SAT study strategies · For students
Before doing more SAT questions, review your last practice test
Use a few questions from your last SAT practice test to understand what went wrong, compare your reasoning, and choose one useful skill to practice next.
By Hetvi Shah ·
You’ve finished an SAT practice test, looked at the result, and started thinking about the next one. Before you add another set of questions, spend a little time with the work you already did.
You don’t have to review the entire test in one sitting. Start with three questions: one you missed, one you guessed, and one that took longer than you expected. If those overlap, choose another question you weren’t sure about. The aim is to understand what happened well enough to choose something useful to practice next.
Try again before opening the explanation
For each question, read the directions and stimulus again. Try it without a timer, and write down your reasoning before checking the solution.
Notice the first place you need help. Maybe you don’t know which relationship to use. Maybe you can do the calculation but aren’t sure what the question asks for. Maybe the passage makes sense, but you can’t explain why one answer is better than another.
Getting it right on this second attempt is useful information, but you’ve already seen the question. It doesn’t prove that timing caused the original miss or that you can handle a different version independently.
Look at what your calculation means
Try this original SAT-style example before reading on:
A jacket’s price decreased from $80 to $68. What was the percent decrease?
A. 12% B. 15% C. Approximately 17.6% D. 85%
The price dropped by $12. Percent decrease compares that change with the original price: 12 ÷ 80 = 0.15, or 15%. The answer is B.
Choice A treats the dollar change as a percentage. Choice C divides by the final price, 68, instead of the original price. Choice D gives the percentage of the original price that remains: 68 ÷ 80 = 85%.
If you chose C, “be more careful” won’t tell you much about what to do next. A more useful note would be: “Before dividing, identify the original amount.” If you couldn’t start, go back to what a percent change measures and work through that relationship first.
Read the explanation with your own attempt beside it
Compare the steps, rather than copying the finished solution. Find the point where your reasoning differed, and check why the other choices don’t fit.
You can use a few rough labels to organize your notes: a concept you need to learn, an instruction you missed, or a decision about time. “Not sure yet” is a reasonable label too. One answer may involve more than one issue, and you don’t have to decide immediately.
For Reading and Writing, make the note just as specific. Instead of “bad at reading,” you might write, “I chose an answer that said every study, but the passage described one study.” That gives you a claim to check in your next question.
Give your next session one job
Choose one issue from the review. Read the relevant lesson or worked example, then close it and try a different question. Keep track of any help you used. If the new question still feels difficult, return to the step that’s unclear rather than increasing the number of questions.
Come back to the idea in a later session with another fresh question. An immediate retry can help you practice a method; returning later gives you another opportunity to choose it without the explanation beside you. Neither is a guarantee of mastery, but both can inform what you work on next.
If the jacket example exposed a gap, begin with the Percentages lesson, then choose a short percentage practice set. If your review points somewhere else, choose that topic instead. Your next SAT session can be small and still have a clear purpose.
