake! A couple of points that you gain in your mediocre section are just as valuable as — and a heck of a lot easier to get than — the same number of points you gain in your weakest section. Humor us and read the book from cover to cover. You’ll pick up some great material.
Whichever way you progress through the blocks, absolutely take the practice test in Block 4. To use the practice test, we suggest two tried-and-true methods:
Diagnostic:
Take the practice exam first to see how you score. Then devour the subject reviews and advice we provide in
Blocks 2
and
3
.
Pure practice:
Devour the reviews and advice first and use the full-length exam to practice and reinforce what you’ve learned in the rest of the book.
Block 1
In a nutshell, the ACT is designed to test what you learned in high school (or secondary school if you’re outside the United States) and how well you can apply critical thinking and analysis skills to what you read — or numerical problems in the case of the math test. Your score on the ACT helps admissions folks at colleges and universities understand how well prepared you are for college-level work.
Of course, it’s more than a little weird to judge everything you learned over about four years into about four hours. But that’s the task before you, and you give yourself an advantage if you have some idea of what to expect on the ACT.
In this block, you get the facts about signing up for the test, including how to request accommodations if you’re eligible. You find out what to bring, what rules you have to follow during the exam, and some basics about the ACT format. You also find pointers about understanding your score and what to do if you didn’t score as well as you’d hoped.
If your school has a day when all students take the ACT, the school probably takes care of your registration for you.
However, if you want or need to take the SAT on your own, you need to know when you want to take the test and plan far in advance if you need to request accommodations for a learning disability, English learner accommodations, or a fee waiver. You must have certain details and documentation ready when you register, so read on to find out how to make all this paperwork go smoothly.
Currently, the ACT is offered at testing sites nationwide and internationally on weekends every February, April, June, July, September, October, and December. Additionally, some school districts offer the ACT during the school day in March, April, October, and November, depending on the high school. If you live in a district that offers one of these schoolday tests, your test date is set for you, but all other options allow for a little freedom of choice.
The best time to take the ACT is not a one-size-fits-all consideration. You may want to wait to take the test until you feel most prepared, but you also need to give yourself plenty of time to retake the test before you apply to college. Most colleges don’t require you to send the scores from every time you take the ACT, so you don’t necessarily have to be completely prepared before you take your first official test. Also, many colleges allow you to superscore your ACT scores, which means they’ll consider only your highest English, math, reading, and science scores from all the times you take the ACT. In fact, the ACT even creates a superscore score report if you take the test more than once. Therefore, there’s not a major downside to taking the test sooner rather than later.
Generally, if you’ve taken algebra II and trigonometry during your sophomore year, we suggest that you consider taking your first ACT test in the first semester of your junior year in either September, October, or December. (If you’re taking algebra II and trig during your junior year, you may want to wait until February or April of your junior year to take the first test.) The beauty of testing in the fall of your junior year is that you can devote the summer before to extensive ACT study.
A perk of taking the December test is that it offers Test Information Release (TIR), which means you can pay extra to get a copy of your test questions and a report of the ones you answered correctly and incorrectly. This valuable information can come in handy when preparing for subsequent tests. This service is also available for the April and June exams.
If you take the test in the fall, you have plenty of options to retake the ACT in the spring and summer to achieve your top score. You can even get some extra summer study time in during the summer before your senior year and take the September ACT. Your scores from this test should be available in plenty of time before the earliest application deadlines in October and November. If you postpone taking your first ACT until April or June of your junior year, you may not have enough retakes to optimize your score.
Table 1-1 summarizes these scenarios to help you choose when to take the ACT.
TABLE 1-1 When to Take the ACT
If You Take Algebra II and Trig at This Time
Then Take Your First ACT at This Time
Pros
Cons
Sophomore year
Fall of junior year
Time to study over the summer and more time to improve your score
None
Junior year
Spring of junior year
Better prepared for the math test
Less time overall to improve your overall score
The ACT provides an optional Writing Test in addition to the other four multiple-choice sections. Its importance in the college application process is dwindling, and most colleges don’t require or even recommend it. If you need to write the essay to enhance your application, make sure you present your best effort, as explained in Block 2.
Not everyone takes the ACT under the same conditions. You may have a special circumstance that can allow you to change the date of the ACT or the way you take your exam. Here are a few of the special circumstances that may affect how you take the ACT:
Learning disabilities:
If you have a diagnosed learning disability (LD), you may be able to get special accommodations, such as more time to take the test. However, you must specifically request such accommodations way in advance. Prepare your requests for fall tests by the prior June and for spring tests by the prior September. Please note that in order to be eligible for special testing on the ACT, your LD must have been diagnosed by a professional, and you should have a current individualized education plan at school that includes extended test time. Talk to your counselor for more information. Note that you can only request special accommodations in conjunction with a test registration.
Physical disabilities:
If you have a physical disability, you may be able to take a test in a special format — in Braille, large print, or on audio. Go to the official ACT website (
www.act.org
) for complete information about special testing.
Religious obligations:
If your religion prohibits you from taking a test on a Saturday, you may test on an alternate date. The ACT registration website specifies dates and locations in each state.
Military duty:
If you’re an active military person, you don’t complete the normal ACT registration form. Instead, ask your Educational Services Officer about testing through DANTES (Defense Activity for Nontraditional Educational Support).
English language learner:
In the United States, if you aren’t proficient in English, the ACT enables you to apply for English learner supports. Because these supports expire yearly, you have to apply for the accommodation each year you take the ACT. English language learners must submit documentation of their status, such as WIDA or TOEFL scores or an official accommodations plan. If your request for English language learner supports is approved, you may be eligible for extended time, a word-to-word dictionary, directions in your native language, or small group testing. The ACT registration website explains how to apply for these accommodations and provides more details.
In the United States, Puerto Rico, and U.S. territories, you can request a fee waiver. The fee waiver means you don’t have the pay to take the ACT, which currently costs about $60 to $85, depending on whether you take the optional writing test. Your school counselor can help you understand whether you’re eligible or you can read the information at www.act.org. If you qualify, you can take the ACT up to four times for free and receive free learning resources. You’ll receive a fee waiver code that you enter when you sign up for the test.
To register for the ACT, you need about 30 minutes and the following items:
A computer with Internet access
Credit card or other payment
High school course information
Headshot photo
If you need accommodations, English learner supports, or a fee waiver, read those earlier sections before you register so you get the resources you’re entitled to.
When you’re ready, go to www.act.org. Choose Start Your Journey Here ⇒ Take the SAT as shown in Figure 1-1. You need to create an account or sign in and then follow the prompts online to register.
FIGURE 1-1: Signing up for the ACT online.
If you can’t borrow the brain of that whiz kid in your calculus class for the day, you’re stuck using your own. To compensate, be sure that you have the following with you before you leave for the ACT test center:
Admission ticket:
You receive your ticket immediately after you register online. Be sure to print it out so you have it for test day.
Pencils:
If you take the ACT in the United States, the ACT is a paper test. Take a bunch of sharpened No. 2 pencils with you. You may also want to take good erasers (nothing personal — everyone makes mistakes). Mechanical pencils aren’t allowed.
Map or directions:
Go to the test center a few days before the actual exam to scope out your driving route and parking area. Often, the ACT is given at high schools or colleges that have parking lots far, far away from the test rooms. Drive to the location a few days in advance, park your car, and see just how long it takes you to get to the room. You don’t need the stress of having to run to the test room at the last minute on test day.
Clothing:
Schools that host the ACT often turn off the heat for the weekend (the ACT is usually offered on a Saturday), and the test room can be freezing cold. Alternately, in the summer, schools turn off the air conditioning, making the room boiling hot. Dress in layers and be prepared for anything.
Photo ID:
Showing the birthmark your boyfriend or girlfriend thinks is so cute isn’t going to cut it with the test proctor. You need to upload a photo when you register for the test and bring a photo ID (student ID, driver’s license, passport, military ID, FBI Most Wanted mug shot, whatever) to the exam. If you don’t have a photo ID, you can bring a letter of identification. The form is available on the official ACT website (
act.org
).
Eyeglasses:
Students taking the ACT frequently forget their reading glasses at home and then squint for the four long hours of the test. The ACT is enough of a headache on its own; you don’t need eyestrain, as well. If you wear contacts, be sure to bring cleaning/wetting solution in case you have to take the lenses out and reinsert them during the break. (Hey, all those tears can really mess up your lenses!)
Snack:
True, you get only one 10-minute break between the Math and Reading Tests, but that’s enough time to gobble down something to jump-start your brain. We often suggest taking an energy bar or some peanuts, something with protein and carbohydrates. Scarfing down a candy bar is actually counterproductive; your sugar levels rise only momentarily and then drop down below where they were before you had your chocolate fix.
Watch:
Keeping track of time on your own timepiece is more efficient than wasting precious seconds seeking out the clock on the testing site wall. Place your watch on the desk where you can refer to it easily throughout the exam. Digital watches or smartwatches may not be allowed. Stick with ones that have faces and hands. Your watch can’t make any sounds either. If the proctor hears so much as a beep from your watch, she will not-so-politely request that you leave the building and cancel your test.
Calculator:
The ACT gurus allow you to use a calculator only on the Mathematics Test. Although the ACT information bulletin has an entire quarter page detailing which calculators you can and cannot use, generally, you can use any calculator (yes, even a graphing calculator) as long as it doesn’t make a noise or have a computer algebra system. Make sure the one you bring has at least a square root function and, ideally, basic trigonometry functions. You may not use a laptop computer (don’t laugh; you’d be surprised by how many students want to bring one to the test!).
Have you ever been so excited about something only to watch all those expectations melt into a big puddle of disappointment? This is how our friend’s daughter felt when her significant other broke up with her right before prom. (But she ended up having a great time after all!) Expectations are often a great setup for disappointment, but when you’re taking the ACT, having some expectations is helpful. You’ll know what you’re getting yourself into.
This section helps you understand the exam room rules; the order, topics, and time for each test; and what the ACT thinks you should know to be prepared for college.
The ACT is pretty strict about what is and isn’t allowed in the exam room. Do not, we repeat do not, take any of the following items with you to the ACT test room:
Cellphones and other electronic devices:
Leave your cellphone in the car. You aren’t allowed to bring it into the test room. One student we know was dismissed from the test because he accidentally left his cellphone in his pocket, and it rang during the exam. The same goes for other electronics, such as iPads, PC tablets, or anything else that can access the Internet or make a sound.
Books and notes:
Take it from us: Last-minute studying doesn’t do much good. So leave all your books at home; you aren’t allowed to take them into the test room with you. (Just be sure to fill your parents in on this rule. We once had a student whose mother drove all the way to the test center with her daughter’s ACT prep book, thinking the girl needed it for the test. The mom actually pulled the girl out of the test to give her the book, resulting in the girl’s nearly being disqualified from the test.)
Scratch paper:
You may not bring your own scratch paper to the paper-based test, and you don’t receive any scratch paper during the exam. Fortunately, the exam booklet has plenty of blank space on which you can do your calculations.
When you’re done with one test, know that you’re done. You can’t go back to a previous section and finish work there or change some of your answers. If you try to do so, the proctor will catch you and you’ll be in a world of hurt.
One last rule that you should already know: Cheating on the ACT is a loser’s game — it’s just plain stupid. Apart from the legal, moral, and ethical questions, you can’t predict what types of grammatical mistakes will show up in the questions; what are you going to do, copy a textbook on the palm of your hand? All the math formulas that you need can’t fit onto the bottom of your shoe.
The ACT is actually four tests in one — or five in one if you take the optional writing test. The test for each subject follows the same order, and you can expect to see a certain number of questions, certain topics, and have a certain amount of time for each test. Table 1-2 gives you the bird’s-eye view of what to expect in each section of the ACT.
TABLE 1-2 ACT Breakdown by Section
Test
Number of Questions
What They’re About
Time Allotted
English
75
Most are about English usage and mechanics.
About 15% ask you to identify and eliminate redundant language.
About 25% ask about writing skills like organization, style, and strategy
45 minutes
Mathematics
60
About one-third of the questions are arithmetic, one-third are algebra, and one-third are geometry.
60 minutes
Reading
40
You will read 4 passages, which include 1 passage and 10 questions for each of the following topics:
literary narrative
social studies
humanities
natural sciences
35 minutes
Science
40
You will read 6 passages and answer 6-7 questions per passage.
2-3 passages about data representation
2-3 passages about research summaries
1 passage about conflicting viewpoints
35 minutes
Writing (optional)
1
Your ability to state, analyze, and evaluate the perspectives given as well as your own, using relevant supporting details. Throughout your essay, you should organize your ideas, maintain focus, and communicate your ideas clearly.
40 minutes
If you add up the numbers, you find that you have 216 multiple-choice questions to answer in 215 minutes; 215 minutes is 3 hours and 35 minutes, or just over 3.5 hours. You get one 10-minute break between the second and third tests (the Mathematics and Reading Tests). You may also encounter an extra 20-minute section after the Science Test that the ACT will use to determine the difficulty of questions for later exams. If you choose not to take the optional Writing Test, you get to walk out right after that. If you include the time in the classroom spent giving out the tests, explaining the directions, checking IDs, answering the Interest Inventory questions, and so on, your whole morning is shot. You may as well figure on giving up 4 to 4.5 hours for this test.
The ACT tests the following subjects:
English:
The ACT expects you to know the fundamentals of grammar, usage, punctuation, diction, and rhetorical skills. For example, you must understand sentence construction — what makes a run-on and what makes a fragment. You need to know how to distinguish between commonly confused words, like
affect
and
effect
or
principal
and
principle.
You must be able to use the proper forms of words, distinguishing between an adjective and an adverb, and you must know the difference between a comma and a semicolon.
Block 2
addresses the English portion of the test.
Mathematics:
The ACT requires basic skills in arithmetic, geometry, and algebra. If you’ve had two semesters of algebra, two semesters of geometry, and a general math background, you have the math you need to answer about 90 percent of the questions. The ACT also tests algebra II and trigonometry. Oh, and you don’t have to know calculus. The ACT has no calculus questions. Happy day! Refer to
Block 2
for more.
Reading:
The ACT expects you to be able to read a passage in a relatively short amount of time and answer questions based on it. Although you probably don’t have time to significantly improve your reading skills before you take the ACT, you can still improve your ACT Reading score.
Block 2
shows you a few tricks you can use to improve your speed and tells you how to recognize and avoid traps built into the questions.
If you take the ACT in a country other than the United States, your exam is offered on computer rather than on paper. This computerized option has been available for several years and may become more common at testing sites in the United States.
The question types, numbers of questions, and scores are the same whether you take the paper or computer-based version of the ACT; the only difference is in the method of delivery. The computer-based ACT, or CBT, provides handy tools that allow you to approach it in much the same way you would for the paper test:
Highlighter and line reader: Use these tools to focus on important data and sentences.Answer eliminator and masker: Use these tools to help you mark out wrong answers.Magnifier: This tool allows you to read the fine print for charts and graphs in the science questions.You also have a timer to keep track of your time and the ability to move between questions and mark them for later review.
The ACT had plans to expand the digital version of the ACT and make it more widely available throughout the United States, but those plans have been delayed indefinitely.
Science:
You don’t have to have much specific science background to ace the Science Test. The passages may test chemistry, biology, botany, physics, or any other science, but you don’t have to have had those courses. The test gives you all the information you need to answer most of the science questions in the passages, diagrams, charts, and tables. Head to
Block 2
for more about the Science Test.
Writing (optional):
The ACT folks added this optional section to test your writing ability. Don’t worry! You’ve been writing for years, and the ACT people know that you can’t possibly write a perfect essay in a measly 40 minutes. They’re not focusing on perfection; instead, they’re looking at your thesis, organization, and ability to support your thoughts. The ACT doesn’t require you to write the essay, and few colleges require or even recommend the essay. The essay portion of the ACT may be eliminated from the test entirely in future administrations.
Block 2
gives you the lowdown on the Writing portion of the ACT.
On the wall of our office, we have a padded cushion that’s imprinted with the words, “BANG HEAD HERE!” We’ve found that most of our students use it either to reduce stress or express their exasperation over careless mistakes. To avoid becoming a head-banger, read the material in this section about how to relax and avoid common mistakes.
Every section on the ACT begins with directions and a line that tells you exactly how many questions are in the section and, therefore, how many minutes you have per question. The ACT is no big mystery. You can waste a lot of time and drive yourself crazy if you keep flipping pages and counting up how many more questions you have to do. You can do what you can do; that’s all. Looking ahead and panicking are counterproductive and waste time.
Tausende von E-Books und Hörbücher
Ihre Zahl wächst ständig und Sie haben eine Fixpreisgarantie.
Sie haben über uns geschrieben: