If you are reading this in an email you received from me, do not click the link to sat.collegeboard.org below. Use the link to my website that is farther down on the email.
http://sat.collegeboard.org/practice/sat-question-of-the-day?questionId=20140531&oq=1 (This link takes you to today’s question. If you use my archive, you will see the question related to my SAT explanation for that date.)
Reading this blog is 10% about learning how to answer today’s questions and 90% learning how to apply strategies and analyze questions you may see on test day.
The answer is D. One way to do the question is the way the SAT test writers explain it on their website. Read their explanation and see if it makes sense to you and you feel like you can remember how to do it that way on test day.
However, I did it a different way that seemed a whole lot easier and faster for me. I did all the work in my head. The difference between the two groups is 16% which the question tells you is a total of 40 students. By dividing 40 by 16, I know that each 1 percent is equal to 2.5 students. So, 100 percent would be 100 times 2.5, 250.
There are always multiple ways to do the math questions on the SAT and ACT. Some approaches are going to be easier and faster than others for you. Nobody can predict what is going to be the easy way for you to do different kinds of questions. You need to figure that out for yourself. Practice will provide the answer. In fact, you should practice seeing how many different ways you can do each question. That way when you take the test, you’ll be a lot more flexible in your approach to the questions and the test will become considerably easier for you.
Let’s see what the ACT folks have for us today.
ACT Question of the Day: Use your “back” button to return to my website after reading the ACT Question of the Day.
The answer is C. Just use my PICK strategy and this question and all other reading test questions become much easier. The wrong answers violate the rules that define the characteristics of the best answers. Be sure to read about them on my free website or watch the Video #300 series.
One of the characteristics of right answers is they do not add to the passage. All three of the wrong answers for this question add a new idea to the story. That makes them wrong because when you insert them in the story they aren’t consistent with what you are told.
Summer Tour Update:
The first stop on our summer tour is going to be Tuesday evening at the YMCA in Tallahassee. Call for details.
Our second stop will be Thursday at Pensacola Community College. Be sure to contact the TRIO program for details or contact me.
The following Monday we will be in Memphis.
I hope to see you at one of our stops this summer.
Bob Alexander, the “SAT and ACT Wizard”
