The 3 ACT Changes You Need to Know About Before the September Test

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What!? There are changes to the ACT, too???

Yep. And it’s come to my attention that not everyone who’s signed up for the September 12, 2015 ACT test knows about the 3 important changes that directly impact what score you’ll get on test day!

Why is this? I’m not totally sure. Perhaps some tutoring companies are lazy or don’t do their research? I mean, it IS hard to miss. You’d have to scour the ACTstudent.org website and countless test prep blogs and belong to tutoring and educational professional groups — like I do — in order the stay abreast of the news. And everybody has their hands full with staying on top of the Redesigned SAT that’s rolling out this Spring!

So, yes, there are ACT changes.

And these changes will be rolled out over the course of the next year or so. Most do not affect how you actually take the test — a lot has to do with reporting. So, do not concern yourself right now with the new way the scores are displayed, the new scores you’ll receive (like the STEM score, which will really only be the sum of your Math and Science scores) or that you’ll soon be able to take the ACT completely on a computer. They aren’t all happening yet. (And the ones that are have to do with reporting, not test-taking.)

However, as a test-taker, you only need to prepare for 3 changes right now.

And as your favorite test prep expert, I’m happy to walk you through them. If you know any Seniors who are about to take the ACT in September or Fall, please help them out and send them this article so they can quickly and efficiently prep for the test without slogging through the extraneous haze of information overload out there!

ACT Change #1: The ACT essay is totally different.

Instead of reading about an issue and improvising three reasons in favor of your point of view, you will now be required to:

• Evaluate 3 different perspectives on an issue,
• Create your own conclusion/perspective about how to handle the issue, and
• Relate your own perspective back to the 3 that you already analyzed.

Okay, that sounds like a mouthful, and it is. However, if you think about it, you’ll be asked to do this for every essay from September on, so you already know how to organize your essay. You basically have to complete the three specific tasks that they asked of you — with your own analysis, good grammar, varied sentence structure, vivid examples, and elevated vocab.

Here’s the sample that’s posted on the ACTstudent.org website:

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ACT Change #2: The ACT Reading section now has a Double Passage.

I know this sounds like I just turned off the Taylor Swift in the middle of your birthday party, but this change really isn’t as bad as you think. The reason? Unlike the SAT’s double passage that sent most of your friends screaming to the ACT in the first place, the ACT does a great job of organizing this double passage to where it’s actually MUCH more efficient and time-saving for you as a test-taker!

What do I mean? Well, here’s what I know for sure:

• There will only be 1 double passage on the test.
• It will be one of the non-fiction passages.

So it’ll either be Social Science, Humanities, or Natural Science. In other words, you’ll only have to deal with it on the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th passages. But only one of those.

• They already organize the questions for you!!!!

The ACT actually divides the questions into three sections, the first about Passage 1 only, the second about Passage 2 only, and the third about both passages together. That’s the order you need to be reading them in anyway, and there’s no guesswork! No scrambling to see if you’ve read enough to answer a particular question.

ACT Change #3: The ACT Science section only has 6 Passages.

So, this was not a change that I read about or that I noticed an announcement about. However, through coaching my own students and studying the April 2015 and June 2015 ACT tests, I saw this trend, and I think it will stick.

Right now, you’re used to having 7 passages on the Science section, which gives you approximately 5 minutes per passage. This has been a huge issue for most students, simply for the timing issue that creates. After all, it takes a while to digest the prompt before answering the questions, and then quickly switching gears every five minutes. (Sedimentary rock layers? Genetics? Nitrogen levels by temperature and longitude in different types of bog soil?!?!?! Make it STOP!!!)

The new Science section breaks down its passages like this:

• 2 Charts and Graphs passages, each with 6 questions
• 3 Experiments passages, each with 7 questions
• 1 “Fighting Scientist” reading passage, still with 7 questions

The main difference? The ACT took away one of the Charts and Graphs passages, and then it gave you an extra question in each of the remaining Charts and Graphs passages and in the 3 Experiments passages.

Interesting things to note are:

• You now have more time per passage! 5:50 per passage, as opposed to the original 5 minutes per passage.
• Over half the Science questions are based on Experiments passages (21 out of 40).
• Charts and Graphs has fewer questions (12 out of 40, as opposed to the original 15 out of 40).
• Fighting Scientists remains the same (7 out of 40).

So that’s what you have to look forward to! If you really think about it, most of the changes work out in your favor, timing-wise and organization-wise. However, I understand how shell-shocked you’d be if you weren’t prepared and walked into the testing center cold turkey, so I wanted to give you fair warning.

You’re welcome.

And remember, if you know any Seniors who are about to take the test this Fall, please do them a huge favor and pass this onto them. Sharing is caring 😉

Xo,

Kristina

6 Easy Steps to Get Into College

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Whether you’re about to begin your Junior year of high school or you’re only a Sophomore or Freshman and have considerably more time, I want to give you a quick landscape of the major steps to get into college that you need to take.

My intention here is that if you know what the crucial milestones are, you can methodically work to knock them off your list one at a time and not be a total anxiety-ridden stress case!  I’ve gone ahead and listed them in chronological order, though some steps may be ongoing and thus overlap with other steps.

Moreover, I’ve tried my best to provide an ideal timeline of when you should be doing each step and about how long it takes.  Keep in mind that “ideal timelines” may of course vary depending on where you are right now and your personal strengths and weaknesses. With my private clients, I can tailor this process to the perfectly bespoke little black dress of college admissions prep timelines—go here for an Ace the Test: Game Plan. However, if I do not know you personally, realize that you may have to adjust the dates just a modicum to apply perfectly to you.

Step #1: SAT I or ACT

Unless you are specifically researching colleges that don’t require standardized tests, you are going to have to take either the SAT I Reasoning Test or the ACT. (To find out which one, either go here or click on the cute teal pop-up in the bottom right of your screen.)

SKILLS NEEDED:

You are going to need to brush up on your math, grammar, reading comprehension, vocab and essay-writing abilities for both tests.

For the ACT, you should also brush up on interpreting charts and graphs and basic scientific method facts for the Science section. (NOTE: If you’re currently a Sophomore, you’ll need this skill too, regardless of which test you take, since you’ll be choosing between the ACT and the Revised SAT.)

IDEAL TIMELINE:

August before Junior year, if not before: Start reviewing content weekly.

January/February of Junior year: Focus on taking mock and practice tests (between 4-6) and going over them.

March/April of Junior year: Take first SAT/ACT for real.

May: SAT attempt #2

June: ACT attempt #2

Fall of Senior year: Attempt #3 if needed.

Step #2: SAT II Subject Tests (Depends on School)

Depending on the schools on your college short list, you may be off the hook for SAT II Subject Tests. Or, if you are applying to Harvard, you may need 3 of them!  Each college has its specifications, so make sure you do your research and write them down.  (Need help? An Ace the Test: Game Plan will do it for you!)

IDEAL TIMELINE:

May/June of Sophomore year: If you are taking any classes that would aptly prepare you for a Subject Test, go ahead and take it.  Give yourself about 2 months’ study time, and pick the test date that is as close to your final exam for the class as possible.

June of Junior year: Take another 1-2 Subject Tests in subjects that correlate to classes you are taking.

Fall of Senior year: If you still need to take more subject tests or improve a score, take them after you have secured the SAT I or ACT score you desire.

Step #3: College Visits

You want to make sure you get a feel for the type of academic environments ideal to your growth and development before you craft your entire testing timeline around them!

IDEAL TIMELINE:

June/July between Sophomore and Junior years: Try to do some of your college visits at this time to set your testing targets and complete all your requirements in a mellow, stress-free manner.

June/July between Junior and Senior years: Do the rest of your college visits at this time.

Step #4: College Application Process: The Activity List

This is where you break-down all of your passions, interests, community involvements, leadership positions, extra-curricular activities, jobs, volunteerism, sports, and talents so that the people in the admissions office know a) what you have to bring to the table at their institution and b) how exactly you’ve spent your time the past four years.  This is where you have the ability to explain some odd-ball hobbies and interests that make you YOU (competitive Pokemon, anyone?).  This is also where you get to demonstrate the actual number of hours you have devoted to your passions and the depth to which you have ventured to explore them.

IDEAL TIMELINE:

July/August between Junior and Senior years: Start keeping a running tab of your activities, denoting the description, length of time you were involved, hours per week, leadership positions and notable accomplishments.

November 1st: This is the beginning of early decision application deadlines.

January 1st: Most regular decision deadlines are due around this time.

Step #5: College Application Process: Common App Essay

Formerly called the Personal Statement, you’ll use this essay for the Common App but can tweak it for applications that are NOT on the Common App, too. This is the main college entrance essay you will write that will give the readers in your dream school’s admissions office a glimpse into you, your hopes and dreams, your mind, your life, your accomplishments, your character, and your essence. All in under 650 impeccably-written words! Have fun!

IDEAL TIMELINE:

July/August between Junior and Senior years: Start brainstorming and ideally have your first draft done before school starts.

November 1st: This is the beginning of early decision application deadlines.

January 1st: Most regular decision deadlines are due around this time.

Step #6: College Application Process: Supplemental Essays (Depends on School)

As delineated by the admission requirements of your particular dream schools, you very well may have additional “essays” to write and include in your application.  I say “essays” with quotation marks, because some are incredibly brief, like describing yourself in 5 words.  Stanford University has a supplemental essay like that.  In fact, Stanford has 10 supplemental essays! (Don’t worry, they’re not all mammoth.)

IDEAL TIMELINE:

August 1st: The Common App opens.  You will be able to look up your list of colleges and compile all the supplemental essays you have to write.  Please plan ahead before you start typing away – can one essay for one school be marginally tweaked and reused for another supplemental essay?  Let’s be a little pragmatic, shall we?

November 1st: This is the beginning of early decision application deadlines.

January 1st: Most regular decision deadlines are due around this time.

So, yes, this DOES seem like a lot, and you may be wondering how I dared to claim these were “6 Easy-Peasy Steps”… But seriously, if you take a long-range look at these, there are a few tests, a few trips, and a few essays that just need to happen at a few designated times.  If you start doing what you can during Sophomore year and the beginning of Junior year, you will be sitting very pretty by the time those acceptance letters start rolling in.

I hope this was able to ease some of your high school stress and help you plan. Remember that though I’m able to offer this one-size-fits-most information for free, you can get more tailor-made advice by working with me. And if you found this helpful, please do me a huge favor and pass it on to 3 of your friends!

Xo,

Kristina

The 4 Best Ways To Improve Your Vocab: Part IV

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Vocab Hack #4: Supplement With The Tried And True

The last installment of my 4-part Vocab Hack Series is a list of the more traditional tutor-approved methods for increasing vocabulary.  These might not be as much fun as the other methods, but I would be remiss to leave them out.  For your sanity, you probably only want to try one of them…

Try a Vocab-building book:

My favorite vocabulary book – if you are a fan of straight-up learning vocab – is Hotwords for the SAT by Barron’s.  The reason I prescribe this book so often is that it manages to teach 500 SAT vocabulary words by “clumping” them together into 32 or so clusters of words.

The idea is that instead of learning 1 word + 1 definition (= 2 things to memorize) for every word you learn, you instead learn 1 definition + a group of 12+ words that have that basic definition.

Thus, to learn a dozen vocab words the old way, you’d need to learn 12 words + their 12 meanings = 24 things to remember.  The Hotwords way, you would only need to remember the 12 words + 1 definition they all have in common = only 13 things to remember.

See how much time that saves?  In addition, you will surely know some of the words in each cluster, so you end up using the words you know as an anchor to remember the other words that are new.  Super easy peasy.

Try a Vocab-building website:

If you’re more into on-line stuff, there is a plethora of newly created resources out there, and I have known some students to have success with Quizlet.  Check it out, and if that’s not your style, Google “vocab games” and you’ll surely find something else worthwhile.

Get back to Latin:

Latin roots, that is.  You can find a standard list of roots, prefixes and suffixes in the back of most test-prep books, or for free if you Google.  You will instinctively know several already, and the ones you know will anchor the new ones.

Flashcards:

And last but not least, for whatever reason, some students really love the feeling of completion that comes with flashcards.  My advice?  If you go this route, separate your cards into three piles: those you totally know already, those that might as well be Greek (or Japanese, if you, like me, ARE Greek), and those you kinda feel you should know but don’t.

• The first pile: place somewhere conspicuous in your room, like on your nightstand or near your desk.  This makes it appear as if you are actively learning vocab words and the ‘rents tend to like this.

• The Greek pile: put back in the box and abandon on the bookshelf.  If you get exceedingly bored of Dawson’s Creek, you can take these out at a later date.

• The middle-of-the-road pile is the low-hanging fruit that will take the least amount of effort to turn into usable knowledge. LEARN THESE FIRST.  Then add them to the first pile of words you know.

And on that note, you should be all set to rapidly expand your vocab and rack up tons of extra point on the SAT and ACT!  And remember, if you found this at all helpful, do me a HUGE favor and tell three of your friends!

Xo,

Kristina