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SAT Reading Test: content areas
An overview of the Reading Test content
In this series of articles, we’re going to take an in-depth look at the SAT Reading Test. On the Test, you will encounter a variety of passages broken into three content areas:
U.S. and World Literature.
Includes prose fiction texts, both contemporary and classic, by American and international authors. These texts may be intact short stories or passages from novels and short stories and written by either well-known or less well-known authors working in the eighteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, or twenty-first centuries.
History/Social Studies.
The History/Social Studies domain comprises texts in two subareas: Social Science and Founding Documents/Great Global Conversation.
- The Social Science subarea includes passages that deal with information and ideas drawn from the fields of anthropology, communication studies, economics, education, human geography, law, linguistics, political science, psychology, and sociology and their various subfields. Social Science passages will sometimes include graphics or pairs of passages. Questions will ask you to determine relationships between the graphic or to analyze how two paired passages relate to one another.
- The Founding Documents/Great Global Conversations include classic and contemporary texts by American and international authors who are grappling with political, legal, social, moral, and ethical issues in an attempt to answer a simple but profound question: How should we live together? Founding Documents and Great Global Conversation texts may also appear in pairs.
Science.
Includes passages that deal with information and ideas drawn from biology, chemistry, physics, and Earth science and their various subfields. Passages may discuss recent discoveries, interesting hypotheses and theories, and innovative research studies and methods. Science passages will sometimes include graphics or pairs of passages. Questions will ask you to determine relationships between the graphic or to analyze how two paired passages relate to one another.
On Official SAT Practice with Khan Academy, students will see the categories of Literature, History, Social Science, and Science. The Founding Documents and Great Global Conversation texts can be found under the History category.
You will not need to know the names of these categories for the test, but this gives you an idea of the passage content.
Attributions
This article was adapted from the following sources:
“Test Specifications for the Redesigned SAT” from The College Board.
“SAT Practice Tests” from The College Board.
Want to join the conversation?
- What preparation can we do in the last minute?(11 votes)
- Take a bunch of practice tests, specifically focusing on the areas that you lack in. So if you're not good at reading, then practice a lot of questions dealing with the reading passages.(6 votes)
- I'm really having problems on the reading section. I'm always getting 5 or 6 correct and which is not encouraging .Please could someone give me some scopes to answer reading questions correctly. Also,it takes me about 4-5 minutes to read a passage and still,I don't really grab what the passage talks about.Please I need help from you guys on how to overcome this because I see it as a storm.(10 votes)
- First of all, take more time in reading the passage on your practice test! Make sure you understand the question and passage in their entirety. Read the question first and then read the assigned passage. While you are reading, keep the question in your head and apply it to the text. This, believe it or not, saves a lot of time.(9 votes)
- What words are we expecting to see in the new SAT?(7 votes)
- There will be a lot of words that we haven't seen but you need to practice on context clues and reading around to find out what the word means or type on google words to expect on ACT, SAT, and FSA.(5 votes)
- It seems that I've finished all of the reading contents on level 4. Is it possible to do level 3 problems without having to deliberately make mistakes to lower my level?(9 votes)
- From what I gather, it doesn't look like it's possible.(5 votes)
- I always dont have enough to finish the reading on time, always about 3 or 4 remaining questions. If I finish my math part early, can I return to reading to continue my work on reading part?(5 votes)
- Dear Sir or Madam,
My score is around 1100. I have a problem with reading literature since english isn't my native languages. I try to look at the strategies for Reading Literature but it still can't find where to look at. I will take the official test in October. And i suppose to get 1200+ for the US Academy: West Point, Naval Academy, Air force..... . How can i improve my Reading Literature.
And what are the strategies for Reading Literature? Where to look at in Khanacademy ?(6 votes)- There are a lot of helpful tips on the internet that might help, here's an example blog:
https://blog.prepscholar.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-sat-reading-strategies-tips-practice
Also, you might want to improve your English knowledge (reading books, writing, etc.) if you think you don't understand the passages or they're too hard.(3 votes)
- I struggle with the Science Reading Passages. I've watched the science reading videos and read science information for reading like the one above but. are there any tips on how to improve my skills in this subject.(5 votes)
- It helps to remember that all of the answers are grounded in the text, and the hard part should be finding where that answer might be hidden. If you have problems reading graphs and charts, that would be a better place to focus than reading entire paragraphs. If you struggle more with the actual reading, then the same steps should be used as any other reading passage. Make sure to read a few sentences before and after where your question is referencing, and do your best to use to process of elimination. And always remember, the answer is in the text! If there is conflicting information in an answer choice, you can cross it out and look for the best answer.(3 votes)
- Can someone tell me a strategy to follow in order to solve the reading Passages !(2 votes)
- From the author:Hi Gana and Hannah - In the last few months, we have added several resources to the Tips & Strategies section of Official SAT Practice on Khan Academy. In particular, I recommend SQ3R and Rephrasing and Predicting. I also recommend that you watch the Facebook Livestreams we did – here's one: https://www.khanacademy.org/test-prep/sat/new-sat-tips-planning/sat-strategies-general/v/effective-strategies-for-each-sat-section-9282016 . Every student is different, so it makes sense to experiment with different approaches: skimming the questions first, skimming the passage first, or reading the passage more thoroughly first.(5 votes)
- what way of stufying would you suggest for someone with not alot of time due to sports.(2 votes)
- There are apps in which they give you one study question per day. That way, you have the option to do more questions if needed. I usually do my question when I'm on the bus or when we have free time in class. I've also heard that doing them right before bed can help you retain the information better(4 votes)
- Should I read the entire passage or not? Reading the entire passage takes up a lot of my time, any suggestions?(2 votes)
- Hello,
I think everyone has their own way in which they read and do well. I've heard many people say: do not read the passage, just look for the answers in the passage. But I feel it's up to you. If you think reading the passage completely slows you down, then you might as well not read it completely. It sure does make me slower when I read it completely, but I get many more questions correctly than when I don't read it completely. So for me, it's worth reading completely. It's just a matter of choice.(4 votes)