SAT comprises two verbal sections: One is evidence based reading section and the other one is writing and language section. Evidence based reading section contains five reading passages which are 500-700 words long each having 10-11 questions. There will be a total of 52 questions in the reading section which are to be solved in 65 minutes.
Most of the students struggle with time management in the reading section because it is lengthy as you are not only supposed to read the passage but also answer the questions.
The following tips can help you improve your reading score:
1. Reading Strategy
SAT Reading passage cannot be solved as a normal reading comprehension that you do in your school. On SAT, it is important to identify a strategy that helps you to do more questions in less time.
One way to do more questions in less time is to do location specific questions first which ask you to refer to say ‘lines 5-10 or line 25’. This is because location specific questions do not want you to read the entire passage rather give you a location from where the question must be answered.
So, it is important to make a strategy.
2. Understand the question
Sometimes the questions can be tricky. Therefore, it is important to understand the demand or task of the question (for example: what or why) so as to answer it correctly. Also, try and predict an answer from the passage rather than looking at the options because options could be confusing and sometimes all the options might seem correct to you.
3. Use elimination
Rather than looking for a correct answer in the options, look for an incorrect one and eliminate it. This will help you to narrow down your options and would make it easy for you to pick the correct answer.
4. Skip time consuming questions
It is important not to waste time on a particular question. If a question is taking too much time, then skip that question and do the other questions. In the end, if time permits you may come back to the skipped question.
5. Do not leave any question answered
There is no negative marking in the test. Thus, it is crucial to do all the questions. You may not be able to solve all the questions but it is important to mark all the questions and not leave any question blank.
6. Practice
It is rightly said that practice makes a man perfect. For all the test takers, it is important to take some mock tests to be able to get a hang of the actual test. But doing the test is not enough, reviewing your mistakes is equally important. Review your mistakes and identify the areas where there is a need to focus more and accordingly make a study plan for yourself. Also, rely on authentic sources to access mock tests and practice material.
Happy Learning!