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Give me 13 minutes, I'll teach you to get a 1500 SAT score — Transcript

by Patrick Choi · 3,148 words · 450 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00The SAT isn't testing what you think it
0:02is. See, most students spend hundreds of
0:04hours drilling content, reading grammar
0:06rules, memorizing formulas, taking full
0:08practice tests, and their score barely
0:10moves. Or, it jumps by 100 points, and
0:12then it slides right back down. And most
0:14of them never realize that the test is
0:15built to spread everyone out on purpose.
0:17The questions themselves aren't the hard
0:19part. The scoring rewards a completely
0:21different strategy than the one that
0:22most prep courses teach. See, I've been
0:24teaching this test for almost 30 years,
0:26and I've taken it myself over 18 times.
0:28And I was a vice president of content
0:29development for The Princeton Review in
0:31Korea. And in all that time, I've
0:32watched thousands of students grind
0:34harder and harder at the wrong thing,
0:36while the ones who figured out the
0:37actual game improved fast. So, in the
0:39next few minutes, I'm going to show you
0:40the framework that separates students
0:42who get to a 1,500 from the ones who
0:44just work hard and never get there. The
0:46section number one, how the test decides
0:48what hard means. Now, everyone thinks
0:51hard on the SAT means an advanced
0:53concept, and it doesn't. Let me show you
0:54where the difficulty label actually
0:56comes from. Every single question in
0:57their own bank is tagged as easy,
1:00medium, or hard, right next to the
1:01topic. And that's not my label, that's
1:03theirs. So, where do these tags come
1:05from? Every time the test is given,
1:06there are four modules, as everyone
1:08knows, and roughly two experimental
1:09questions on each module. So, about
1:11eight per test. These questions look
1:12identical to every other question, but
1:14they don't count towards your score, and
1:15nobody knows which ones they are. After
1:17a test, the College Board now has
1:19hundreds of thousands of data points on
1:20every question. They know exactly what
1:22percentage of the students got it right,
1:23and what percentage got it wrong. So,
1:25difficulty isn't really assigned by how
1:27advanced the concept is. It's assigned
1:29by how many students get wrong. So, the
1:31test doesn't really decide that a
1:32question is hard or that they're testing
1:34you on more advanced concepts, but for
1:35some reason, most of the students get
1:37this one wrong. And these are what's
1:38called the the tricks or the traps that
1:40the that a lot of people talk about when
1:42they're talking about the test. And
1:43these could be just simply that people
1:45read a passage, and it talks about a
1:47popular novel, and everyone knows it, so
1:49the student makes a certain assumptions
1:50about those novels. Or, it could be just
1:52simply topics that aren't that haven't
1:53been covered in a while, like, you know,
1:54the circle formula, or volume, or area
1:56of a circle or geometry and things of
1:59that sort. Miserable versus
2:00uncomfortable. Multiple steps to not
2:02even answer the question. Careless
2:04mistakes. Some of the reasons why these
2:05questions are considered hard is because
2:07they're not necessarily testing on
2:08advanced concepts, but there are
2:10multiple steps to do. And by time the
2:12student's done with the question or
2:13while they're doing the question,
2:14they're saying, "Am I even done yet?
2:16Holy cow." Or a lot of times a student
2:18will pick an answer that doesn't
2:19actually answer the question. It's just
2:21one of the parts of the answer to the
2:22question, but the answer choice is right
2:24there. Or just even careless mistakes.
2:25The SATs know when most students make
2:27their careless mistakes. So then they're
2:29going to build that into the problem so
2:31that you make those mistakes. And
2:32because they know those accuracy rates
2:34in advance, they built each test to
2:36spread scores across the whole range. So
2:38most students will end up landing in the
2:39middle, a very few low, a very few high.
2:42Because if everybody scored in the 700s,
2:44a 700 would be meaningless. And the
2:46whole point of the test is to separate
2:47people. Now, people will tell you that
2:49the question types are what matters, but
2:51look at any student's test from the
2:52difficulty angle instead. They get all
2:54the easy questions right, most of the
2:55medium right, and then they'll get most
2:57of the hard questions wrong. They
2:58already know how to find the central
3:00idea. The topic barely changes. It's the
3:02difficulty that climbs. So if the test
3:04is built to sort you, the thing that
3:05decides your score is how you spend your
3:07time. Section two. You don't get points
3:09for finishing. Almost every student does
3:10this. They open up the module, they
3:12start question number one, and they
3:13treat finishing all 27 or 22 questions
3:16inside the time limit as the goal. I
3:18know this because when I ask students,
3:19"How did the test go?" they'll say,
3:21"Well, I finished it." Great. [music]
3:22And it makes sense, right? Because no
3:24teacher in your life has handed you a
3:26test and said, "Answer as many questions
3:28as you can and bring it back to me when
3:29you're done." No, you've always been
3:31told to finish it. So finishing and
3:33doing well got fused together in your
3:34head as good. You don't get points for
3:36finishing the test on time. That's a
3:37given. You get points for answering the
3:39questions correctly. I'll show you my
3:40easy, medium, and hard trick. So the
3:43lowest score that you can get on any SAT
3:45section is 200 points. And the highest
3:47score that you can get on any SAT
3:48section is 800 points. 200 points just
3:50for signing your name, and 800 points is
3:52the maximum points that you can get. So,
3:53on for example, the reading writing
3:55section, you have up to 600 points that
3:57you can earn. Now, let's look at this
3:59from a macro perspective. The questions
4:00are broken down into three types. You
4:02have the easy questions, the medium
4:04questions, and the hard questions, okay?
4:06There's an even distribution of points
4:07that you can earn from each of the
4:09different question types. So, that means
4:10you can get 200 from the easy questions,
4:12200 from the medium questions, 200 from
4:14the hard questions, plus the 200 points
4:15that you originally get. Now, let's say
4:17that your typical student gets about 80%
4:19of the easy questions, right? 50% of the
4:21medium questions, right? And none of the
4:23hard questions, right? Because
4:25statistically, that's what you're
4:26supposed to do. So, now, 80% of 200 is
4:28160, 50% of 200 is 100, and 0% of 200 is
4:330. So, now, if I add that all up, I get
4:36200 + 160, so that's 360, + 100 is 460.
4:40So, this is the score that they get. So,
4:41if I were to look at this differently,
4:43and let's say we use a different color
4:44pen. So, a student who focuses on easy,
4:47medium, and hard, so let's say they get
4:48100% of the easy questions, right? 100%
4:50of the medium questions, right? And just
4:52guesses or doesn't even do the hard
4:54questions. Well, then that changes the
4:55calculus here, right? So, we have the
4:56200 points to start. 100% of 200 is 200,
4:59and then 100% of 200 for the mediums is
5:01200, and then 0% of 200 is 0. So, 200 +
5:05200 + 200 is 600. So, right there, a
5:08student went up 140 points by doing
5:10fewer questions and only focusing on the
5:13easy's and the mediums versus going into
5:15the hards. So, take a student scoring
5:17below 1,000, for example. If they only
5:19work the first half of the test and got
5:21all of it right, and just pick a single
5:22letter for the rest, they probably score
5:24higher than they do now. Now, this feels
5:26so wrong to students because they cannot
5:28stop themselves from finishing the test.
5:30They cannot stop themselves from getting
5:32to the end, because we've all been
5:33trained to do so, even though the name
5:36of the game is answering the most number
5:37of questions correctly. So, if you were
5:38to answer 2/3 [music] of the test
5:40correctly, and just kind of pick a
5:41letter for the remaining third, then you
5:42would answer more questions correctly,
5:44then that's a win. But, we can't seem to
5:46get that out of our head. So, if
5:47finishing isn't the goal, you need a way
5:49to decide in the moment which questions
5:51are actually worth your time. That's the
5:53[music] framework. Section number three,
5:54now, later, or last. If you see my SAT
5:56math videos, you've heard me sort
5:57questions this way. This is the version
5:59that runs on all of it. It's the one
6:00that moves the composite score instead
6:02of just one section. Now, later, or
6:04last. So, now questions. If you look at
6:06it and you know you can do this, it's
6:08straightforward, do it immediately.
6:09Later, you look at it and you can do it,
6:11but it'll take some work or you're a
6:12little bit rusty, do that later. Come
6:14back later. Come back after all the nows
6:16are done. Last, you have no idea what
6:18you're looking at. You pick a letter and
6:20you move on. These only get done if you
6:21have time left.
6:22>> Okay, so if I look at a test, if I look
6:24at a section, the first couple of
6:26questions are going always going to be
6:26vocab in context. Just looking at the
6:28words, uncertainty of, indicator of,
6:30motivation for, criticism of, I know
6:31what these words mean. The The passage
6:33is pretty short and straightforward, so
6:35this is going to be a now question. Uh
6:37this one, susceptible, contingent,
6:38saturated, depleted, I know what most of
6:40these words mean. The sentence is a
6:41little bit more complicated, so I'm just
6:42going to put this as a later question.
6:44I'm going to do this after I do all of
6:45my nows. And then this one, speculated,
6:47dismissed, expand, I know what these
6:48words mean, so I'm going to do these
6:50now.
6:50>> [music]
6:50>> Uh get his mother to accept, get his
6:52mother to apologize for, get his mother
6:54to match. Yeah, this one, I know what
6:55they mean, so I'm going to do these now.
6:57And so this question, the passage is a
6:58little bit longer, there's a lot of
7:00different things to keep track of, and
7:02it's asking me for something that would
7:03logically complete the text, so it's
7:04harder to predict what the answer is
7:06going to be. Uh this is going to be
7:07last. [music] And this one here talks
7:09about the young contagion. It's a
7:11scientific study, and then sometimes I
7:13struggle with scientific questions, so
7:15this one's definitely going to be last
7:16as well.
7:17>> And if you run out of time before the
7:18last, that's fine. You spent the clock
7:20on everything you should have been
7:21getting right instead of bleeding it on
7:23harder questions. One thing, on a
7:25student's very first test, I give no
7:27guidance at all. Just take it like you
7:28normally would. The instructions simply
7:30accuracy over completion. The triage
7:32comes once patterns start showing up.
7:34Now, for students who already answer
7:35everything and are only fighting the
7:36clock, you flip it. You do the hard
7:38questions first and come back to the
7:40easy ones immediately. The logic is you
7:41protect your clock for the hard
7:43questions because you can't tell how
7:44fast you need to go until it's too late.
7:46For the intermediate and beginner
7:47students, this is wrong because they
7:48can't do the hard questions with any
7:50amount of time. Triage tells you which
7:51question to work. It doesn't tell you
7:53how to work them. And that's where most
7:54of the remaining points are. That's what
7:56I actually do with my students. We pull
7:58their real practice tests, we find the
7:59three or four mistakes costing them the
8:01most points, and build the processes
8:02that fixes them. And we keep working
8:04with you until you hit your 1500. That's
8:06the guarantee. So, if you want that, the
8:07link in the description books a call
8:09with our enrollment team. Section four,
8:11the three processes. Triage gets you the
8:13right question. Now, how you actually
8:14work them. There's a process for each
8:16question, and each one changes what you
8:18physically do at the desk. Same
8:20knowledge, different move. Reading. The
8:22habit I have to break is this. A student
8:24reads a passage, looks at the answers,
8:25pick the one that they like, and then
8:26moves on. Instead, I make them do this.
8:28I make them paraphrase what they've
8:29read, write the paraphrasing down,
8:31predict what the right answer is going
8:32to look like before you look at the
8:33answer choices. And then for each of the
8:35answer choices, I find the exact word or
8:36phrase that makes it wrong. What word or
8:38phrase makes the answer choice wrong?
8:40And the reason I make them write the
8:41paraphrasing down is so that I can see
8:43it. A student gets a question wrong, I
8:44look at their paraphrase, and if it's
8:46too broad or if it's missing half the
8:47concepts, now I know exactly what to
8:49fix. So, like a bad paraphrasing would
8:51be something that says like "Vandalism
8:52equals bad." When the entire passage is
8:55not about vandalism being bad, but how
8:56there are benefits to vandalism. Now,
8:58most students read with their eyes and
9:00not with their brains. You know what I'm
9:01talking about. And then there's a two
9:03answer trap. Students get down to two
9:05answer choices
9:06>> [music]
9:06>> and freeze because they've been hunting
9:07for what's right, looking for the right
9:09answer, makes your brain fill in the
9:11gaps and justify the answer choices.
9:13Switch to hunting for what's wrong, and
9:14one of them will collapse. Say a choice
9:16claims a character was miserable, but
9:18nothing in the passage justifies misery,
9:19maybe discomfort, but not misery, then
9:21it's gone. Logically, one of them has to
9:23be right, and one has to be wrong. Prove
9:25one true or prove one false. On grammar,
9:28the default move is to plug each answer
9:29choice back into the sentence and read
9:31through to see which one sounds good.
9:33That's slow, and it relies on the ear
9:35that was never trained on correct
9:36grammar. Do this instead. Look at what's
9:38changing between the answer choices. So,
9:40when we're doing grammar questions, I
9:42always want to go through the answer
9:43choices and do what's called a vertical
9:44process of elimination and look for what
9:46changes in the answer choice. [music]
9:48So, for this one, for example, I have
9:49screws, apostrophe s, s apostrophe,
9:52apostrophe s, s.
9:54>> [music]
9:54>> So, now I have to figure out whether
9:55they're talking about singular
9:56possessive, plural possessive, or just
9:58[music] plural. For example, if it's
10:00singular possessive, then I can get rid
10:02of B and I can get rid of D and I'm left
10:04with A [music] and C. Okay? So, let me
10:06just mark this out.
10:09So, now I have A versus C. Now, the next
10:10thing that changes is threads apostrophe
10:12s versus threads s, right? It's plural
10:15threads, not possessive, so I'm going to
10:16get rid of A and then C is my answer. A
10:18comma against a semicolon means you're
10:20being tested on punctuation. You never
10:22have to read the sentence for how it
10:23sounds. You eliminate it based on that
10:25change. Move to the next thing that
10:26changes and repeat until there's only
10:28one choice left. That's a real process
10:30of elimination. On any math problem,
10:32your first move is to figure out what
10:33makes it look nasty, not hard, just
10:35intimidating. Look for lots of
10:36fractions, squares, roots, then you
10:38strip it. Use algebra to get rid of
10:40whatever is making it ugly until it's
10:41countable. Then three questions. What am
10:43I being told? What do I need? And how do
10:45I get from one to the other? The usual
10:47failures are not breaking the word
10:48problem into pieces, not writing
10:50anything down, not simplifying, and
10:51sometimes not even answering the
10:53question that was actually asked. Watch
10:54what that did to this one student's
10:56score. Angelo, 1180 to 1490. So, Angelo
10:58started at an 1180. On the first test,
11:01he got every easy question right, eight
11:02medium wrong, 23 hard. Test two, easy
11:05still clean. Medium was down from eight
11:07to four and hard from 23 to 18. Test
11:10three, 1370. One easy wrong, three
11:12medium wrong, 11 hard wrong. And here's
11:14a decision point. At 11 hard questions
11:16wrong, squeezing more out of the medium
11:18band is like squeezing blood from a
11:19stone. He was consistently clean on easy
11:22and medium, so we switched the strategy.
11:23Hard questions first. The test right
11:25before the real one, we did the hard
11:26questions first and there he got zero
11:28easy wrong, one medium wrong, and six
11:30hard wrong. That was down from 23 hard
11:33wrong. The official test was 1490. He
11:35did a 1510 on the on our test. And he
11:37took the real one twice and came out
11:38with the 1490 both times. Nearly
11:40identical splits. This is important
11:42because the easy questions set the
11:44foundations. It set the tone. It gets
11:46the ball rolling. It get It helps him
11:47build momentum. And then I told him to
11:49stop chasing 10 more points and put that
11:51energy into his college applications.
11:52He's at Columbia now. He's commented on
11:54a couple of my ads. One more real quick.
11:56So yeah, here called me on Thanksgiving.
11:58He was a senior and had the test coming
11:59up
12:00and it was his last possible attempt. He
12:02had tried getting help from seven prior
12:04test prep companies and tutors. And
12:05before I touched timing, I had to kill
12:07his careless mistakes. So I printed the
12:08math out as a PDF and made him write out
12:10every operation. Literally 2 * 2 = 4 and
12:14check each line before moving on. A day
12:16or two of that stopped the errors. Then
12:18hard questions first. His math went from
12:20a 690 to 780 in two weeks. And the
12:22reason the careless mistake fix works
12:23here is cuz you don't know you're that
12:25you're making a careless mistake when
12:26you're making them. The feedback loop is
12:28too slow. You only find out at the end
12:30when you're scoring the test. So three
12:31things to take with you. Difficulty is
12:33defined by what students get wrong, not
12:34by what's hard. You don't get points for
12:36finishing and every question gets sorted
12:38into a now, later, or last before you
12:39spend a second on them. If you want to
12:41see this actually work, watch this next.
12:43One student came to me after seven
12:45failed attempts. Stuck at a 1380 and
12:47jumped to a 1520 in less than two weeks
12:49doing what I just showed you. I break
12:50the whole thing down.

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