Slow Down to Go Faster

High-stakes timed tests like the SAT and ACT are inherently stressful experiences, and reducing stress is a primary goal. A chief driver of this stress is time pressure.

Paradoxically, sometimes the best thing one can do to improve speed on timed tests is to do untimed practice.

In untimed testing, students take all the time they need to fully understand questions and find correct answers. Without the pressure of the clock, it's much easier to master various question types and discover the best ways to find right answers most quickly and easily.

It's also ironic that getting stuck on super-hard questions during untimed practice is actually a good thing. By spending way too much time on impossibly difficult questions, students learn to quickly recognize "nightmare questions" they can't answer and just going to waste their time on test day (the strategy: eliminate, guess, move on).

After gaining everything possible from untimed testing, students then return to timed practice, and work on speeding things up. Now they know what to do – they just need to do it faster.

This approach has been useful to a great many students of mine over the years, particularly on the ACT science section, which is famous for being a time-burner. Unfortunately, its counter-intuitive nature can make this miraculous study tactic uncomfortable to use at first. Once regularly employed in practice, however, improved results generally dispel any initial doubts or fears.

Building muscles slowly in the early stages of any strength-building process just makes sense. The same goes for building test-taking muscles.

It's a maxim that applies to disciplines as widely varied as musical performance, athletics, academics, and more. At all stages of the learning process – and especially at the beginning – deliberately sacrificing speed for the sake of developing concentration, accuracy, and control is the best way to optimize progress.

Slow down, to go faster!