Overview
Students develop a good vocabulary as one of the advantages of going to college. It is a result of reading scholarly texts, writing papers and essays, and listening to professors expound on a myriad of subjects. The SAT tests vocabulary directly through sentence-completion and reading-passage questions, and indirectly through appropriate word choice in the essay and writing sections.
Why Vocabulary?
By the time students are in high school, they are adept at using many different styles of communication. Many of the words, slang phrases, and idioms used when hanging out with friends are not appropriate at school or in the workplace. Students should use different terminology and tone when writing a formal paper or essay test than when writing a note to a friend. In particular, reading and formal writing in college often demands the sort of vocabulary used by well-educated persons. The SAT tests students on many of the most frequent words they will encounter in college and will find useful in writing assignments.
Utilize, Don’t Memorize
The SAT used to test obscure words and analogies, so students were urged to memorize definitions of words that they rarely encountered in their time in college. Test developers on successive forms of the SAT began using more frequently-occurring terminology. Therefore, one of the best strategies for learning new words is to read widely and see new words in their natural habitats, whether in well-written periodicals, textbooks, literary fiction, or nonfiction. Also, it is easier to remember word meaning by a unique definition that has been generated in context. My friend Rachel is reticent and seldom volunteers an opinion in meetings.
Look It Up
If a word is unfamiliar, or if a familiar word is used in an unfamiliar context, use a good dictionary and look it up. The SAT tests on many words used in unusual contexts. Most college students have several dictionaries at their disposal; a general dictionary such as the New Collegiate Dictionary or the American Heritage Dictionary; as well as specific dictionaries for their major discipline, or for specialized terminology they encounter frequently. For example, a medical dictionary may be useful if a student refers to articles in the Journal of Pediatrics or even in the Annals of Psychiatry in the process of researching a term paper or thesis.
Word Lists, et al.
Many test preparation services have lists of frequently-occurring words on the SAT and other standardized tests. These lists also have other forms of the word, such as exemplify, exemplary, and exemplification. Lists are useful, as a starting point, if only because they alert the reader to the some of the vocabulary that may be on the SAT.
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