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55 of 57 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very Helpful for SAT, August 2, 2007
This review is from: Cracking the SAT, 2008 Edition (College Test Preparation) (Paperback)
This book is definitely worth reading and studying. Princeton Review challenges College Board's party line that there are only minimal benefits (in the range of 50 points improvement for CR and for Math) from pre-test prepping and coaching for the SAT, and that there is no "trick" to doing well on the SAT because it is essentially an aptitude test that measures verbal and mathematical skills acquired over a long period of time. While not denying the benefit of basic skills acquired through conscientious schoolwork over time, Princeton Review maintains that is not the only way to improve your score, possibly dramatically. By studying patterns in the ETS answer choices and question sequences, Princeton Review has come up with what it calls the Joe Blog approach, which is a very clever strategy for making educated guesses when you are not 100% sure of an answer to a multiple-choice question. At its core, Joe Blog says that on easier questions (the earlier questions in a section), go for the obvious answer that Joe Blog (a hypothetical Joe-Average) would guess; on the harder ones (the later questions in a section), avoid the "obvious answers, because they are "tricks" to fool Joe Blog, who will jump on superficially correct, but profoundly wrong answers. Beyond the Joe Blog approach, the Princeton Review writers do provide excellent practice exercises on basic reading and mathematical content. They seem to have studied the content of the test better than most authors. If there is one flaw, it is that the explanations to the practice questions don't always explain the correct answer very well. However, along with the "official" books and online study resources put out by the College Board, using this book from Princeton Review will help you do the best you can -- -- which what test taking process is and should be all about.
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24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Math questions are not representative, March 13, 2008
This review is from: Cracking the SAT, 2008 Edition (College Test Preparation) (Paperback)
I am an SAT tutor and instructor (with my own company) with over 9 years' experience, and I used this book in 2006 in a 3-session SAT refresher course that took place just before the October 2006 SAT. The students improved overall in the Critical Reading section, but they actually DROPPED in their Math scores on average (the students had fairly high Math scores at the start). I had used Math questions exclusively from this book as review, and I will never make the same mistake again. The book, and Princeton Review in general, does not have a good grasp of the style and "flavor" of actual SAT Math questions. An experienced SAT tutor who has worked with the official and real SAT questions should be able to detect small, but important, differences in the Cracking the SAT Math questions as compared to official SAT questions. For one thing, the last few questions on a section are not tough enough, and they are a bit off in the style and emphasis on "question types." The Math coverage and questions are probably good enough for a student scoring below 550 on the Math section, but I would hesitate to recommend them to any students scoring 550 or higher on Math. On the other hand, the Critical Reading and Writing sections are probably strong enough for students of almost all levels. As for the claim from one reviewer (for the previous edition) that the practice tests in this book are "extremely accurate" and preferable to those in the Official SAT Study Guide, I would have to STRONGLY disagree with that assertion. I've already stated that the Math questions are not representative, but readers should know that the Critical Reading questions, while fairly representative, contain some blatant (and sometimes subtle) errors in the answer choices and stated correct answers. For good practice alone, stick with the Official SAT Study Guide and the College Board Official SAT Online Course.
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22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Verges on perfect, October 15, 2007
This review is from: Cracking the SAT, 2008 Edition (College Test Preparation) (Paperback)
I bought over half a dozen books on test prep, and this one is by a huge margin the best of them. It is engaging, and the tone of it is truly remarkable. It feels like you are talking to a highly knowledgeable friend, while imparting more information and knowledge than all the others I bought put together. I would recommend this book to absolutely anyone planning on taking the SAT, or for that matter anyone who finds themselves in school period. The strategies for test-taking, while obviously best suited to the SAT, are very much applicable in every other test taking situation which involves multiple choice.
Highly insightful, highly engaging, and actually entertaining.
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