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SAT
Course: SAT > Unit 11
Lesson 3: Writing: Grammar- Writing: Setting Up Ideas — Video Lesson
- Setting up ideas | Quick guide
- Writing: Strong Support — Video lesson
- Strong support | Quick guide
- Writing: Relevant Information — Video lesson
- Relevant information | Quick guide
- Writing: Sequencing sentences — Video lesson
- Sequencing sentences | Quick guide
- Writing: Transition Words — Video lesson
- Transition words and phrases | Quick guide
- Writing: Transition Sentences — Video Lesson
- Transition sentences | Quick guide
- Writing: Introductions — Video lesson
- Writing: Conclusions — Video lesson
- Introductions and conclusions | Quick guide
- Writing: Interpreting Graphs and Data — Video lesson
- Interpreting graphs and data | Quick guide
- Writing: Precision — Video Lesson
- Precise word choice | Quick guide
- Writing: Concision — Video lesson
- Concision | Quick guide
- Writing: Formal and Informal Language — Video Lesson
- Writing: Formal vs. casual language — Example
- Formal vs. casual language | Quick guide
- Writing: Syntax — Example
- Writing: Sentence Fragments — Video Lesson
- Writing: Sentence Boundaries — Example 1
- Writing: Sentence boundaries — Example 2
- Sentence fragments | Quick guide
- Writing: Subordination and coordination — Example
- Writing: Combining Sentences — Video Lesson
- Linking clauses | Quick guide
- Writing: Parallel Structure — Video lesson
- Writing: Parallel structure — Example
- Parallel structure | Quick guide
- Writing: Modifier Placement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Modifier placement — Example
- Modifier placement | Quick guide
- Writing: Verb Tense and Mood — Video Lesson
- Writing: Shift in verb tense and mood — Example
- Verb tense and mood | Quick guide
- Writing: Pronoun Clarity — Video Lesson
- Writing: Pronoun clarity — Example
- Pronoun clarity | Quick guide
- Writing: Pronoun Agreement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Pronoun-antecedent agreement — Example
- Pronoun-antecedent agreement | Quick guide
- Writing: Possessive determiners — Example 1
- Writing: Possessive determiners — Example 2
- Writing: It’s/Its Confusion — Video Lesson
- Confusion with "its" and "their" | Quick guide
- Writing: Subject-Verb Agreement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Subject-verb agreement — Example
- Subject-verb agreement | Quick guide
- Writing: Noun Agreement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Noun agreement — Basic example
- Noun agreement | Quick guide
- Writing: Frequently Confused Words — Video Lesson
- Writing: Frequently confused words — Example
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- Writing: Conventional Expressions — Video Lesson
- Writing: Conventional expression — Example
- Conventional expressions | Quick guide
- Writing: Logical Comparison — Video Lesson
- Writing: Logical comparison — Example
- Logical comparison | Quick guide
- Writing: End-of-sentence punctuation — Example 1
- Writing: End-of-sentence punctuation — Example 2
- Writing: Commas — Video Lesson
- Commas | Quick guide
- Writing: Semicolons — Video Lesson
- Semicolons | Quick guide
- Writing: Colons — Video lesson
- Colons | Quick guide
- Writing: Possessive Pronouns — Example
- Writing: Possessive Nouns — Video Lesson
- Making nouns possessive | Quick guide
- Writing: Items in a series — Example
- Writing: Punctuating Lists — Video Lesson
- Lists and punctuation | Quick guide
- Writing: Nonrestrictive and parenthetical elements — Example
- Writing: Nonessential Elements — Video Lesson
- Nonessential elements | Quick guide
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Writing: Concision — Video lesson
David demonstrates a Concision question on the SAT Writing and Language test. Created by David Rheinstrom.
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Video transcript
- [Instructor] We are looking
at question four here. Some commentators claim
that there is an excess of too many pressing constraints on the federal budget to commit funds to federal land protection. And the three other choices
are all similar versions of that underlined phrase. So this tells me that this
is a concision question. Our goal is to eliminate redundancy, and redundancy is when
a sentence or a phrase is unnecessarily wordy or repetitive. Essentially, if you see
a sentence with two words that mean the same thing, you don't need to use both of them. And there are likely to be between three and five concision questions
on your official SAT. And the errors that you'll find usually take one of five distinct forms. You can have compound verb phrases, like beavers construct
and build dams in streams, so construct and build
is the redundant part, redundant adjectives, like
this large, huge elephant, redundant adverbs, like
quietly, she silently entered, redundant nouns, like a symbol
and representation of wealth, and redundant implied descriptors,
like varied differences. Varied differences is redundant because differences already
kind of implies variation. This category is a test of your ability to recognize repetition, of your ability to look
at a choice and think, "Wow, that's really clunky." You wanna be able to identify repetition and understand accordingly
that for a question like this, the shortest choice is
usually the best choice. So let's take a look at
our target sentence again. Some commentators claim
that there is an excess of too many pressing constraints on the federal budget to commit funds to federal land protection. Whew, excess of too many
immediately strikes me as clunky and repetitious. If I were just gonna edit this sentence, I'd say there is an excess
of, or there are too many, because right now that's
just too much at once. Excess of is redundant with too many. If I were gonna fix that sentence, I would just choose one. This doesn't neatly fit
into our five categories because many is being used as an adjective to modify constraints, but it is still very awkward to look at. Let's go over to the choices, because excess of too many
is the no change answer, and I think it's too clunky to stay, so I'm gonna eliminate that one. Our other choices, B, is
too much of an excess of, yeah, that uses nearly
the same construction, it's just in a slightly different order. I'm gonna cross that one off, too. Choice C, there are an abundance, too many pressing constraints. This is no good either
because it's repeating that too many idea, right? Abundance and too many
mean nearly the same thing, so let's cross that off. And that leaves us with choice D, which is not only the shortest choice, it's one of the predictions I had earlier for a neater, shorter
version of the phrase. Now, a warning, there
may be shorter answers that cut off important information, so don't just choose the shortest answer without reading it carefully. But in general, shorter
is definitely better for questions like these. So, the strategy for
completing concision questions hinges on your ability
to identify repetition. Does the sentence use two synonyms when they could have used one word? Is an idea expressed twice, like each year, the Oscars
are awarded annually. Each year and annually
mean the same thing, right? So look out for repetition, and in general, shorter is better.