Posted: Wed Aug 26, 2009 4:30 pm
Reading is good for learning vocabulary and grammar patterns and punctuation, but beyond a certain point it's not going to help much with reading comprehension. For that you really need formal study materials of the sort you'll find on the test, so you can try out different strategies and see which works the best. For instance, I've found that it helps to read the questions first, then the text, then answer the questions, since if you know what the questions are in advance, you can pick up the answers as you go.
Learning 5 random dictionary words per day is useless. There are so many words in the English language that even if you learn 5 per day for several years with perfect retention, you'll only end up learning only about 4% of the vocabulary. Moderate difficulty crossword puzzles might help, studying vocabulary lists specifically from the SAT will help a lot more, and learning all the common word roots will perhaps help the most. For instance, if you know that amoral means without morals, then you can guess that atypical means not typical or unusual/abnormal.
Writing practice is certainly good, but you need someone to grade / fix your writing or you may not make much progress in anything except speed.
Learning 5 random dictionary words per day is useless. There are so many words in the English language that even if you learn 5 per day for several years with perfect retention, you'll only end up learning only about 4% of the vocabulary. Moderate difficulty crossword puzzles might help, studying vocabulary lists specifically from the SAT will help a lot more, and learning all the common word roots will perhaps help the most. For instance, if you know that amoral means without morals, then you can guess that atypical means not typical or unusual/abnormal.
Writing practice is certainly good, but you need someone to grade / fix your writing or you may not make much progress in anything except speed.