McGraw-Hill’s ACT Steven W. Dulan and the faculty of Advantage Education New York/Chicago/ SanFrancisco / Lisbon/ London/ Madrid/ Mexico City Milan /New Delhi /San Juan/Seoul / Singapore /Sydney/Toronto Copyright © 2010, 2009, 2007, 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. ISBN: 978-0-07-174090-6 MHID: 0-07-174090-2 The material in this eBook also appears in the print version of this title: ISBN: 978-0-07-174089-0, MHID: 0-07-174089-9. All trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners. Rather than put a trademark symbol after every occurrence of a trademarked name, we use names in an editorial fashion only, and to the benefi t of the trademark owner, with no intention of infringement of the trademark. 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CONTENTS About the Author vi PART I GETTING STARTED 1 Chapter 1 Understanding the ACT 3 What is the ACT? 3 What is the Structure of the ACT? 3 Who Writes the ACT? 4 Registering for the ACT 4 Why Do ACT Exams Exist? 4 ACT Scores 4 Bias on the ACT 5 Disabilities and the ACT 5 Testing Irregularities 6 SAT Differences and Similarities 6 PART II ACT DIAGNOSTIC ASSESSMENT 7 ACT Diagnostic Assessment Test 9 Answer Key 61 Scoring Guide 65 Diagnostic Test Answers and Explanations 69 PART III STRATEGIES AND REVIEW 91 Chapter 2 Strategies to Get Your Best Score 93 The Psychology of Testing 93 Strategic Thinking 95 Relax to Succeed 95 Getting Ready to Take the Test 98 Taking the Test 99 Guessing on the Test 101 After the Test 101 Chapter 3 ACT English Test: Strategies and Concept Review 103 General Strategies and Techniques 103 Usage and Mechanics 105 Rhetorical Skills 107 ACT English Skills Exercises 110 ACT English Exercises: Answers and Explanations 119 Practice Questions 127 Answers and Explanations 132 iv CONTENTS Chapter 4 ACT Mathematics Test: Strategies and Concept Review 135 General Strategies and Techniques 135 Mathematics Concept Review 140 ACT Mathematics Skills Exercises 156 Answers and Explanations 168 Practice Questions 189 Answers and Explanations 194 Chapter 5 ACT Reading Test: Strategies and Concept Review 199 Timing 199 General Strategies and Techniques 200 Question Types 204 Strategies for Specific Question Types 205 ACT Reading Skills Exercises 205 Answers and Explanations 214 Practice Questions 219 Answers and Explanations 223 Chapter 6 ACT Science Reasoning Test: Strategies and Concept Review 225 General Strategies and Techniques 225 The Scientific Method 228 ACT Science Reasoning Test Exercises 230 Answers and Explanations 235 Practice Questions 237 Answers and Explanations 241 Chapter 7 ACT Writing Test: Strategies and Review 243 How to Prepare 244 The Essay Prompt 244 Essay Writing Techniques 245 Common Mistakes 247 Essay Scoring 250 Simplified Essay Scoring Rubric 251 Sample Student Responses 253 ACT Writing Skills Exercises 257 Improving Paragraphs 258 Answers and Explanations 262 PART IV THREE PRACTICE TESTS 265 ACT Practice Tests 267 ACT Practice Test 1 269 Answer Key 319 Scoring Guide 323 Answers and Explanations 327 ACT Practice Test 2 349 Answer Key 399 Scoring Guide 403 Answers and Explanations 407 CONTENTS v ACT Practice Test 3 429 Answer Key 477 Scoring Guide 481 Answers and Explanations 485 PART V APPENDIXES 505 Appendix 1 What’s Next? 507 Choosing the Best College or University for You 507 Applying to College 510 Suggested High School Courses 512 Appendix 2 Grammar and Punctuation Rules 515 Appendix 3 ACT Vocabulary List 533 ABOUT THE AUTHOR Steve Dulan has been involved with the ACT since 1982 when he received a score of 32 on his own test as a high school junior at Iron Mountain High School. That score qualified him for the State of Michigan Competitive Scholarship in 1983. In 1989, after serving as a U.S. Army Infantry Sergeant, and during his time as an undergraduate at Michigan State University, Steve becameanACTinstructor.Hehasbeenhelpingstudentstoprepareforsuccess on the ACT and other standardized exams ever since. Steve attended the Thomas M. Cooley Law School on a full Honors Scholarship after achieving a 99th percentile score on his Law School Admission Test (LSAT). In fact, Steve scored in the 99th percentile on every standardized test he has ever taken. While attending law school, Steve continued to teach standardized test prep classes (including ACT, SAT, PSAT, GRE, GMAT, and LSAT) an average of thirtyhourseachweek,andtutoredsomeofhisfellowlawstudentsinavariety of subjects and in essay exam writing techniques. Professor Dulan has also served as an instructor at the college and law school levels. Thousands of students have benefited from his instruction, coaching, and admissions consulting and have gone on to their colleges of choice. Steve’s students have gained admission to some of the most prestigious institutions in the world, and received many scholarships of their own. A few of them even beat his ACT score! Since 1997, Stevehas served as the President of Advantage Education(cid:2) (www.AdvantageEd.com), a company dedicated to providing effective and affordable test prep education in a variety of settings, including classesandseminarsathighschoolsandcollegesaroundthecountry,summer College Prep Camps at The University of Michigan, and one-on-one via the Internet worldwide via its trademarked Personal Distance Learning(cid:2) system. The techniques included in this book are the result of Steve’s experiences with students at all ability and motivation levels over the years. PART I GETTING STARTED 2 PART I ACT Format ENGLISH (75Questions, 45Minutes) Content/Skills Number ofQuestions Usage/Mechanics 40 Punctuation 10 Grammar/Usage 12 Sentence Structure 18 Rhetorical Skills 35 Strategy 12 Organization 11 Style 12 MATHEMATICS (60 Questions,60 Minutes) Content Number ofQuestions Pre-Algebra and Elementary Algebra 24 Intermediate Algebraand Coordinate Geometry 18 Plane Geometry 14 Trigonometry 4 READING(40Questions, 35Minutes) Passage Type Number ofQuestions ProseFiction 10 SocialStudies 10 Humanities 10 NaturalSciences 10 SCIENCEREASONING (40 Questions, 35Minutes) Format* Number ofQuestions Data Representation 15 Research Summaries 18 ConflictingViewpoints 7 ContentAreas: Earth/Space Sciences, Chemistry, Physics, andBiology *TheScienceReasoningTestwilltypicallyincludethreeDataRepresentationpassages,threeResearchSummary passages,andoneConflictingViewpointspassageinrandomorder. Following a 10-minute break, the optional 30-minute Writing Test will be administered. CHAPTER 1 UNDERSTANDING THE ACT WHAT IS THE ACT? Eachyear,morethan1millionstudentstaketheACTinordertogainentrance into the colleges of their choice. The ACT is a standardized test designed to measure your critical thinking skills and to assess your ability to apply knowledge and logic when solving problems. Your ACT score will be evaluated along with your high school grade point average, involvement in school and extracurricular activities, letters of recommendation, and college application essay. While the ACT is just one factor that is examined during the admissions process, it is essential that you maximize your ACT score so that you can remain competitive among the many other applicants hoping to gain admission. The authors of the ACT insist that the ACT is an achievement test, meaning that it is designed to measure your readiness for college instruction. There is ongoing debate about how well the ACT accomplishes that mission. What is not debated is that the ACT is not a direct measure of abilities. It is not an IQ test. The ACT is certainly not a measure of your worth as a human being. It is not even a perfect measure of how well you will do in college. Theoretically, each of us has a specific potential to learn and acquire skills. The ACT doesn’t measure your natural, inborn ability. If it did, we wouldn’t be as successful as we are at raising students’ scores on ACT exams. The ACT actually measures a certain knowledge base and skill set. It is ‘‘trainable,’’ meaning that you can do better on your ACT if you work on gaining the knowledge and acquiring the skills that are tested. WHAT IS THE STRUCTURE OF THE ACT? The ACT is broken up into four multiple-choice tests and one optional essay. The multiple-choice tests are called English, Mathematics, Reading, andScienceReasoning.Theyarealwaysgiveninthissameorder.Infact,there is a lot of predictability when it comes to the ACT. The current exam still has very much in common with ACT exams from past years. This means that we basically know what is going to be on your ACT in terms of question types and content. Refer to the chart on page 2 for more information on the structure of the ACT. 3