27% on Kaplan

[tennisball80]

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😡😡😡

I am trying to ace ACT and today I bought a Kaplan book.

It tells me to do a practice test first.

Did a kaplan quick ACT practice test and got the following result

Overall %= 65%

ACT Book Companion - English Section 64%

ACT Book Companion - Math Section 73%

ACT Book Companion - Reading Section 27%

ACT Book Companion - Science Section 73%
I am really disappointed

Any study tips for the reading section ? 👍

 

[Caesar]

😡😡😡

I am trying to ace ACT and today I bought a Kaplan book.

It tells me to do a practice test first.

Did a kaplan quick ACT practice test and got the following result

Overall %= 65%

ACT Book Companion - English Section 11 737 64%

ACT Book Companion - Math Section 11 949 73%

ACT Book Companion - Reading Section 11 1463 27%

ACT Book Companion - Science Section 11 829 73%
I am really disappointed

Any study tips for the reading section ? 👍

read alot. pick up some more difficult reading. Some journal or something. I like National Geographic. Not too complex at all but still entertaining and not a childrens book. Also helps keep up on the humanities.

 

[penguinophile]

😡😡😡

I am trying to ace ACT and today I bought a Kaplan book.

It tells me to do a practice test first.

Did a kaplan quick ACT practice test and got the following result

Overall %= 65%

ACT Book Companion - English Section 64%

ACT Book Companion - Math Section 73%

ACT Book Companion - Reading Section 27%

ACT Book Companion - Science Section 73%
I am really disappointed

Any study tips for the reading section ? 👍

Don't have any familiarity with Kaplan for ACT, especially a "quick" practice test. However, if you want to get good at ACT reading you need a different approach for each of the sections. Overall though, the beauty of the ACT reading is that the questions are more holistic in nature, requiring that you only read the passage and process a bit.

Social Science and Natural Science really are fairly straightforward, but often a little boring. What you need to do for these sections is focus in on the main arguments that the author is making. Most of the questions will come from this.

In the Prose Fiction section, you need to understand the characters and their motivations. If you can gain an appreciation for who each character is and what role they play then you should be fine for most questions.

The humanities is a bit different because it can resemble prose fiction or it can come close to the way social science is written.

The best thing for you to do, especially if you have limited time is to read newspapers or magazines like discover and scientific american so that you can focus on passages that aren't incredibly long. If you do that and take a ton of practice tests, you should be well on your way to succeeding. Remember that the ACT doesn't historically do a lot of "line reference" questions, so you need to be able to understand the passage as a whole and not have to go back line by line and justify your ideas.

 

[Silverzc413]

ignore percents, what's your actual score out of 36 for each section?

also, you gotta remember, the ACT is only one part of your application. However, I believe it is the EASIEST thing to raise up. ACT, SAT, etc, are all a game. The more you play, the better you get. Keep doing practice tests, get familiar with the test's layout (this is very important), and go over to see what you got wrong and right.

 

[tennisball80]

ignore percents, what's your actual score out of 36 for each section?

also, you gotta remember, the ACT is only one part of your application. However, I believe it is the EASIEST thing to raise up. ACT, SAT, etc, are all a game. The more you play, the better you get. Keep doing practice tests, get familiar with the test's layout (this is very important), and go over to see what you got wrong and right.

It was a practice test and Kaplan did not give me any actual score.

 

[Ella Shepherd]

😡😡

I am trying to ace ACT and today I bought a Kaplan book.

It tells me to do a practice test first.

Did a kaplan quick ACT practice test and got the following result

Overall %= 65%

ACT Book Companion - English Section 64%

ACT Book Companion - Math Section 73%

ACT Book Companion - Reading Section 27%

ACT Book Companion - Science Section 73%
I am really disappointed

Any study tips for the reading section ?

I suggest you start reading good books a little more. Even 15 to 30 minutes each day or before going to bed would do. I often keep a dictionary near me so that if I don't understand a word being used I can consult it right away. At first it'll be quite irritating to stop reading to check a word in the dictionary, but you get the hang of it and it benefits you in the long run.

I dunno what kind of books you like reading but some books you can try are (If you don't like them then at least they can give you some ideas of what to read.) 🙂:

Echoes from the Infantry: A Novel by Frank Nappi
The Legend of Mickey Tussler by Frank Nappi
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Esperanza Rising by Pam Munoz Ryan
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Bell Jar: A Novel by Sylvia Plath
Books from the Tillerman Cycle by Cynthia Voigt (in order):
Homecoming
Dicey's Song
A Solitary Blue
The Runner
Come a Stranger
Sons from Afar
Seventeen Against the Dealer

There are so many books to choose from! 😀 You just have to look for one that both interests you and helps improve your vocabulary.

I hope I helped. Good luck!

 

[creativedentist]

I have also found a lot of familiar words from the SAT/ACT from Jane Austen & Charlotte Bronte books. Like Pride & Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Emma, Jane Eyre, etc. They're actually really good books (and filled with a ton of good vocabulary). I've been taking practice tests over and over again, and my reading score has definitely improved.

What I've found is that the main things you need to know from the passages they give you, is the purpose and the main ideas the author is trying to tell you. Just get familiar with the test. Good luck! I'm going to be taking the ACT "for real" this time on October 25th!

 

[Depakote]

Something I've found with Kaplan specifically... they like to hit you hard in the beginning. It motivates you to study and it also identifies your weaknesses.

I wouldn't stress so much about the fact that you got a 27% as using it to recognize that it is a weak point and that you need to devote a reasonable proportion of your prep time to that area.