Writing Lecture Two

Registration deadlines for the SAT this spring:

Registration Deadline	Test Date
Feb. 10, 2010	Mar. 13, 2010
Mar. 31, 2010	May 1, 2010
May 5, 2010	June 5, 2010

Cost is only $45, and you can register online. Fee waivers are available for homeschoolers if they qualify and have some type of counselor send the form in.

Let's focus now specific types of questions that are asked.

Sentence Completion Questions

18 out of 67 questions -- more than 25% -- of the "critical reading" section ask students to "complete the sentence" by filling in two missing words. Let's look at some examples and improve our ability to answer this type of question.

Example:

Once the underdog Republican Scott Brown defeated the favored Democrat Martha Coakley win the election for the U.S. Senate seat long held by the late Democrat Ted Kennedy, it demonstrated the __________ between the Republicans and Democrats would likely ___________.

(A) agreement ... continue

(B) conflict ... persist

(C) bipartisanship ... end

(D) cooperation ... prevail

(E) negotiations ... be unthinkable

This type of question is like filling in a jigsaw puzzle. You are given an idea of the "point" or message of the sentence, and then asked to fill in two missing "pieces" or words to complete the sentence. This is no different from having an almost-complete jigsaw puzzle and trying to find the pieces that can fit into and fill the remaining gaps.

It's impossible to complete a jigsaw puzzle until you first understand what the final picture is supposed to look at. The same is true for these sentences. Be sure to understand the point of the sentence before trying to fill in the blanks.

In the above example, the point of the sentence is that a Republican won a Senate seat that was long held by the opposite party, the Democrats. The contest between Republicans and Democrats was not a friendly one, but one of tension. This immediately points to (B), which uses the word "conflict", as a "fit" for the gap in the sentence.

The key to success on these sentence completion questions are the following:

• the correct pair typically has some natural relation to each other, either as opposites or as a common matter of speech
• awkward pairs can typically be eliminated
• the context should guide you to the first word, and the context should give you clues as to what the second word should be in relation to the first

<understanding point of sentence before trying to fill in blanks>

<identifying tension between blanks before filling them in>

<dealing with words of unknown meaning by using context>

Focus on Writing Section

The writing section begins with an essay that you are given 25 minutes to write.

The remainder of the writing section is 49 multiple-choice questions to be completed in only 35 minutes (one 25-minute section and one 10-minute section).

The 49 multiple choice questions are divided as follows:

• improving sentences (25 questions)
• identifying grammar errors in sentences (18 questions)
• improving paragraphs (6 questions).

Biggest mistakes

• cramming
• scheduling test-taking too late
• not managing time
• under-emphasizing, then over-emphasizing significance of test

Homework Assignment

<read lecture>

<writing exam questions>