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Get your ACT together with this smart study guide!
For over 20 years, the fun-and-friendly Dummies ACT guides have helped college hopefuls like you crush it on test day and get into the schools of their dreams! ACT 2022 For Dummies makes it easy to pump up your English, math, science, and readings scores, and to write circles around the graders, if you choose to take the optional writing test. You’re about to launch into the rest of your life! With book’s straight-to-the-point explanations, practice questions, and full-length tests—and a side of laughter, courtesy of the teen-approved Dummies style—you can ace the ACT and start your college career with confidence.
Forgot how to solve for x? Can’t tell your hyphens from your hypotheses? No worries! Review it all—or maybe figure it out for the first time—in no time with explanations that complement your teachers’ lessons—and are definitely funnier. Then, figure out what you’ll face on the ACT with practice exams, including explanations of every answer. By the time you make it to test day, you’ll be stress-free and ready to succeed!
Begin your post-high school journey on the right foot with ACT 2022 For Dummies!
Lisa Zimmer Hatch, MA, and Scott A. Hatch, JD, have been helping students excel on standardized tests and navigate the college admissions process since 1987. They have written curricula and taught students internationally through live lectures, online forums, DVDs, and independent study, and have authored numerous test-prep texts.
Introduction 1
About This Book 1
Foolish Assumptions 2
Icons Used in This Book 3
Beyond the Book 3
Where to Go from Here 4
Figuring Out How Long All This Studying Will Take 5
Part 1: Coming to Terms with Reality: An Overview of the ACT 7
Chapter 1: Getting Your ACT Together: ACT 101 9
What to Take to the ACT 10
What Not to Take to the ACT 11
What to Do If You Have Special Circumstances 11
Guessing for Points to Maximize Your Score 12
Your Number’s Up: Scoring on the ACT 12
What the ACT Expects You to Know 13
Repeating the Test for a Better Score 14
Chapter 2: Succeeding on the ACT 17
Surviving the ACT with Four Stress-Busters 17
Inhaling deeply 17
Stretching a little 18
Thinking positive thoughts 18
Practicing POE 18
Avoiding a Few Dumb Mistakes That Can Mess Up Your ACT 18
Losing concentration 19
Panicking over time 19
Messing up on the answer grid 19
Rubbernecking 19
Cheating 20
Worrying about previous sections 20
Worrying about the hard problems 20
Forgetting to double-check 20
Chapter 3: Surviving the College Admissions Process 21
What’s the Main Thing Colleges Look For? 21
How Do Higher ACT Scores Increase My Scholarship Chances? 22
Do Schools Care Whether I Repeat the ACT? 22
What Classes Should I Take in High School? 22
How Helpful Are Sports and Charity? 23
What Should I Say on the College Essay? 23
What Will They Ask Me in the Interview and What Should I Say? 23
How Do I Decide Which School is Best for Me? 24
What’s the Biggest Mistake Most Students Make in College Planning? 24
How Do I Make My Final Decision? 25
Part 2: Serving Your “Sentence”: The English Test 27
Chapter 4: Mastering the English Test 29
Figuring Out What the English Questions Want You to Know 29
Seeing is Believing: The Test’s Format 30
The passages 30
The question types 30
Their Pain, Your Gain: Looking Out for Traps That Others Fall into 32
Chapter 5: Getting a Grip on Grammar and Usage 35
Reviewing the Parts of Speech 36
Getting in the action with verbs 36
Identifying the culprit with nouns 37
Avoiding repeating yourself with pronouns 37
Defining nouns with adjectives 37
Clarifying the questions with adverbs 38
Joining together with conjunctions and prepositions 38
Piecing Together the Parts of a Sentence 38
Subjects and predicates 38
Phrases and clauses 39
Keeping Track of Punctuation Rules for Every Occasion 39
Periods and question marks 39
Semicolons 40
Colons 40
Commas 40
Dashes 42
Apostrophes 43
Chapter 6: Spotting Usage Errors and Ripping through Rhetorical Questions 45
Spotting Questions That Test Standard English Conventions 45
Properly placing punctuation marks 45
Picking up on pronoun errors 48
Forming possessives 49
Evaluating verbs 50
Calling out sentence fragments 51
Identifying problems with parallelism 51
Recognizing misplaced modifiers 51
Checking for Proper Production of Writing 52
Eliminating superfluous words 53
Completing the mission 54
Determining the function of a deletion 54
Pondering an addition 54
Creating smooth transitions 55
Organizing and positioning elements 56
Seeing the big picture 56
Sticking to appropriate vocabulary and standard expressions 57
Chapter 7: It’s Not What You Say but How You Say It: English Practice Questions 59
Part 3: Don’t Count Yourself Out: The Math Test 65
Chapter 8: Number Nuts and Bolts 67
The Wonderful World of Numbers 67
Keeping it real: Types of numbers 68
Lining things up along the number line 69
Understanding absolute value 69
Getting familiar with prime numbers and factorization 69
Minor Surgery: Basic Math Operations 70
Adding and subtracting 70
Multiplying and dividing 70
Working with odds/evens and positives/negatives 71
Focusing on Fractions, Decimals, and Percentages 71
Converting fractions, decimals, and percentages 72
Working with fractions 72
Pondering percentages 74
Eyeing Ratios and Proportions 75
Ratios 75
Proportions 76
Covering Your Bases: Exponents 77
Smooth Operator: Order of Operations 78
Dealing with Average, Median, Mode, and More 78
Doing better than average on averages 78
Weighing in on weighted averages 79
Mastering medians 80
Managing modes 80
Getting ready for range 80
Abracadabra: Elementary Algebra 80
Variables 101 81
Solving simple equations 81
Adding and subtracting expressions 82
Multiplying and dividing expressions 83
Curses! FOILed again 83
Extracting by factoring 84
Solving a system of equations 86
Chapter 9: Getting into Shapes: Geometry and Trig Review 89
Toeing the Line 89
Analyzing Angles 90
Triangle Trauma 92
Classifying triangles 92
Sizing up triangles 93
Zeroing in on similar triangles 94
Figuring out area and perimeter 95
Taking the shortcut: Pythagorean triples and other common side ratios 95
Thanks 4 Nothing: A Quick Look at Quadrilaterals 98
Missing Parrots and Other Polly-Gones (Or Should We Say “Polygons”?) 100
Measuring up polygons 101
Solving for volume 101
Running Around in Circles 102
Trying Your Hand at Trigonometry 107
Introducing trigonometric functions 108
Circumventing the unit circle 110
Measuring in radians 111
Graphing trig functions on a coordinate plane 112
Applying the Law of Sines and Law of Cosines 114
Chapter 10: Algebra and Other Sleeping Aids 117
Suffering Inequalities 117
Using Your Imagination: Complex Numbers 118
Too Hip to Be Square: Roots and Radicals 119
Adding and subtracting radicals 120
Multiplying and dividing radicals 120
Working from the inside out 121
Thinking Exponentially: Logarithms 121
Log rules 122
Natural logarithms 122
Barely Functioning with Functions 122
Taking a Flight on the Coordinate Plane 123
Defining the coordinate plane 123
Knowing which formulas you need to guide your flight 124
Graphing more functions 126
Evaluating graphs of functions 130
Picking Your Way through Percent Increase, Probability, Permutations, and Combinations 132
Managing the ups and downs 132
Practicing probability 133
Calculating outcomes and orderings 135
Setting Up Sequences 138
Managing Matrices 138
Chapter 11: Numb and Number: Acing the Mathematics Test 141
What You See is What You Get: The Format and Breakdown of the Math Test 141
Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder: What Isn’t on the Math Test 142
Getting into the Grind: The Approach 143
Translating English into Math 144
Time Flies When You’re Having Fun: Timing Tips 145
Skim for your favorite questions 145
Backsolve when the answers are actual values 146
Plug in values for variables 147
Kindly refrain from showing off everything you know 148
Put aside two minutes to fill in the remaining ovals 148
Do’s, Don’ts, and Darns: What to Do and Not Do on the Math Test 148
Do get the lead out 148
Don’t start working until you’ve read the entire problem 149
Do reread the problem with your answer inserted 149
Don’t strike out over a difficult question early on 149
Chapter 12: More Fun than a Root Canal: Mathematics Practice Questions 151
Part 4: Time to Read the Riot ACT: The Reading Test 159
Chapter 13: This, Too, Shall Pass(age): Sailing through the Reading Test 161
Facing 40 Questions: The Reading Test 161
Timing 162
Scoring 162
Getting Prepared: Reading Strategies 162
Preview the passages 162
Decide on an approach 163
Skim the passage effectively 163
Identifying Reading Question Types 164
Big picture questions 165
Direct statement questions 165
Inference questions 166
Figuring Out Reading Question Formats 166
Vocabulary in context 167
Most nearly means 167
Exception questions 167
Approaching Comparative Passages 168
Chapter 14: Where Are SparkNotes When You Need Them? Reading Practice Questions 171
Part 5: Studying Brain Defects in Laboratory Rats: The Science Test 177
Chapter 15: From Frankenstein to Einstein: Excelling on the Science Test 179
Examining the Science Test’s Format 180
Classifying Passage Format 180
Data-representation passages 180
Research summaries 181
Conflicting viewpoints 183
Analyzing Tables, Graphs, and Diagrams 184
Tackling tables 185
Grappling with graphs 185
Dissecting diagrams 186
Examining Experimental Procedures 187
Independent and dependent variables 187
The control 188
Immersing Yourself in Answer Choices 189
Considering Question Types 190
Questions about results 191
Questions about procedure 194
Questions about viewpoints 198
Chapter 16: Faking Atomic Ache Won’t Get You out of This: Science Practice Questions 201
Passage 201
Initial Analysis 202
Questions 203
Part 6: Writing Rightly: The Optional Writing Test 209
Chapter 17: Excelling on Your Essay: The Writing Test Review 211
What to Expect From the ACT Writing Test 211
Making the Grade: How the ACT Folks Score Your Essay 212
Examining the Prompt and Creating a Thesis 212
Putting Up Your Dukes: Defending Your Perspective 214
Throwing a Good First Punch: The Hook 214
The Proof is in the Pudding: Defending Yourself 215
Using specific examples 215
Mixing things up with a variety of examples 216
Forming logical arguments 216
Hamburger Writing: Organizing Your Essay 218
The top bun: Introduction 218
The three meats: Example paragraphs 218
The lettuce, tomato, and special sauce: Transitions 219
The bottom bun: Conclusion 220
Wielding the Red Pen: Editing and Proofing 220
Using the touch method to look for spelling mistakes and ghost words 220
Calling all action verbs: Be descriptive 220
Avoiding problems with punk-tu-a-tion: Punctuate properly 221
Handwriting check: Write legibly 221
Writing Don’ts 221
Writing before you think 221
Panicking about time 221
Referring to the perspectives by number 222
Sticking to the status quo 222
Using words you don’t know 222
Being overly critical of yourself 223
Writing like you speak 223
Repeating yourself over and over again 223
Failing to edit your essay 223
Reviewing Some Example Essays and Their Scores 223
1 — 1 is the loneliest number: How not to be a 1 224
2 — 2 little 2 late: Steering clear of coming in second 224
3 — Still finding yourself on the wrong side of the tracks 224
4 — Reaching 4 a better score 225
5 — Shining brightly: A 5-star winner 226
6 — Unlocking the code to a perfect score 227
Chapter 18: Practicing Promptly with Practice Prompts: Essay Practice Questions 229
Writing Prompt 1 229
Writing Prompt 2 231
Part 7: Putting It All Together with Three Full-Length Practice ACTs 233
Chapter 19: Practice Exam 1 235
Answer Sheet 236
English Test 238
Mathematics Test 249
Reading Test 259
Science Test 269
Writing Test 281
Chapter 20: Practice Exam 1: Answers and Explanations 283
English Test 283
Mathematics Test 293
Reading Test 306
Science Test 313
Writing Test 319
Sample response 319
Score One for Your Side: The Scoring Guide 320
Answer Key for Practice Exam 1 322
Chapter 21: Practice Exam 2 325
Answer Sheet 326
English Test 328
Mathematics Test 339
Reading Test 347
Science Test 356
Writing Test 366
Chapter 22: Practice Exam 2: Answers and Explanations 367
English Test 367
Mathematics Test 378
Reading Test 391
Science Test 398
Writing Test 407
Sample response 407
Answer Key for Practice Exam 2 409
Chapter 23: Practice Exam 3 411
Answer Sheet 412
English Test 414
Mathematics Test 425
Reading Test 435
Science Test 445
Writing Test 455
Chapter 24: Practice Exam 3: Answers and Explanations 457
English Test 457
Mathematics Test 467
Reading Test 486
Science Test 493
Writing Test 500
Sample response 500
Answer Key for Practice Exam 3 501
Part 8: The Part of Tens 503
Chapter 25: Ten Wrong Rumors about the ACT 505
You Can’t Study for the ACT 505
Different States Have Different ACTs 505
The ACT Has a Passing Score 506
The ACT Tests IQ 506
You Can’t Use a Calculator on the ACT 506
You Should Never Guess on the ACT 506
The ACT is Easier Than the SAT 507
Selective Colleges Prefer the SAT to the ACT 507
You Have to Write an Essay 507
You Shouldn’t Take Both the SAT and the ACT 507
Chapter 26: Attention, Parents! Ten Ways You Can Help Your Child Succeed on the ACT 509
Give Awesome Test-Prep Materials 509
Encourage Studying 509
Supply a Good Study Environment 510
Take Practice Tests Together 510
Model Good Grammar 510
Help Memorize Math Formulas 510
Encourage Reading 510
Explore Colleges Together 510
Arrive at the Test Site on Time 511
Help Keep a Proper Perspective 511
Index 513
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