Your Upcoming PSAT 8th/9th Grade Test

 

Test Date: Thursday, November 1, 2018

Total Test Time: 2 hours, 25 minutes

 

The PSAT 8th/9th Grade is highly relevant to your future success and focuses on the skills and knowledge at the heart of education. It measures:

• What you learn in school
• What you need to succeed in college

 

How to Get Ready

You don’t have to discover secret tricks or cram the night before.

The same habits and choices that lead to success in school will help you get ready for the PSAT 8/9 and other tests in the SAT Suite of Assessments. The best way to prepare is to:

• Take challenging courses (which you already are)
• Do your homework (which you already do)
• Prepare for tests and quizzes (which you already do)
• Ask and answer lots of questions

In short, take charge of your education and learn as much as you can

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Here are some important things you need to know about the PSAT 8th/9th Grade Test:

 

What’s on the test?

 

The Reading Test...

The Reading Test will ask you questions that are a lot like ones you’ll experience in a lively, thoughtful, evidence-based discussion.

 

It’s About the Everyday

The Reading Test focuses on the skills and knowledge at the heart of education: the stuff you’ve been learning in school, the stuff you’ll need to succeed in college. It’s about how you take in, think about, and use information. And guess what? You’ve been doing that for years.

It’s not about how well you memorize facts and definitions, so you won’t need to use flashcards or insider tricks or spend all night cramming.

 

Quick Facts

• All Reading Test questions are multiple choice and based on passages.
• Some passages are paired with other passages.
• Informational graphics, such as tables, graphs, and charts, accompany some passages—but no math is required.

• Prior topic-specific knowledge is never tested.
• The Reading Test is part of the Evidence-Based Reading and Writing section.

 

What the Reading Test Is Like?

When you take the Reading Test, you’ll read passages and interpret informational graphics. Then you’ll use what you’ve read to answer questions.

 

What You’ll Read

To succeed in college and career, you’ll need to apply reading skills in all sorts of subjects. Not coincidentally, you’ll also need those skills to do well on the Reading Test.

 

The Reading Test always includes:

• One passage from a classic or contemporary work of U.S. or world literature.
• One passage or a pair of passages from either a U.S. founding document or a text in the Great Global Conversation they inspired. The U.S. Constitution or a speech by Nelson Mandela, for example.

• A selection about economics, psychology, sociology, or some other social science.
• Two science passages (or one passage and one passage pair) that examine foundational concepts and developments in Earth science, biology, chemistry, or physics.

 

What the Reading Test Measures

A lot more goes into reading than you might realize—and the Reading Test measures a range of reading skills.

 

Command of Evidence

Some questions ask you to:

• Find evidence in a passage (or pair of passages) that best supports the answer to a previous question or serves as the basis for a reasonable conclusion.
• Identify how authors use evidence to support their claims.
• Find a relationship between an informational graphic and the passage it’s paired with.

 

Words in Context

Many questions focus on important, widely used words and phrases that you’ll find in texts in many different subjects. The words are ones that you’ll use in college and the workplace long after test day.

The PSAT 8/9 focuses on your ability to:

• Use context clues in a passage to figure out which meaning of a word or phrase is being used.
• Decide how an author’s word choice shapes meaning, style, and tone.

 

Analysis in History/Social Studies and in Science

The Reading Test includes passages in the fields of history, social studies, and science. You’ll be asked questions that require you to draw on the reading skills needed most to succeed in those subjects. For instance, you might read about an experiment then see questions that ask you to:

• Examine hypotheses.
• Interpret data.
• Consider implications.

Answers are based only on the information in the passage.

 

 

The Writing and Language Test...

The Writing and Language Test asks you to be an editor and improve passages that were written especially for the test—and that include deliberate errors.

 

It’s About the Everyday

When you take the Writing and Language Test, you’ll do three things that people do all the time when they write and edit:

1. Read.
2. Find mistakes and weaknesses.
3. Fix them.

The good news: You do these things every time you proofread your own schoolwork or workshop essays with a friend.

It’s the practical skills you use to spot and correct problems—the stuff you’ve been learning in high school and the stuff you’ll need to succeed in college—that the test measures.

 

Quick Facts

• All questions are multiple choice and based on passages.
• Some passages are accompanied by informational graphics, such as tables, graphs, and charts—but no math is required.
• Prior topic knowledge is never tested.
• The Writing and Language Test is part of the Evidence-Based Reading and Writing section.

 

What the Writing and Language Test Is Like

To answer some questions, you’ll need to look closely at a single sentence. Others require reading the entire piece and interpreting a graphic. For instance, you might be asked to choose a sentence that corrects a misinterpretation of a scientific chart.

 

What the Writing and Language Test Measures

Questions on the Writing and Language Test measure a range of skills.

 

Command of Evidence

Questions that test command of evidence ask you to improve the way passages develop information and ideas. For instance, you might choose an answer that sharpens an argumentative claim or adds a relevant supporting detail.

 

Words in Context

Some questions ask you to improve word choice. You’ll need to choose the best words to use based on the text surrounding them. Your goal will be to make a passage more precise or concise, or to improve syntax, style, or tone.

 

Analysis in History/Social Studies and in Science

You’ll be asked to read passages about topics in history, social studies, and science with a critical eye and make editorial decisions that improve them.

 

Expression of Ideas

Some questions ask about a passage’s organization and its impact. For instance, you will be asked which words or structural changes improve how well it makes its point and how well its sentences and paragraphs work together.

 

Standard English Conventions

This is about the building blocks of writing: sentence structure, usage, and punctuation. You’ll be asked to change words, clauses, sentences, and punctuation. Some topics covered include verb tense, parallel construction, subject-verb agreement, and comma use.

 

 

The Mathematics Test...

The Math Test covers a range of math practices, with an emphasis on problem solving, modeling, using tools strategically, and using algebraic structure.

 

It’s About the Real World

Instead of testing you on every math topic there is, the PSAT 8/9 asks you to use the math that you’ll rely on most in all sorts of situations. Questions on the Math Test are designed to mirror the problem solving and modeling you’ll do in:

• College math, science, and social science courses
• The jobs that you hold
• Your personal life

For instance, to answer some questions you’ll need to use one or two steps—because in the real world a single calculation is rarely enough to get the job done.

 

Quick Facts

Most math questions will be multiple choice, but some—called grid-ins—ask you to come up with the answer rather than select the answer.

• The Math Test is divided into two portions: Math Test–Calculator and Math Test–No Calculator.
• Some parts of the test include several questions about a single scenario.

 

Focus

The Math Test will focus in depth on two of the areas of math that play the biggest role in a wide range of college majors and careers:

• Algebra, which focuses on the mastery of linear equations and systems.
• Problem Solving and Data Analysis, which is about being quantitatively literate.

There will also be some Advanced Math questions; these require the manipulation of complex equations.

 

What the Math Test Measures

 

Fluency

The Math Test is a chance to show that you:

• Carry out procedures flexibly, accurately, efficiently, and strategically.
• Solve problems quickly by identifying and using the most efficient solution approaches. This might involve solving a problem by inspection, finding a shortcut, or reorganizing the information you’ve been given.

 

Conceptual Understanding

You’ll demonstrate your grasp of math concepts, operations, and relations. For instance, you might be asked to make connections between properties of linear equations, their graphs, and the contexts they represent.

 

Applications

These real-world problems ask you to analyze a situation, determine the essential elements required to solve the problem, represent the problem mathematically, and carry out a solution.

 

Calculator Use

Calculators are important tools, and to succeed after high school, you’ll need to know how—and when—to use them. In the Math Test–Calculator portion of the test, you’ll be able to focus on complex modeling and reasoning because your calculator can save you time.

However, the calculator is, like any tool, only as smart as the person using it. The Math Test includes some questions where it’s better not to use a calculator, even though you’re allowed to. In these cases, students who make use of structure or their ability to reason will probably finish before students who use a calculator.

The Math Test–No Calculator portion of the test makes it easier to assess your fluency in math and your understanding of some math concepts. It also tests well-learned technique and number sense.

 

Grid-In Questions

Although most of the questions on the Math Test are multiple choice,18 percent are student-produced response questions, also known as grid-ins. Instead of choosing a correct answer from a list of options, you’ll need to solve problems and enter your answers in the grids provided on the answer sheet.

 

Gridding-In Answers

• Mark no more than one circle in any column.
• Only answers indicated by filling in the circle will be scored (you won’t receive credit for anything written in the boxes located above the circles).
• It doesn't matter in which column you begin entering their answers; as long as the responses are recorded within the grid area, you’ll receive credit.
• The grid can hold only four decimal places and can only accommodate positive numbers and zero.
• Unless a problem indicates otherwise, answers can be entered on the grid as a decimal or a fraction.
• Fractions like do not need to be reduced to their lowest terms.
• All mixed numbers need to be converted to improper fractions before being recorded in the grid.
• If the answer is a repeating decimal, students must grid the most accurate value the grid will accommodate.

 

Below is a sample of the instructions students will see on the test.