Overwhelmed by the ACT? Need an organized, straightforward study plan that gives you real results? Bryce R, a test prep coach who has helped over 100 students, provides his insight and master plan to tackle every concept on the 4 sections of the ACT.
Posted January 10, 2024
12:00 AM UTC · 60 minutes
ACT English: Key Tips ACT English: All Concepts Tested, in Order of Importance ACT Reading: Key Tips ACT Reading: All Concepts Tested, in Order of Importance ACT Math: Key Tips ACT Math: All Concepts Tested, in Order of Importance ACT Science: Key Tips ACT Science: All Concepts Tested, in Order of Importance Conclusion
“There is no way I can confidently finish each section in time, and a lot of those questions are just too tricky. I’m not even close to the average test score of my dream school! I’m not a genius. How am I supposed to score higher than a 32?” When on an introductory call with a student, I usually hear a phrase like this when we are analyzing recent test scores. Then, we look at all the subscores and metrics on the score report. Almost every student I have worked with does not know how to make a strategic list or plan to tackle the concrete concepts they need to learn for the 4 sections of the ACT. What do those ambiguous concept categories on the score reports actually mean? What specific methods do I need to apply in order to strengthen these categories? These are the common questions on many students' minds when they receive their ACT score report.
With six years of experience as a test prep coach and many of my students receiving score increases greater than 100 points, I have seen exactly what concepts tend to be the trickiest on the ACT, as well as what concepts are most prevalent. As a coach on Leland, I would love to help you achieve your dream score on the ACT, and you can schedule a free introductory call with me here!
Remember, the ACT is a test against time and many of the concepts are actually quite simple. They consistently test the same concepts, with different questions that are worded to trick you. Many students do not understand that there is a concrete list of rules, methods, formulas, and tactics tested on the ACT, and understanding all of these concepts just takes time and practice.
Many of these concepts are not tested or reinforced in common high school courses and must be reviewed. Some examples include probability, single dashes, ellipses, matrices, evaluating data, and more. The list goes on and on. In order to study efficiently, you must master the concepts in order of how frequently they are tested, and how hard they are. Once you master all the concepts, it’s just a matter of recognizing the tricky questions.
The ACT is really just a game that has a limited range of flexibility to trick you. The more you review the solutions to practice questions, the more likely you can catch these tricks.
Grammar rules include punctuation and sentence structure and make up over 50% of the ACT English Section. That’s twice as prevalent as the SAT! Punctuation rules can be broken down as follows: commas, double commas, semicolons, colons, double dashes, single dashes, and apostrophes. Getting sentence structure grammar questions right requires the proper usage of verb tense, parallelism, and pronouns. Knowing these rules and putting them into practice is key to success.
On the ACT English, the answer choice you select is either perfect, or has some error (whether it is grammatical, the wrong tone, redundant, etc.). Try to plug in an answer choice, test it by reading the sentence with the answer choice inside of it, and see if your mind alerts you that there is an error. This is called using your “grammar ear”, and it can be highly effective for some questions. Even if you are not sure about an answer choice, sometimes you can eliminate all the other choices that you know are wrong.
Do not try to skip ahead to the questions without reading the passage. Understanding the overall structure, main subjects introduced, and flow of the sentences is essential for correctly answering all of the questions, including grammar questions like punctuation.
