SAT Tip: Setting goals for your score will help you to score higher

Many people are intimidated by the SAT and tests like it. However, one of the best ways to increase your score is to set a goal for how many questions you want to get right in a section. For example, if you have a test section with 25 questions and you typically get only ten correct, the next time you take the test aim to get at least 12 or 13 correct.

You'd be surprised how many students fail to set goals when they take a test. They just look at a section and hope for the best. This doesn't work. You need to be engaged when you take a test, just like when you play a game you really want to win. It really doesn't matter if you don't know all the content that's being tested in order to score well. But, you do need to use strategies to pass the SAT and most standardized tests and setting goals is one of the most important strategies you can use. You may wonder how you will know for sure if the answer choice you selected is the correct one. Just make sure that you have the feeling that you get when you know your answer is right for the number of questions you set in your goal. So, if you want to get 15 out of 25 items correct, you want to make sure that you feel confident about the answers on 15 of the questions before you put your pencil down.

So, the next time you take a test, set a concrete goal for how many questions you want to get correct and then you'll see that you'll hit or even surpass your goal.