What I Learned from Taking My First DIGITAL SAT

So I took the Digital SAT. Here’s what I learned.

IT IS SHORTER

What they say is true. It was four sections, two verbal/reading and two math. The verbal came first and they were each 27 questions long. Then came the two math sections, each of which was 22 questions long. The whole thing takes just over two hours.

IT GETS HARDER

It gets harder as you go. If you do well on the first module, then the second module of each section is harder. Read more from the collegeboard here.

A NEW KIND OF READING CHALLENGE

The Verbal section is composed of lots and lots of unique, short passages. This is interesting and students will find it better. But it takes more time to orient yourself to each new passage. It’s like continuously walking into a completely different room in a house you’ve never been to before. It takes time to figure out what is going on. And you have to do that over and over again. This will reward students who know how to be patient and re-read sentences until they make sense.

GOTTA HAVE SCRATCH PAPER

I needed scratch paper! Staring at a screen taking a test is more challenging on math because you can’t draw on the diagrams. So I had to re-draw the pictures as needed and it was important that I drew my figures clearly so I didn't make careless errors.

I’M HUMAN (I ALREADY KNEW THIS)

I’m human. I rushed through a couple of math questions and missed them and I shouldn’t have because I knew the content. So I’m reminded of the lessons I teach my students. We are not robots, we make mistakes. We need to be aware of this and not get over-confident.

And just so you know I’m not making this up, here are my scores below! In your corner, Drew

MY SCORES!

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