Customer Reviews

McGraw-Hill's 10 ACT Practice Tests, Second Edition (McGraw-Hill's 10 Practice Acts)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I used this book along with the Real ACT book, the Sparknotes Guide to the ACT book, and the Dummies ACT prep book. I found that this book was one of the more helpful ones. I was skeptical at first to buy this book, as the ACT content can get distorted when it isn't written by the actual ACT writers. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that the practice tests in the book resemble the real ACT tests greatly. The writers of the 10 McGraw Hill Practice ACT (as stated in the introduction) analytically scrutinized the content of the real ACT and emulated it in the 10 practice tests. The only defect is the answer explanations. The explanations are very succinct and sometimes you don't understand why you got the wrong answer. But that is not the case with all the answer explanations. In order to significantly improve your score, taking practice ACT tests greatly helps. Therefore, this is one of the best resources to use to improve your ACT score.

This book helped me get a 33!

I feel like I have been through nearly every ACT prep product sold on Amazon. I have been working to get a 99th percentile ACT score without spending big bucks on private tutoring or a prep class. I figured I should post a review with my feelings about these products to prevent other students from having to do all the shopping around that I did.

I used this book, The Real ACT Prep Guide: The Only Official Prep Guide From The Makers Of The ACT, Boost Your Score! The Unofficial Software Guide to the Real ACT, a Kaplan book,The ACT For Dummies and a Princeton Review book. I took the test in June and September and I have been studying since last December.

Here is how I felt about this product. Like another reviewer mentioned, the tests did seem a little easier than the real thing. When I worked with materials that relied on official ACT materials (the Real ACT Prep Guide and the Boost Your Score software that is compatible with it) I found that many math problems required multiple steps, with a small sneaky hook at the end. For example, you'd have to solve a quadratic equation, but then the question would ask you what the PRODUCT of the two roots was. But two of the answer choices would be the roots themselves. Sneaky, right? Generally, the McGraw-Hill tests were just not that sneaky. In my case, I really had to practice more than just skills. I had to learn out to "out think" the test. For me, I found that using official tests worked best to teach me how to do that.

That said, I still thought this product was helpful and I would recommend it to others. There's something nice about having so many practice tests in one place. It gave me the flexibility to play around with different test sections as I worked on proper pacing, without having to worry I was "wasting" a test (as I felt with the Real ACT Prep Guide, since it only has 3 tests in it).

On contrary to some of the other reviewers, I found this book a little on the easy side compared to REAL ACT tests epecially in the math. Yes, this book similiar in questions but the difficulty level is something to take notice of. For example, in the math section, one reoccuring question that appears on all of the test multiple time is "What is the slope of the line 2x+4y=1, or vice-versa with a question dealing with the y-intercept. The ACT will not typically be this generous to you so be warned. And yet another example can be taken from the Reading Section. The passages generally seemed more easy to read than the real thing however, I will give them that questions were very similar to REAL ACT questions.

Overall, a good book to boost your confidence, but not a book to significantly raise your score to the 32-36 range due to the slight inaccurcies and sometimes rather short explanations. If you are looking for a score of 26-29, I do not see any problem with this book then.

One of the reviewers said he achieved a 33. I am nearly positive this was due the excellent book "The Real ACT" which he said he used. The reason for this is that book contans REAL ACT tests that have been administered before.
At the end of the day, you are what you practice so choose your test prep book with that in mind.

The main thing I was looking for when I went looking for ACT Prep Books were practice tests. They are no doubt the best way to improve your score on the ACT. I knew that The Real ACT Prep Guide: The Only Official Prep Guide From The Makers Of The ACT (which I also bought) was the only way that I was going to be able to get real ACT tests that had been used before. These are of course the best tests you can take, as other practice tests can sometimes be too easy or even too hard.

I went looking on Amazon for some more practice books and this one literally jumped out at me on the list. TEN ACT PRACTICE TESTS!?!?!? TEN?! TEN!?!?!?!. I knew I had to get this book if it was going to give me ten whole practice tests that I could work through during the the three to four times I was planning on taking the ACT. So, I bought it, and I would advise that you do the same.

The great thing about this book is that it has 10 whole practice tests. I would definitely say that they are a little on the easier side compared to the real thing, but if you want practice, then its worth it for the fact that it does simulate the Real ACT.

For an example of how it is easier than the Real ACT: I bought this book and got an ENGLISH: 33 MATH: 29 READING: 31 SCIENCE: 31 COMPOSITE: 31. That made me pretty happy, as I was aiming for the 30s. However, when I took the actual test I got an ENGLISH: 33 MATH: 29 READING: 26 SCIENCE: 27 COMPOSITE: 29. As you can see, my reading an science scores were significantly higher on these practice tests than on the Real ACT, and my composite went down by two points. So, in general, I would say that these two sections (reading & science) are easier on these than the real thing. I've even taken a practice reading out of this book and gotten a 35 (that gave me a real shock!) and then got a 25 on the actual test (that shocked me even more!). However, in general, your practice composites will be within 1-3 points of your actual.

Overall, whether you're shooting for the 'teens' the low, mid, or high 'twenties' or even the low 'thirties', this book is worth the 10 or so bucks. However, if you're looking to achieve anywhere from a 33-36, this book isn't going to do much for you, and instead I would recommend Barron's ACT 36: Aiming for the Perfect Score.

SO, if you're looking for some decent practice tests, and NOT a 'learn how to do well on the ACT' book, then this book will pretty much do it for you. It's got 10 full practice tests along with decent explanations of the answers.

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NOTE: If you are the kind of person that generally scores in the high twenties to low thirties, then DO NOT follow the scoring procedures in this book. Instead, count how many you got right and go to the scoring tables in The Real ACT Prep Guide: The Only Official Prep Guide From The Makers Of The ACT and find where your raw score matches on an average of the three sub scores it gives you there. This will be MUCH more accurate.
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I am an ACT Tutor who used this book for students. This edition is chock full of discrepencies and is very poorly edited. The answers keys are often just wrong, or the explanation offered for the answer doesn't make sense. It's a shame, because this is the only book that offers 10 tests.

In depth detailing to help you understand the how's, why's, yes' and no's. Perfect for the adult going back to school!!!

A great resource if you are looking for practice tests to check your progress. It doesn't have any test taking tips or strategies, but those are well documented in other resources (which typically have only have 4 practice tests). Well worth the investment.

My daughter used this book to help her prepare for the ACT test. She indicated that is was very helpful.

just what we needed, less expensive than we otherwise would have paid for it in a bookstore, on time........ thanks!