Do NOT waste time, even if you finish early, by laying your head on your desk or flirting with the girl or guy next to you…there will be time for both later, but for now, you've got to stay focused on the task at hand! Instead, go back and recheck your answers one more time, or work on any problems that you had to skip previously.

Also, be sure to read each question completely, and re-read if you're not comprehending. For reading stuff, the answer will ALWAYS be contained within the passage. And, if you're not sure of the meaning of a word, try to use the context to figure out what they're talking about.

Also, when you're reading a passage, don't skip from one to another. Answer ALL the questions related to that passage before you move on to the next one.

Answer the sentence completion questions first…they'll take you less time than the passage-based questions.

Math Section:

On the math section, be sure to read the directions first. Also, keep in mind that you do NOT have to memorize formulas...they'll provide them for you. You just need to figure out which one is the correct one to use in that situation. Further, all figures will be drawn to scale, unless they tell you otherwise.

HOT STRATEGY

Now, if they give you some question like:

If Tom is twice as old as Linda, and Linda is 4 years younger than Karen, and Karen is one-third as old as Brian who will be twice as old as Tom next year, how old is Tom now?

(A) 26
(B) 22
(C) 18
(D) 14
(E) 10

Many students will rip their hair out trying to put together different equations to solve for this. (In fact, you probably wrote down T = 2L and L = K + 4 as you were reading the question, but then started to get lost with all of the letters.)

To solve this algebraically would be ridiculously complicated. Instead, understand what the question is asking, and then reason your way to the answer. The question asks us, "How old is Tom now?" You need to realize that Tom's age has to be one of the five answer choices, so let's just pick one of them and work backwards. We'll start with Choice C, 18, because it's in the middle.

Now re-read the problem assuming that Choice C is correct. If Tom is 18 and he is "twice as old as Linda", that means that Linda is 9. Now we learn that "Linda is four years younger than Karen", that means that Karen is four years older or 13. Next, we find that "Karen is one-third as old as Brian". Well, this might appear to be a bit confusing, but let's think about it logically - If Karen is one-third of Brian's age, that means that Brian is 3 times as old as she is. We might need a calculator for 13 × 3 to get to 39. Finally, "Brian will be twice as old as Tom next year". Next year Brian will be 40 (he is 39 now) and Tom will be 19 (he is 18 from the beginning of the problem). So, is 40 twice as much as 19? No, so we'll need to try another number.

The second time around this goes much quicker. Let's choose Choice B, 22. If Tom is 22, Linda is 11. If Linda is 11, then Karen is 15. If Karen is 15, then Brian is 45. Next year Brian will be 46 and Tom will be 23. Is 46 twice as much as 23? Yes - there's our answer.

CORRECT ANSWER: B AND YOU SAVED A TON OF TIME

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