My Child Needs SAT Help. Where Do We Start?
If you’re the parent of a high school student and you’ve started thinking about the SAT, it can be difficult to know where to begin.
Should your child take a practice test first? Start tutoring? Enroll in an SAT prep course? When should preparation begin? And how much preparation is actually necessary?
After more than 20 years of helping students prepare for the SAT, I’ve found that the best place to start is not with hours of studying. It’s with figuring out exactly where your child stands.
First, know that freshman year or earlier is really too soon to prepare for the test. A sophomore who wants to get a head start can do some preparation and college planning. I've designed a course called SAT Foundations expressly for this purpose. It shows students the skills that are on the SAT and introduces them to college and the application process.
After sophomore year, follow these steps:
1. Visit a college. Go on a tour.
College is an intangible thing to high school students until they get their feet on a campus and walk around. A college tour or two will help them see what they're about to work toward.
2. Get a baseline score.
A good prep course will start with a full SAT so that students can see the test and see where their scores are before preparation. Then they can make a plan to increase that score realistically. You can't pick the score you want; it's all about maximizing your score from where you started. Know that sometimes PSAT score can line up with starting SAT scores, and sometimes not.
3. Make a plan to prepare.
Decide whether your student needs self study, a course, private tutoring, or both. Most student have trouble teaching themselves, so usually a course or tutoring is more effective, but it also depends on what your student needs. If it's a matter of a few point increase to get into the range of colleges that student is considering, self study can work. For most, a course gives the structure and content students need. Some students need more focused attention, and some students take a course, take the test, and then do some private tutoring before taking the test again. ThatI's why HASSSAT offers all options to meet different students' different needs. Also, don't try to prepare when a student is most busy; if a student plays basketball, winter is not the best time to prepare for the SAT. Decide when to prepare.
4. After preparing, take the test and then take it again.
It's important to take the SAT and then plan on taking it again soon after. Get the scores (two weeks after the taking it), see where you can improve, work on those things with review and practice (or with some one on one tutoring), and take the test again. Colleges superscore the results, meaning that if a student does better on English on test one and better on math on test two, the colleges will put those two scores together. So it's in everyone's best interest to take the test multiple times. Waiting months before taking it again can be counterproductive since students generally loose their test-taking skills over time.
5. Don't wait until the last minute.
Waiting until fall of senior year means placing all your eggs in one basket. Sometimes this is unavoidable, but it's better to tackle the SAT junior year and leave senior year to college applications.
SAT Help for South Jersey and Philadelphia-Area Students
I have been helping students prepare for the SAT for more than 20 years through HASSSAT SAT Prep.
I personally teach my SAT courses and work directly with students in individual tutoring. My approach combines SAT content, test-taking strategies, digital SAT techniques, and targeted practice designed to help students understand not only what they missed, but why they missed it.
HASSSAT works with students throughout South Jersey, including families in Voorhees, Cherry Hill, Marlton, Moorestown, Haddonfield, and surrounding communities.
You can learn more about HASSSAT SAT Prep, upcoming courses, SAT Foundations, and individual tutoring at hasssat.com.