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How is academia responding to the growing essay writing industry? (From Quora)

12/7/2018

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www.quora.com/How-is-academia-responding-to-the-growing-essay-writing-industry

There are websites that scan the web for plagiarism. See, for example, Online Plagiarism Checking | PlagScan. which I know about only because my website's analytics showed someone accessed my website from that site (probably because I have some sample essay answers in my blog. According to their site, they check the web, academic databases, a “pool” of information designed to prevent plagiarism, and so on.

Essay-writing services, often advertised as “research assistance” (I believe that was the name of one such company that advertised in magazines and/or comic books) get by on the grounds that it’s perfectly acceptable to cite the research of others in your own research paper, as long as you cite it properly. Of course, they’re “shocked, just shocked!” to find some people simply submit the research paper they bought as their own work, instead of using it as “research assistance.”

Would you trust people who’ll help you defraud your high school, college, etc., so you can get grades you didn’t earn NOT to sell the same paper to others taking the same course? Even if they don’t do it the same semester or the same year, an odd turn of phrase or factual or grammatical error can stick in a professor’s or high school teacher’s mind for years.

I heard some of my college classmates got in trouble when one of them copied another’s old paper from one course and submitted it in another, without wondering why the professors in both courses had the same last name. As it turned out, they were a married couple, and they discussed some unusual feature of the two papers, which led to the plagiarism being discovered. But I digress. I can’t imagine this NOT happening if two students order the same research paper. Also, schools could simply be proactive and order papers from these “paper mills” and put them in anti-plagiarism databases.

This may be a bit melodramatic, but someone who’s evil might use your plagiarized paper to blackmail you, etc. Imagine this phone conversation between a term paper mill owner and a person who submitted such a paper as his or her own work “Hello, Judge Smith? Congratulations on being appointed to the bench at such a young age! Hey, I’d like to use your name and picture as one of our satisfied customers… Oh, you wouldn’t like that? Well, we already printed up flyers at a cost of about $20,000 - oh, you’ll pay us to destroy them? Well, that’d be a shame, but we’ll do that as soon as we get the money - have a nice day, Your Honor…” People in professions where they can lose jobs and licenses for “moral turpitude” (e.g. judges, lawyers, doctors, teachers) can suffer real consequences from cheating YEARS after the fact…

Even after you’re dead, people will accuse you of plagiarism - I believe both Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and President Nixon were accused of plagiarism or cheating in school in the late 1990s, LONG AFTER THEY HAD DIED.

Don’t cheat - everything is really easy to upload to a database. That’s how many college papers are “handed in” these days, so it’s not as though colleges wouldn’t take an extra few minutes, or even hours, a week to upload everyone’s papers to a database. It could easily be done at say, 3 am on Saturday or Sunday, when computer resource use is at a minimum. So it’s super easy to get caught these days. Just do your own homework; don’t be a putz.

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What type of student is more likely to do well on the SAT vs the ACT? (From Quora)

10/24/2018

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The ACT is better for you if you can pound out simpler math questions in less time (you get 60 minutes to do 60 problems); the SAT math is better if you can handle questions that are trickier (i.e., there’s a shortcut you need to find to do it quickly). If you take the SAT, you do also need to memorize the basic formulas the SAT provides, but you really should know most of them in any event. ACT math asks you to plug values into some scary-looking formulas, and the SAT asks you to manipulate some formulas. If you get past the weird decimals, variables, etc., the actual math is very easy in both types of “formula” problems.

As others have answered, the “new SAT” is very similar to the ACT. The SAT has added charts and graphs to interpret, in response to the ACT’s science section, which mostly should be called the “Data Interpretation” or “Can You Read Charts and Graphs?” section, since you need only know very basic science to do the problems. (You do need to know some basic science facts such as the charge of an electron, what photosynthesis is, etc., but way less than I’d expect anyone who’s about to graduate from high school to know.)

The reading sections on both tests are very similar - it’s a wash. You won’t see any real differences between the two. Both test vocabulary in context, details, main ideas, and inferences from things implied but not stated in the text. They’re both frustrating in that the hard questions can present very subtle shades of meaning where many students lose points for picking answers that are perfectly good answers, but not the “best” answers according to the test makers. The English/Writing tests are identical - the College Board basically copied the ACT’s test wholesale, then added a few charts and graphs, when they came up with the “new SAT.”

The essay on the SAT is probably harder for most students. While the ACT just asks you to analyze three perspectives on an issue, then present your own (or just explain which of the three you agree with), the SAT requires you to analyze the arguments in a persuasive essay (e.g., a newspaper editorial), explaining how the argument is presented and NOT whether you agree with it. So if you aren’t familiar with the terms “ethos,” “pathos,” and “logos,” don’t like it when you can’t express your personal opinions on an issue on which you have strong feelings, etc., or just didn’t do that well in English classes where you had to analyze the texts you read for technique, rather than simply explain what you just read, you’ll find the ACT essay easier to handle. It’s closer to the essays you had to write from grade school on; the SAT is more of a 10th or 11th-grade assignment.

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Answer to "What should I do to increase my reading score on the SAT, and what is the best way to deal with the passages?" (From Quora)

10/24/2018

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As the answer to the old “How do I get to Carnegie Hall?” joke goes - “Practice, practice, practice!”

For the reading, you don’t need to know so much about “basic grammar concepts,” as another responder posted, although those will help immensely with the writing sections.

What you should focus on for READING is vocabulary and reading comprehension, as well as some SAT/ACT-specific test-taking tips. The fastest way to learn new words is to learn word roots, using a page such as this one: The web’s largest word root and prefix directory

It also pays to read your SAT review book’s vocabulary section (e.g., roughly pages 163 through 240 of the Barron’s SAT book - I don’t have a copy handy as I am out of town right now). If your book doesn’t have a vocabulary section, you can find vocabulary pages online or simply get a high school level vocabulary book, or get the Barron’s SAT book (all of these should be available at your public library if you are in the US).

There are 8 downloadable official practice SATs, as well as links to Khan Academy and other resources here: SAT Practice Tests What you should use these for is to experiment with reading the passage, then the questions, or reading the questions, then the passage. Generally, you should read the passage first, then do the questions, but you may find the opposite approach is easier if you (1) are having real trouble understanding the passage, or (2) already understand the point the passage is trying to make and the passage is organized to be skimmed easily (most likely a science passage or news article).

This approach probably won’t work so well with prose fiction, which can jump all over the place in reference to time, are more likely to have weird details buried in the text, and so on.

Generally speaking, you should use the same tactics you use to answer ANY SAT (or ACT) question - math, writing, or reading - which is to try to guess your own answer before you look at the answer choices. If you see an answer choice that matches your choice, congratulations! You’ve probably got the right answer. But double-check your answers at the end to make sure you haven’t been tricked.

Another tactic you should use is marking the questions PRECEDING “command of evidence” questions. What I mean is some questions will read something like “15. Which of the following provides the best evidence for your answer to the previous question?” So if you make some mark next to question 14, the previous question, and then mark where you find your answer to that question with your pencil, you should have the answer to question 15 clearly marked. That doesn’t always work, since the there can be more than one group of lines that both support the same correct answer, but it’s a lot better than panicking while thinking “Where the heck are those lines with the answer? I was JUST LOOKING AT THEM!”

A related tactic is “reverse engineering” answers using the command of evidence questions. Let’s say you didn’t know what the answer to question 14. You could read all the answers to question 15, go to those lines, and see what lines lead you to a good answer to question 14. That’s a way to use the test questions to answer each other. It’s not as good as figuring out the answers yourself, but it’s a good emergency tactic if you get stuck.

To handle vocabulary questions, GO AND READ THE LINES. Don’t rely on the answer choices or questions with ellipses (you know, those dot thingies as in “All the young dudes … the news”) - they’ve left out the parts that will help you answer the question, and of course, they’ll say it’s to save on printing. If you believe that, I can get you a really good price on the Golden Gate Bridge. ;-) One thing you SHOULD know is that the common meaning of the word is often NOT the right answer, but you should be able to determine that by reading the lines in the passage. This is especially true if the passage was (or seems like) it was written more than 50 years ago, written by someone whose first language is not English, or is a highly technical piece of writing. For example, a “sheet” can be used to cover a bed and to sleep under, but it can also be a piece of paper, or a rope used to adjust a sail on a boat. It should be obvious which one is meant when we read “The sailor pulled on the sheet to raise the sail,” but that’s certainly not the most obvious choice if we’re just guessing without looking. So DON’T GUESS AT VOCABULARY QUESTIONS WITHOUT LOOKING. They’re usually fairly easy, so you might even want to do them first. Remember, a hard question isn’t worth any more than an easy one, so you might as well get the easy questions right first.

Speaking of handling easy questions first, it’s a pretty good idea to flip through the whole section and start with passages you like and/or understand well. If you know you don’t understand biology, or Jane Austen novels make your skin crawl, work on the passages that you like more first. You’re more likely to get the right answer to questions about passages you understand and enjoy than you are to get the right answer to questions about passages you don’t understand or don’t like. That way, if you run out of time, you can simply guess at the questions you were less likely to get right. In other words, the sections you don’t like can be your “sacrificial” sections (this is especially useful on the ACT, where you generally aren’t given enough time to read all the passages properly).

Furthermore, don’t fall for the “smart kid answer.” What I mean is, don’t pick an answer just because it has a word you don’t understand in it. The SAT and ACT people know many teenage test takers will pick an answer with a fancy word because “the smart kids know this word, so it must be right!” So if you see an answer that uses simpler language and seems right, it probably IS right. However, if none of the other answers are right, then PLEASE DO pick the “smart kid answer.” The process of elimination really does work.

When answering detail questions, such as “Which of the following was the reason why…” or “All of the following are true, EXCEPT…” make sure you scan all the answer choices, then look for words from those choices in the passage. Then make sure they haven’t used those words to try to trick you. For example, if the passage said “Joe really liked French fries,” a good trick would be to have “An aversion to French fries” as an answer to “Which of the following was a characteristic Joe had?” A careless, rushed, or panicking test taker might see “French fries” in the text and think “Ooh! That must be the right answer,” ignoring that an “aversion” to something is a dislike of, or tendency to avoid. that thing.

When answering paired passages, make sure you read Passage 1, then answer all the questions about it. The Passage 1 questions almost always come first (sometimes there’s a question about both passages before the Passage 1 questions - if so, skip it) Only then should you read Passage 2 and answer the questions about it. Why? It’s simple - facts from Passage 2 make great wrong answers to questions about Passage 1. A student could think “Hey, I recall reading something about turtles, so this turtle answer must be right!” If turtles were discussed in Passage 2, not Passage 1, he or she is wrong. Is it fair to do things like that? Probably not, but we don’t get to choose.

That’s all I have for right now. Hope this helps!

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What are the differences between ACTs and SATs? (From Quora)

9/21/2018

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https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-differences-between-ACTs-and-SATs/answer/John-Linneball

The “new SAT” that came out in 2016 is almost a complete copy of the ACT. The main differences are in the lack of a “science” section on the SAT, some slight differences in the math sections, and differences between the optional essays.
The SAT has graphs and charts to interpret in the reading and writing sections to make up for the lack of a “science” section. Since the ACT “science” section is mostly the “Can you interpret a graph or a chart?” section, and some SAT reading and writing sections are science-based, that’s not a bad substitute.

The math sections differ in that the SAT has two sections - one “calculator,” and one “no calculator,” whereas the ACT has one long section where calculator use is permitted. The SAT problems involve more creativity and thought - or to put it more negatively, involve more “tricks.” The ACT math section involves doing 60 questions in 60 minutes. They’re more straightforward than SAT questions.
Both tests will give you “fill in the formula” questions for complex formulas, to see if you can manipulate equations and substitute in values. The SAT has the same little formula box in at the beginning of both sections, in which basic geometric formulas are printed, as well as some other basic math formulas. The ACT expects you to know the basic formulas.

The optional essays for the tests differ. The ACT presents you with a description of an issue, along with three perspectives on that issue. Your job is to write an essay discussing all three perspectives, then explaining your own perspective, which could be agreeing with one of the perspectives, partially agreeing with one or more, or presenting an entirely different perspective.

The SAT presents you with a persuasive essay of some sort, usually a newspaper or magazine editorial. Unlike the ACT prompt, the SAT prompt does NOT ask for your opinion on the subject of the essay, but instead asks you to analyze how the author uses facts, rhetoric, and logic to present his or her case. It helps to know the meanings of the words “ethos,” “pathos,” and “logos.”
That’s about it - hope this helps!

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Does reading the SAT preparation books made for earlier SAT exams help for the new ones (the ones starting from 2016)? (From Quora)

9/14/2018

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The math is the same for pre-2016 and 2016-and-later “new” SAT books. with the exception of right-triangle trigonometry and imaginary and complex numbers. The books I used before and after 2016 didn’t bother to write very many new math problems for the chapters on subjects common to the new and old SAT (i.e., everything but right-triangle trig and imaginary/complex numbers). They did come up with many new problems for the practice tests, and those problems are a bit different from old SAT problems. But you can learn these problems by doing similar ones from the College Board’s website (don’t bother to buy THEIR books - the same tests are available for free download from their website, and their review chapters aren’t that great) or from Khan Academy.

Alec G-Man is correct, to some extent, in that old (or new) ACT books would work better for SAT prep than old SAT books, because the new SAT practically copied the ACT wholesale - the new SAT writing section is basically the ACT English (as some SAT prep tutors commented in the documentary “The Test,” the ACT people (American College Testing) should seriously consider suing the College Board for copyright infringement. And older SAT grammar/usage/vocabulary “sentence correction” problems would still be good practice for the writing/English portion of the SAT or ACT.

However, the SAT math questions are more “trick question”-like than most ACT questions, so I’d be more inclined to use old SAT math books than ACT ones to study for the new math SAT. I also really like most test prep books’ coverage of the tips and tricks for countering common SAT tricks and for guessing (which they’re not going to give you on the College Board site or Khan Academy’s videos, as far as I can tell - it’d be like the California Highway Patrol telling people where the freeway speed traps are).
I’d say you can use the old review books for the math and general practice, but you really should try a post-2016 review book for additional practice and better explanations than the College Board’s answer explanations. Khan Academy is great, but Barron’s SAT is really great for learning the tricks to SAT taking, as are books from Kaplan, Princeton Review, etc. Why don’t you see if you can look at a post-2016 SAT book at your public library, or post on FreeCycle, Rooster, or Craigslist to ask for one? I’m sure at least a few people near you have such a book to give away.

Best of luck,

John

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Two More SAT Success Stories!

9/14/2018

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Two new success stories - one of my students scored 360 points higher on the August 2018 SAT than on her previous SAT! Another student of mine, taking the same SAT, scored a 1500 (790 math; 710 verbal)!

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What's the Easiest Way to Get Your SAT Score Up a Couple Points? (From Quora).

9/14/2018

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https://www.quora.com/What-s-the-easiest-way-to-get-your-SAT-score-up-a-couple-points

I’m not sure what you mean by “a couple points,” since the minimum increment is 10 points on the SAT, but I assume you mean by a small amount. I’d say the easiest way is to study the grammar for the writing/editing multiple choice section. Make sure you know the rules regarding “who” and “whom” “he/she/they” “him/her/them.”
Memorize the formulas in the little box before each math section, so you don’t have to spend time looking at them when you’re taking the test. Know the difference of squares (a+b)(a-b), as well as the binomial expansions for (a+b)(a+b) and (a-b)(a-b). Know your squares from 1 to 20. Know the properties of transversals, circles, and squares. Know the sum of the internal angles for a polygon with n sides = (n-2)*180.
Practice the reading and read the vocabulary section of Barron’s SAT or a similar SAT book. Practice all the SAT questions in general. Take a practice SAT in the actual time you’d have on the test.

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What Did You Do in High School that Helped You to Get a High ACT/SAT Score? (From Quora)

9/14/2018

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https://www.quora.com/What-did-you-do-in-high-school-that-helped-you-to-get-a-high-ACT-SAT-score/answer/John-Linneball

I studied hard to learn the material, as Jon Richards noted, a little at a time. Studies in neuroscience have proven you can’t learn effectively through last-minute “cram studying.”
Read a lot; it’s the only way you’ll do well on the reading section. You’ll need to know lots of vocabulary and be accustomed to looking for main points in reading passages. And you’ll have to be able to do that for the rest of your life. Read op-ed (opinion-editorial) pieces in newspapers or their online equivalents so you will know common argument forms and how they are made. YouTube is a really good place to find such things in video form.
Practice your math - if you really pay attention in math class, you’ll know everything you need to know for the math SAT, EXCEPT the typical SAT tricks, that you can learn fairly quickly using any review book (other than the official SAT books - asking them to teach you what tricks they use, or what shortcuts you can use is like asking the highway patrol where the speed traps will be today).
Pay attention in science if you’re taking the ACT - while you don’t need to know MUCH science to do well on the ACT science section, there are always a few questions where you DO need to know a little of the science involved, or where knowing the science will make the passage much easier to understand. This will also help with reading passages that deal with the natural sciences. Believe me -I’ve heard people complain loudly about science problems being in reading or math tests when they didn’t really need to understand the science to do the math, and the science could be understood well enough to answer the reading questions. Don’t be one of THOSE people. No one will want to hear your complaint, and no one will take it seriously. Pay attention in ALL your classes, and the ACT and SAT will not be that daunting.
Hope this helps!

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Quick Real-Life Math Problem:

6/4/2018

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If you’re a normal student (or former student), you probably have asked yourself why you should know algebra. “I’m not a scientist, engineer, or doctor – what’s the point?” Well, a little algebra can help you make important financial decisions, as I found a little while ago.
I have a credit card that gives me 4% “cash back” when I pay for gasoline using my credit card. Since the bank’s not paying me for advertising, I’m not going to say which bank or credit card it is. ;-)
If you live in California or some other states, you may see most gas stations charge about 10 cents per gallon more for gas paid for by credit card than by cash. So the problem is – when does it become a better idea to pay with a credit card? [Of course, that’s assuming you pay it off at the end of the month – if you can’t do that, NEVER pay with a credit card unless you absolutely have no other choice but to buy the item now. Google “credit card interest compounded daily” for more details. Here’s one result I found: https://www.consumercredit.com/financial-education/financial-calculators/credit-card-interest-calculator But I digress. ]

The problem is simple enough : Just set up the inequality
(P + 0.10)*0.96 < P , where P is the cash price per gallon.
P + $0.10 < P/(0.96)
P +0.10 < 1.0417 P
$0.10 < 0.417 P
$2.40 < P

So if the cash price of the gas is more than $2.40 per gallon (as it does now), you save money with that credit card, even though you have to pay $2.50 when you use the credit card. Math is good!

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A Note on “Submissions” to My Website(s)

6/4/2018

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I never dreamed I’d have to write this, but since the same person has emailed me about this twice, here I go. I do not accept unsolicited content to post on my website. Any article, essay, blog, think piece, whatever you’d like to call it you send to me will not be read. In other words, as all the big publishers and production studios put it, “Unsolicited manuscripts will be returned unread,” assuming you’ve sent me a physical copy. If you’ve emailed me, I’ll just delete them without reading them. They’re not going up on any site I run.
Why am I being such a jerk, you ask? It’s simple – I don’t want to be sued by someone who says I promised them payment in the future for “free” content they sent me today. [See, for example, http://www.lawlawlandblog.com/2012/10/qa-why-are-unsolicited-submissions-policies-so-brutal-201210.html ].

That’s in addition, of course, to the obvious – I have no idea if your content is something with which I would agree, and finally, if your content’s so great, why not post it on your own website? You can get your own site literally for free (and the would-be contributor has her own site), and simply publicize your site. If I like your content, I’ll link to it (and maybe even tweet it), and you’ll get full credit for the article, since it will be on YOUR site.

I know that 99% of the people reading this have no intention of submitting anything for publication without my requesting it, but there’s always that obnoxious and/or oblivious 1%. Thanks for reading this!

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Tutoring blog! :-D

How is academia responding to the growing essay writing industry? (From Quora)

What type of student is more likely to do well on the SAT vs the ACT? (From Quora)

Answer to "What should I do to increase my reading score on the SAT, and what is the best way to deal with the passages?" (From Quora)

What are the differences between ACTs and SATs? (From Quora)

Does reading the SAT preparation books made for earlier SAT exams help for the new ones (the ones starting from 2016)? (From Quora)

Two More SAT Success Stories!

What's the Easiest Way to Get Your SAT Score Up a Couple Points? (From Quora).

What Did You Do in High School that Helped You to Get a High ACT/SAT Score? (From Quora)

Quick Real-Life Math Problem:

A Note on “Submissions” to My Website(s)

Author: John Linneball Who did you think? ;-)

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