15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The most effective SAT vocab book!, October 19, 2009
This review is from: Direct Hits Core Vocabulary of the SAT: Volume 1 2010 Edition (Paperback)
If you're a teenager, Direct Hits is indisputably the best way to learn all the SAT vocabulary. It's not the regular vocabulary list you learn words from; the examples provided in the book are simply the most powerful mnemonic devices to remember those long, hard SAT words.
The new 2010 editions of the books have surprisingly up-to-date examples such as that of Michael Jackson's passing away, references to the 2009 summer movie "Up" and many more. However, the most important characteristic of the examples is their closeness to the ordinary teenager's life. Examples of "recalcitrant" Amy Winehouse who sings "No no no" or "surreptitious" Dumbledore's Army just stick with you. Oftentimes, reading Direct Hits feels like listening to a friend who has extremely good vocabulary.
Furthermore, although 400 words might seem few compared to other lengthy lists, I found that 400 is indeed enough. For the SAT, you don't have to learn 3500 words, but very well chosen words that tend to appear and have appeared on the test, i.e quality over quantity.
Aside from vivid examples, the division of words into chapters and testing of the words after each chapter was very helpful. What I found very appealing was also the general look of the book; because of the larger fonts used in the book and the interesting cover, it doesn't look as dull and boring as a vocabulary book should.
The Core Vocabulary volume is absolutely a must for the SAT but might include words that you know if you have a good vocabulary, so I would advise you to flip through the pages a bit and see whether you know most of the words. The Toughest Vocabulary is essential if you want to tackle those harder questions and get a high score. For those who wonder whether they should get the Volume 1 or 2, I believe that although printed separately, the books were meant to be used together (cross-references between books etc.). So unless you're very confident in your vocabulary, or with only [...] bucks, definitely get both. For those who wonder whether they should get the older editions, I would say no, since the new books include all the words that were in the older ones in addition to few dozen new ones with more recent examples.
All in all, these books are simply point boosters for the SAT's verbal sections. Vocabulary not only helps in doing well on sentence completion questions but also on passage-based questions for which you have to know the keywords in order to answer them correctly.
UPDATE: I got my November SAT score report and I got all of the 19 sentence completion question right! Thanks DH.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Phenomenal Book for SAT CR, October 11, 2010
This review is from: Direct Hits Core Vocabulary of the SAT: Volume 1 2010 Edition (Paperback)
I can't express how much I love this book and emphasize its importance for success on SAT critical reading. Contrary to advices that teacher may offer, memorizing SAT vocabulary is a must for all those who have a relatively weak vocab. The first step in answering the question involves understanding what it is asking. How could you attack a problem if you don't know what it's asking in the first place? This is why I highly recommend this text; it provides the most efficient (and fun!) way to study. DH is a compilation of past SAT words that have appeared on previous SAT tests. It's indispensable to know these vocabulary simply because collegeboard often recycles the words for use in future tests. Personally, this book (in addition, to Toughest Vocab in Volume Two) raised my SAT CR score from a slumping 550 to the 700s.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Useful Compilation of BB Vocab Words, December 30, 2009
This review is from: Direct Hits Core Vocabulary of the SAT: Volume 1 2010 Edition (Paperback)
The first thing that needs to be said is that this book is simply a compilation of the most frequently occurring words from the Official Study Guide (BB). You can just as easily go into your own copy of the BB and look up the words yourself, without paying for this book.
However, that said, this book is THE best SAT vocab prep book available. I got a 2330 on my SAT, and this book helped me immensely. Do not trust those big test prep companies that claim to have a perfect list of 3000000000+ words.
They. Do. Not. Work.
Buy one of those lists, and you might as well go memorize the dictionary. The best way to find SAT words is simply... from the SAT itself. In that sense, this book has nailed it. Each word also comes with one or two examples that demonstrate the usage of the word in context, which is EXTREMELY helpful for the SAT, as many of the words are tested in context, as opposed to for a denotative definition.
Therefore, I highly recommend this book. It's a small price to pay for not having to look up each of the BB words and come up with contextual examples of each by yourself.
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