How much time is left before your SAT test day? If your answer is anything under 2 months and you want a good score, you should already be studying.
It happens—the exam could completely slip your mind, or you simply procrastinate until test day is around the corner. These last-minute SAT tips are study strategies to help you use your remaining time as effectively as possible. Whether you have 2 months or 2 days left, keep reading to see how you can get closer to the score you hope for.
How Long SHOULD You Study for the Digital SAT?
How long a student should study for the SAT depends on how high they want to score. As with any test: the more you study in advance, the better your result will be. So, if you want to score as high as you possibly can, study on a regular basis from now until test day.
To get more specific: an average student can expect to improve their SAT score by 40 points for every 7 hours of studying. (This is based on the approximate time it takes to study an SAT question and relearn the tested concept.) You can earn a 80-100 point-gain with 16 hours of prep and a ~250 point gain with 40 hours.
Generally, these test-prep hours are spread out over months. (Students often begin hiring SAT tutors or starting prep courses five months ahead.) Studies have shown that learning and retaining information is more effective when you space out study sections (the “spacing effect”). Not only is cramming 40 hours of SAT studying into just a few weeks before the test unreasonable, it’s less successful than, say, spreading out 2-3 hour study sessions across 5 months.
How to Study for the SAT with Less Time
If you’re now at the point where you don’t have months of time to dedicate to studying, that doesn’t mean you should try to fit dozens of hours of studying into the few weekends and evenings left before test day. It also doesn’t mean you should give up on prep and rely on your current knowledge to get you to an “okay” score. Instead, maximize the time you have left to get the best score you can.
If you’re behind and you want to perform as well as possible, be prepared to use your free time! A suggestion for a student who doesn’t have long before their test is: an hour of studying each evening after school, plus at least 6 hours throughout during the weekend—a higher-intensity study week like that could net you a ~60-point improvement. While this is a great idea for those weeks of lighter loads of homework, those eleven hours may not be possible each week. While the amount of time you dedicate each week to test prep can vary based on your schedule, the important part is to consistently practice for at least a few hours each week, building your familiarity with the test and developing a stronger memory of the concepts you’re tested on.
However long you have left, the first and most important step in SAT prep is taking a practice test. This helps you prepare by (1) showing you how you currently score prior to studying, (2) making you more familiar with the SAT’s style and structure, and (3) identifying your weakness so that you know what to study. After practice test number one, it’s about seeing how much time you can dedicate to test-prep each week and following through until test day. (Looking at a question you missed, identifying your mistake, and re-learning the concept tested should probably take you 45 minutes to an hour.)
Note: Remember to take a Digital SAT practice test, not one for the earlier version of the SAT!
2-Month SAT Study Plan
You could improve your score by more than 200 points if you have eight or more weeks before your SAT test date. To potentially reach that ~250-point gain we mentioned, you’ll need to study for at least five hours each week. This total of 40 hours of prep seems steep, but is definitely doable—study schedule could look like an hour after school each weekday, 2.5 hours each day of the weekend, or a mix of after-school and weekend studying.
If you don’t have that much time each week to study, committing at least 2-3 hours on a weekly basis will still help you make meaningful strides towards your goal score, culminating in a possible score improvement of about 90-120 points.
After you go through your first benchmark results and study the concepts from each missed question, a second test narrows down which skills you still need to improve. Continue working through the problems and relearning the basic concepts until test day, supplementing your learning with lessons about the topics and even additional practice questions.
1-Month SAT Study Plan
To create an SAT study plan for 1 month, start by taking a practice test, then structure your weeks around your results. Focus on your weakest areas first before moving on to study other topics you missed. Once you’ve reviewed the whole practice test, you should either:
- Study with practice questions that target your weaknesses. If you don’t have the time to take another practice test and work through all your answers before test day, continue your prep using practice questions specifically on the topics that you’ve struggled with. You can do this either through online courses offering personalized practice or by compiling questions on this topic from different practice tests.
- Take a second practice test and review it through test day. If you have around two weeks left, you probably have time to take another practice test and work through most of your missed questions. This can help you see how you’ve improved so far and which topics you’ll need to take another look at in the days leading up to the SAT.
2-Week SAT Study Plan
If you only have two to three weeks until your SAT, there are only a few weekends left for significant studying. You won’t be able to fit more than one full practice test review into those weeks, so make sure you thoroughly review your work and supplement it with additional practice questions. Focus more time and effort on the topic areas that you struggle with most—a targeted approach will maximize how much you’ll improve.
Since you’ll only be able to thoroughly work through one practice test, remember to supplement your review and practice questions with other habits and strategies for improving SAT preparedness. Read a book or two similar to the passages you’ll encounter on the digital SAT reading and writing test, study vocabulary lists when you have extra time, review your math schoolwork on common digital SAT math topics, and make sure you understand how to use test-taking strategies.
1-Week SAT Study Plan
With only about one week of SAT studying, it’s less likely that you’ll retain all the information you learned from studying. Still, familiarizing yourself with the exam and learning what mistakes you commonly make will prepare you to put forth your best effort. Take some time before your first practice test to go over common test-taking strategies. Then, use those strategies on your practice test!
When you’re reviewing your practice test, prioritize the questions you are more surprised to see you got incorrect. Because you’re building on the knowledge you applied during the benchmark, you’ll be more likely to remember how to solve them (as opposed to relearning a concept you don’t recall).
SAT Study Plan for Under 3 Days: The Nights Before the Exam
With three or fewer days left until the SAT, you’re unlikely to make huge advances in terms of your knowledge of exam content. So, while you should review the incorrect answers from your practice test, it’s more important to make sure you have a good grasp on what test day will look like for you. If you just started preparing in the days leading up to the test, review essential test-taking strategies and develop a game plan for SAT day.
If you need to cram for the SAT across just a few days, take the time to complete a digital SAT practice test and look over your results. If you had a week or more before the test, you would be using these results to guide what topics you should relearn; however, since you only have a few days left, you’ll use your practice test results to form a test-day game plan. This could mean telling yourself to avoid geometry and trigonometry questions and focus your energy on algebra questions because you know them well, or prioritizing vocabulary questions over ones that ask about inferencing on the Reading and Writing portion. Having a plan going into your SAT is about knowing how to maximize your time on test day to apply what you already know well.
If you have more time after creating your SAT plan, use it to study based on your practice test results. Focus on the questions you nearly missed or were surprised to get wrong—this way, you’ll be able to review a greater number of questions more effectively than if you focus on topics you need to relearn from scratch.
To be as well-prepared as possible, devote as much of your free time as you can to studying in these last few days, but make sure you don’t overwork yourself and burn out. Take breaks throughout study sessions, try to have eight hours of sleep each night before the test, avoid drinking too much caffeine, and enter practice sessions and test day with a positive mindset! Even if you score lower than you expected, you’ll probably be able to retake the exam for a better score.
Test-Taking Strategies for the SAT
Students preparing to take the SAT can improve their test-readiness simply by learning test-taking strategies! These tips will improve the way you approach the exam, helping you work through questions efficiently. Remember to use these Digital SAT tips as you work through practice tests!
- Answer easy questions first. By prioritizing easier questions that you fully understand, you are guaranteed those points before you move on to harder questions that confuse you or take longer to solve.
- Answer every question. Since there is no penalty for wrong answers on the SAT, there’s no reason to leave any questions unanswered. If you’re extremely confused about a question or run out of time to work through it, make educated guesses by crossing off obviously wrong answers.
- Review your math formulas. Even though you’ll have access to a list of formulas for the SAT math portion, you need to understand when to use which formula and how to use them to find the correct answer choice.
- Read actively and with intention. Make sure you don’t zone out, especially on the reading section of the test. The Bluebook app provides an annotation tool and a line reader, which you can use to help keep you concentrated!
Digital SAT Test Prep, Personalized to Your Schedule
We hope these last-minute SAT tips have helped you prepare for your upcoming test! Any amount of preparation will help you put your best effort into this test, no matter how much time is left. Plus, you can (and should!) retake the SAT if your score is lower than you hoped for. Whether you’re preparing to take the SAT for the first time or anticipating a future retake, Piqosity is here to help!
Along with our full-length, online ELA and Math courses for grades 5-11, we offer full SAT, ACT, and ISEE test prep courses, each of which includes 12 practice exams, dozens of concept lessons, personalized practice software, and more. For our digital SAT course, we’re also offering cost-free digital SAT practice tests! This practice Digital SAT is designed to help you prep ahead of time for the exam’s new format, available by signing up for a Piqosity community account.
References:
Emeny, William G., et al. “Spaced mathematics practice improves test scores and reduces overconfidence.” Applied Cognitive Psychology, vol. 35, no. 4, 9 Mar. 2021, pp. 1082–1089, https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.3814.
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