Nearly every college-bound high school sudent takes the SAT in the spring of their junior year. You should be thinking about it LONG before that, however. This article is a 'laundry list' of the Math you should prepare.
Get going RIGHT NOW, especially if you don’t understand one or more of these topics.
· Basic math word problems – Recognition of the math concept within the word problem is an essential part of SAT preparation.
· Math Operations – Here are a few specific operations that appear often:
o Fractions
o Decimals
o Percents
o Converting fractions to decimals to percents and back
o Exponents – These appear often and should get prep attention.
o Simplifying radicals
o Ratios – These are seen in all sorts of questions. You should have a solid understanding of them. Cross multiplication should be in your tool bag.
o Venn diagrams
· Math Concepts – Beyond straightforward calculations, the SAT tests more advanced concepts like the following:
o Order of operations – Be very careful of this. The 'wrong' answer you will get is nearly always included in the choices.
o Path – Very often the hard problems involve a series of operations– finding that path is a skill worth refining in your preparation.
o Inclusive and exclusive counting – On multiple choice questions they will always include an answer that is one off from the correct one.
o Evens and odds – This appears often in problems in order to increase the difficulty of otherwise simple calculations.
o Absolute value
o 'Manufactured' symbols – The SAT uses functions defined using manufactured operation symbols. Study through old practice SAT test questions along with your tutor to see how they work. A very simple example: Let the symbol @ be defined such that a @ b = a + b. Given this definition, what is the value of 2 @ 87? The @ represents addition, so the answer is 89.
o Simple probability
o Combinatorics – This is a 'fancy' name for a fairly common problem type. For example: Max must choose three workers for his team. There are 8 workers. How many different teams can he create? These can be time consuming or quick and easy depending on your preparation for them.
· Algebra accounts for the greatest portion of the test. Here are specific skills:
o Linear equations are very often presented in word problems.
o Systems of equations – These turn up frequently on the SAT, sometimes with three equations in the system.
o Averages – Problems involving these are sometimes quite simple, but be ready for problems that give the average of some numbers and expect you to solve 'backwards' for an individual number in the list.
o Factoring – This skill is essential to the harder SAT math questions. Prime factorization is also needed, both alone and as part of factoring polynomials.
o Functions
o Rate and Distance Problems
· Geometry topics: Questions involving geometry are both some of the simplest and some of the hardest ones. Remember that several useful formulae, as well as some triangle and angle facts, are given at the beginning of each math section. You should have this information MEMORIZED so you don’t have to waste time looking it up during the test. Also, beware the figure marked, “Note: Figure not drawn to scale.” The test preparers are totally honest about this. If it is NOT marked this way, the figure IS drawn to scale, and you can trust its dimensions and angles. Otherwise, it’s usually a good idea to redraw it to make it more realistic, if possible.
o Triangles are the most important figures to know.
o Pythagorean Theorem (It is GIVEN on the test!)
o Similar triangles
o Plane figures – You will need to be able to find the perimeters and areas of plane figures.
o Solid figures – Surface area, lengths of edges and volume are called for. Again, they GIVE many formulae.
o Angle relationships
o Coordinate Algebra and Graphs
If you have good understanding of these topics and practice them in your preparation you will be able to give a good showing on the mathematics portion of the SAT. If you struggle, by all means work with a tutor or take a preparation course. Remember that the SAT is a very important part of your college application packet.
Jo Karabasz
Managing Directorwww.overlooktutorialacademy.net
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