by Liza DiStefano Co-editor-in-chief
Highschool students eveywhere stress it. Take it over and over until they can not stand it anymore. Throw all their hopes and dreams of college, scholarships and a future on the two-digit number that is the ACT score.
Looming next to GPA’s and extracurricular involvement, an ACT score ends up being the difference between acceptance and rejection to that dream college or between a $5,000 scholarship and a $500 one.
Some students breeze through standarized tests, getting in the top 10 percent ever since MAP testing back in the day. But there are others that get antsy just at the idea of sitting through a 3+ hour test, bubbling in endless rows of encircled letters.
But with a little luck, and a lot of handy tips and tricks, everyone can walk away from this high-school-must unscathed and minimal sleep loss.
Before the test:
Practice makes perfect. Free practice tests are everyone you turn. The counselor’s office has a stack of practice test booklets. Free online tests are available, and a mini-practice packet is distributed to all juniors. It seems simple enough, but many people choose not to take a test drive and walk in on the day of the ACT unaware and unprepared for what to expect. With so many options both through school and on-line, there are no excuses.
Get close and personal (with your calculator). With a 60 minute time limit, the math portion of the ACT is not the time to learn how to use your calculator. Make sure to familirize yourself with all the basic and not-so-basic functions of your calculator, including sin, cos, and tan buttons, along with program options such as whether you want an answer in degrees or radians. Have a spare minute? Try to find short-cuts to get your answer fast, for every second counts.
The Big Day:
Bed & Breakfast. The ACT has the inconvenience of being scheduled early Saturday morning. You may feel the temptation to go about your usual Friday night routine of going out and falling into bed around 2 a.m., but waking up just four hours later for the 8 a.m. test, you will come to regret it. Make it a goal to go to bed early, and make sure to follow the usual advice of eating a filling breakfast. There is only a 15 minute break in the middle of the test taking process for bathroom usage and snacks, so skip the extra cup of coffee in the morning.
Wear a watch. “Don’t underestimate how much time you have. Time is not your friend,” said Kaitlyn Smith, a 2011 graduate with a top ACT score of 27. The ACT consists of a 45 minute English portion, 60 minutes of Math, and 35 minutes each of Reading and Science. Pace yourself and do not linger long over one question, skip it and come back or pay the price of a whole empty column of bubbles when time is called. “The content isn’t hard and none of the problems are too challenging, but time goes by fast,” said Smith.
Dress accordingly. Dress for comfort, not for style. School heating is totally bipolar, so wear a hoodie or jacket you can remove if you get too cold or too hot, as you do not know what room you will placed in. You just cannot focus when your spine is stiff from shivering or you are worried about the pit stains about to form thanks to the heater next to you and your elevated stress level.
Lastly, get psyched, don’t psyche yourself out. “Relax! People put way too much pressure on themselves. You can always take it again if you didn’t do well,” said Nick Zewiski, senior with a first time score of 31. Many students get overly nervous and stressed out, which does nothing to help their score. Remember there is no limit to how many times you can take the ACT, and there is one every two months during the school year.
The next ACT you may sign up for is February 11, 2012, with a deadline in mid-January. Good luck!
Photo courtesy of http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01356/exam_1356851c.jpg
