Customer Reviews

Kaplan 12 Practice Tests for the SAT

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This book is likely the best buy currently on the market to complement the Collegeboard's Official SAT Study Guide. Unlike previous KAPLAN publications on the New SAT 1, it contains a myriad of additional practice, which is strongly modeled upon the exercises of abovementioned Official Guide. In particular, the grammar-related exercises of the Writing Section show identical error patterns to those of the Official Guide, and the Sentence Completions practice is featuring the traditional SAT vocabulary without venturing out into the kind of exotic vocabulary which is so often found in other books, but which is unlikely to ever make an appearance in the real test.

This apparent duplication of question types is not a bad thing. The scope of the SAT 1 is actually rather limited, and optimizing one's score often comes down to additional reliable practice, which is just what this book offers. Note that in earlier publications on the New SAT 1, KAPLAN made some serious errors in test format and content, probably as a result of a lack of initial information about the ultimate format and emphasis of the New SAT 1. This book settles at least that problem: the 12 practice examinations overall follow the official test, both in test structure (number of sections, number of questions and time allotment per section) and in test questions.

A serious word of caution, though, about the Mathematics practice in this book. Whereas the authors seemed to have closely followed the patterns of the Official SAT Guide for the Writing and Reading Sections, they seemed to have ventured into unnecessary improvisation in the Mathematics Section.

I find some of the exercises, particularly the ones defined as High Level, far from representative for the exercises in the real test, as it has been administered for the first time in March, May and June of this year. In particular, there's a lack of emphasis on questions related to the freshly added pre-calculus topics, such as the study of quadratic functions, and the vertical and horizontal shift of polynomial and absolute value functions. Other High Level questions are either too hard for the SAT 1 or very unlikely to appear in the New SAT 1 - in fact they are more likely SAT 2 Level 1 questions - and therefore serve no other purpose than bringing the student into a state of confusion or even panic because he is unlikely to do well on these questions.

Last, but most certainly not least, the authors of the Mathematics Practice in this book, in all their diligence to come up with creative High Level problems, seem to have failed to provide them with correct and appropriate answers and explanations. I have come across multiple annoying mistakes - answers and explanations that are just plain wrong! - and an even greater amount of answer explanations which are, although factually correct, unclear at best and bound to confuse the prospective test taker. Having a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics, I think these problems need urgent follow up on!

Overall though, I believe this book is, at least at this point in time, the best out there for additional practice to complement the Collegeboards's Official SAT Study Guide, which is and remains the sine qua non of any successful SAT Test Preparation.

I am a student, practicing independently for the SAT. I bought this book because it had decent reviews on amazon. I have to say that this book has some terrible mistakes that can't be even called typos. I took only the first practice test, and I akready discovered grammatical errors on the verbal and writing sectios that are supposed to test on the same mistakes! Some of the answers are poorly explained and some reading passages do not (at all) adhere to the real SAT format- questioons on these passages are usually very ambiguous.
On the other side, I believe this is the best practice test SAT book on the market other than the Officail SAT Guide. If one runs out of the "real" questions, not many decent practice test options are left...

I bought this book solely because it was the only book that offered the most number of practice tests for the SAT Reasoning Test. Generally, I found the practice tests to be solid, reliable and closely resembling the real exam itself. However, I have to say that the vocabulary questions of the critical reading section are much easier than that of the real exam. The maths section is also not comprehensive enough as there seems to be a lack of polynomials and graph-transformation questions.

I was irritated by the fact that a surprising number of questions in the later practice tests were recycled from the previous tests, particularly the vocabulary and essay questions. Also, the fact that grammatical errors exist in the critical reading passages pinpoints a lack of editing on the writer's part. On the brighter side, the explanations provided together with the answers are comprehensive enough except for the sample essays which I found to be overtly simple. In fact, when I compared the sample essays with those provided at the official College Board website, I found that a grade 6 sample essay in this book would at best be awarded a grade 4 according to College Board standards.

Notwithstanding the blemishes and imperfections of this book as outlined above, I would still recommend this book as additional practice for any SAT candidate. However, one should still attempt the practice tests in the Official College Board blue book before buying this book.

1.)some of the answers do not match with the explainations
2.)overly repetitive
3.) Most of the reading composition topics are the same as the blue book. They just changed some of the words.
4.) Why buy this when you can get the real thing at collegeboard.com

I am a full-time tutor and have several of my students use this book. As with any test prep book not published by the College Board, there a couple of questionable questions. The answers and explanations sections are fair; I have not found a book that offers very good commentary on answer choices. The explanations still give a student the chance to work independently.
Some questions are modeled after the College Board book's while others are not.
Overall, Kaplan 12 is valuable, because it is most important for students to PRACTICE and think critically about their incorrect answers. Where are you going to find more practice?

I've probably read every SAT book on the market at this point. I can say that in terms of sheer practice, this one is outstanding. The students that I work with say that these tests "feel" like the SAT. The Princeton Review tests are just plain awful and are either overly difficult or too easy.

There's also something else that I've noticed. If you become really acquainted with the questions from the practice tests in the Offical Guide by Collegeboard, you'll notice very apparent parallels between the questions in this Kaplan book and in the Official Guide. This is especially true for the math and writing sections. Some of the writing questions in certain sections literally follow the same error pattern, just using different sentences. And the math questions just use different numbers in many cases, but the same concepts and ideas are tested.

I find this to be invaluable. It gives the students a chance to continue practicing with "real" questions after we've exhausted all of the questions in the Official Guide.

I highly recommended this product to practice with as close to real SAT questions as possible.

I just recently bought this book and it is definetely worth the money for those who are preparing for SAT/PSAT in general. Although it might contain some lapses in grammar and few recycled questions, its format strongly adheres to the actual SAT. The questions, not least the Critical Reading questions are very good. What stands out, however, are its insightful explanations of how to approach each type of reading question and why each of the other choices are wrong. Plus, with 12 complete tests, it offers a comprehensive preparation for the exam. This book, combined with the Official SAT book (whose questions I consider a bit easier than the actual exam), will make an excellent preparatory material.

I am a student who bought this book that thought that I could benefit from real practice tests, turns out these tests are nothing like the real SAT. THe CR section is too easy and the answers seem to be a little unstandardized. There are too many reading passages. THe SAT in total has 6 reading passages. This book has 7 reading passages combined in each test. In addition the math section is a little harder than the real test but not hard as in analyzing, hard as in tricky. some of the answers explanations are things that the kaplan just probably made up because how would anyone come up with that kind of solution on the spot. The writing section is also easy but tricky because it doesn't test the same things as the REAl SAT. furthermore the scores with these tests and the collegeboards study guide are drastcally different. With the kaplan test I got 1850 at the most and as low as 1590 but with the Collegeboards sat I always get in the 1900 range. The test is tricky and does not present the same traps the SAT presents so I consider this book fallible.

I used this book exclusively in my tutoring sessions I provided for inner city kids. However due to a lack of improvement in my student's scores, I decided to switch over to the far more superior Princeton Review guide books.

Kaplan 12 Practice Tests for the SAT, 2009 Edition (Kaplan 12 Practice Tests for the Sat)
Other reviewers have noted many errors but only two corrections are listed on Kaplan's web site: [...]

An error that I found in the Practice Test Three, Section 3 (Math Section), Question 19, is NOT listed in the errata. Errata for other Kaplan books are available at [...]

Kaplan is a respected test prep organization. I gave three stars for their book and correction sheet not living up to their reputation.