It’s that time of year again! School bells are ringing and classes are officially back in session. Sharpen your pencils, change your calculator batteries and dust off your backpack. Check the shopping list from your teachers and fill in any gaps. Some important things to remember:
-A planner! Arguably the most important thing you need for the year. A planner will keep you organized and ahead of the game all year, and take the stress out of trying to remember assignments and due dates.
-Highlighters. These are great for critical reading when you need to mark passages or important quotes, or for marking your answers in math
-Sticky Notes. Need to remember a page in a textbook? Mark a date in the planner? Make a to-do list? Remind yourself about anything? These will do the trick without damaging your books.
-Hole punch. Papers aren’t going to fit in your binder without one of these! Really useful if you hate your assignments flying out of your binder or getting crumpled in the bottom of a backpack.
-Colored pens. Using different colors to make notes or color coding your outlines and flashcards will keep you organized and help with recall later.
And most importantly, schedule your tutoring sessions! The Study Hut is gearing up for the school year, with some fresh new faces and a lot of new school supplies. Things are already getting crazy here, the first round of tests are coming up fast! Whether you need an extra push with schoolwork or want to practice for standardized tests, we are here for you. We have several diagnostic tests coming up for SATs and ACTs, as well at tutoring in all subjects. Need help in math? Got an essay to write and don’t know where to start? Just want to get ahead? Come on by! Our goal is to help students be successful.
With summer underway and the Independence Day holiday weekend behind us, our enrichment programs at Study Hut are in full force, and learning is back on the agenda.
Tonight we begin our ACT small-group course, which runs Monday and Wednesday evenings for the remainder of summer. Our SAT small-group course also begins tomorrow evening, and runs through the rest of summer on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. Students are excited to learn concepts that they either missed in high school or have not yet learned, and they are even more eager to go over their practice tests and learn time management and question prioritization strategies for both the ACT and SAT. Students in previous classes at Study Hut Tutoring have learned all about the tremendous benefits of having an ACT tutor or an SAT tutor in their corner.
Whether a student needs help with SAT math, critical reading, writing, or some combination of these, having a top Study Hut tutor has shown to make a huge difference in students’ scores. Our small group ACT and SAT classes have helped to earn students an average of over 200 points of improvement from their original scores, and many students improve 300 or more points.
At the Hut, we strongly suggest making a game-plan early so as to ensure that your son or daughter has the maximum amount of time to make the gains that he or she desires. The test preparation process is, after all, about opening as many doors as possible, both for college and for opportunities beyond.
If your son or daughter has not yet taken a practice SAT or ACT, now is the time to see where you stand. We offer free full-length SAT and ACT diagnostic tests, and we also provide free consultations to parents and students after the test so that you can fully understand your results. Please email info@studyhut.com today to sign up at any of our beach-front locations.
We’ve all heard the expression and sang the song, School’s out for summer by the one and only Alice Cooper… but for many, it’s the beginning of the end!! As we say, “So close, yet so far”
AP’s have past and finals are quickly approaching… and SAT’s are tomorrow!!
For those that are on the cusp of a letter grade, focus hard and makes sure to get that grade up! If you’re at a 79.8, 79.9,80.0, 89.8, 89.9…. you want to make sure to pull those grades up!!
If you are in the middle of a grade… it will be harder to move your grade to the next letter grade.
What else can you focus on? Well for those taking the SAT, here are some good tips to remember:
– Make sure to read the question and making yourself read like a 2nd grade. Put your finger under every word in the directions (if you tend to make mistakes by not reading the question).
– Lookout for extreme answer choices in the Critical Reading section! If the answer choice contains strong words like ‘never, always, must, impossible, cannot, only, all, none, etc,’ then it is likely incorrect.
-Maintain a healthy low sugar diet high in vitamins and other essential nutrient, it will increase your ability to focus and is good for you anyway!
– Ample sleep is crucial just like any other test!
– Do your best not to stress out, cortisol is a hormone released when you stress, and while its effects may help save you from a bear attack, the effects of cortisol are no good for test taking! Stay positive!
-Consistent studying is very important, cramming Is stressful and not too successful!
-Try to have a good understanding of the direction of how to take the test before you go in so you don’t have to waste time reading directions! Every second is important.
For the past 7 weeks, we have held 2 group courses to help students prepare for the SATs. Our group courses took place on the nights of Tues/Thurs and Mon/Wed from 7-9 p.m.
The cap for the SAT classes are 10 students and P.J. and Josh were the teachers for the SAT course. The January group course helped the students prepare for the March SAT exam that just took place this past Saturday, March 9th.
HIGHLIGHTS: Victoria, one of the 10 students in P.J’s SAT Group Course, went up 300 points from the help of the SAT course!
HERE’S THE IMPORTANT PART: Our next SAT course starts TONIGHT…. and we have 4 SPOTS LEFT!! P.J. will be the teacher for this SAT Group Course which will help students prepare for the May SAT test. We are only offering one group course on Tues/Thurs!!
We will have one week off for Spring Break so please keep that in mind. If you would like to sign up for our group course please contact our MB office manager Samantha … samantha@studyhut.com or call the Manhattan Beach Study Hut: (310)546-2408.
We have many tips that we share with our students on how to succeed on the SAT – and today our 1st tip comes from Andrew, one of our SAT tutors.
1st Tip: “Lookout for extreme answer choices in the Critical Reading section! If the answer choice contains strong words like ‘never, always, must, impossible, cannot, only, all, none, etc,’ then it is likely incorrect.”
Lastly, if you don’t want to be in the SAT Group Course, we also offer 3 different SAT Packages: 40 hour, 32 hour, and 24 hour (prices range depending on package you pick). We also do private one-on-one SAT tutoring. We have wonderful SAT tutors including but not limited too: Rhiannon, Kristen, Jeff, Frank, Rita, Josh, and Andrew! One-on-one private tutoring costs $100 plus a $65 materials fee.
A: The confirmed dates so far for 2013 are January 16, March 9, May 4, June 1.
Q: How do I sign up for the SAT test?
A: There are two ways to sign up for the SAT, by mail and Online at www.collegeboard.com. To sign up by mail acquire the College Board’s Bulletin by calling or emailing the college board and having them send a copy or getting one from your schools guidance counselors and fill out the registration form within. The other and much easier way to register is directly at the collegeboard website. You will first have to create a profile on the collegeboard website, filling out the required personal information and a short questionare. After completing those forms you will now have a username and password which you will use to sign up for everything SAT related. On the website you will follow the prompts to sign up for your specific test and testing location
Q: How far in advance do you need to sign up for the SAT
A: The regular deadline to apply is 5 weeks before the testing day, so for the January 16th test the deadline is December 28th. There is also a late deadline that is 2 weeks before the test which incurs an additional sign up fee and you will not be guaranteed your first choice of testing center.
Q: Does the writing section of the SAT count towards your final score?
A: The short answer is Yes, the collegeboard will send you a score out of 2400 including the writing section, 800 total for each math, critical reading and writing. The long answer is much more complicated. Different colleges either use or do not use the writing score in determining your score and admittance. For further information check each respective colleges websites to see if they do or do not take into account the writing score in determining the applicants admission status.
Today in AVID 10 at Palos Verdes High School, Rob and SP introduced our first lesson for the Critical Reading section of the SAT. Training for the SAT can be very difficult, and for many students, the vocabulary component of the Critical Reading section can be extremely daunting.
In an effort to keep things simple, but at the same time teach students a new and complex concept, Rob decided to start the SAT tutoring with the “plus-minus-neutral” approach, a strategy that can help students eliminate incorrect answer choices by assigning a value or feeling of worth to the blank space, as well as each of the answer choices.
Students then practiced eliminating wrong answer choices and making educated guesses about which vocabulary words would and would not work in each sentence. The process was rigorous and slightly painful, but I think we all walked away from the experience with a new tool in our quiver of SAT strategies.
Here is an example of a question students will see on the Critical Reading section of the SAT. You will probably understand why training is the only way to attack a test that contains hundreds of problems like this:
1. Today Wegener’s theory is ____ ; however, he died an outsider treated with ____ by the scientific establishment.
A. unsupported – approval
B. dismissed – contempt
C. accepted – approbation
D. unchallenged – disdain
E. unrivaled – reverence
Please let Study Hut know if you need any tutoring or training for the SAT, specifically the Critical Reading section. We have excellent SAT tutors who earned great scores, went to top universities, and follow our streamlined approach to no-nonsense SAT training.
Ah, the SAT. No matter where you live, where you go to school, or what kind of grades you get, the SAT is an experience that bonds American students of all ages. It’s changed over the years, but the idea is the same: find a way to accurately gauge a student’s level of education through completely standardized means. Now, whether it’s an effective gauge is another debate entirely. What matters to you is how well you do on the test. And that’s what we’re here to help with.
First of all, you should understand what you’re getting into. The SAT is divided into three sections: Math, Writing, and Critical Reading. The Math section covers nearly everything you’ll learn in the first two years of High School, plus a little bit of Junior year. Basically, expect to be tested on all of Algebra and Geometry. Not to worry, though; nothing from Trig or beyond will be on the test. The Critical Reading section involves two main parts. First is Reading Passages, in which you’ll be given passages to read (duh.) and will have to answer questions based on the content of the reading. Second is the Fill-In-The-Blank section, where you’ll have to school SAT vocabulary words to complete sentences, based on context. Last but not least, there’s the Writing section. This begins with an essay, followed by MORE reading paragraphs (now based more on grammar and sentence structure than content), and correcting sentence errors.
The test runs just under four hours. This involves 6 25 minute sections (two from each subject, including the essay), two 20 minute sections, and one ten minute sections. You’ll receive breaks after each two sections (3 breaks total).
NOW, how do you prepare? This is going to sound weird, but studying the material is NOT the biggest way to prepare (but still important). What we do here in our SAT Prep Courses is teach you STRATEGY. We teach you how to solve any problem, and how to do it in a quick and efficient manner (which, on a timed test, is priority one). We’ll teach you when to skip a question, when to guess, how to mark up a paragraph, and how to write a proper essay that the graders will love. We’ll show you how to raise that grade.
SO, this is how to do it. Come in for a free diagnostic. This let’s us see what level you’re at. Then, sign up for either our group classes, or private SAT tutoring sessions. This is dependent entirely on you, and how you learn best. Either way, we’re gonna work hard to make sure you know what you’re doing when that SAT rolls along.
