Higher Education Test Practice: Basic Exam Preparation 2024

If you are planning to take a standardized test, a placement test, or any other sort of aptitude test, chances are you will come across reading, writing, and math questions. These questions are not designed to require extra knowledge, but rather to test what you have already learned. Each testing format varies, but more often than not, these assessments consist of multiple-choice, short answers, and fill in the blanks. College admission and placement tests all cover the same essential material that forms the basis for academic and career success.

Below is a summary of what you can expect in each section:

• Reading comprehension tests often consist of passages, followed by content-based questions
• Writing ability tests often consist of grammar, synonym, and antonym-based questions
• Math skills tests often consist of algebra, pre-algebra, and basic arithmetic questions

Even if you are, or were, a strong student in any of these subjects, it is important to prepare for any test. Since many of the questions are based on information you’ve learned in the past, a lot of it may not be as clear to you as it was before. To strengthen your familiarity with the knowledge and skills required for these types of tests, review and practice are highly recommended. Success on a standardized test depends not just on familiarity with the content, but also comfort in a testing situation that could involve time restrictions, a computerized testing system, and questions in a specific style. TestPrep-Online's Higher Education prep materials can help you build upon your classroom work in order to succeed on college admissions and placement tests to the fullest of your abilities. By simulating common types of standardized test questions, our test prep materials can help you feel knowledgeable and confident on test day, even if you are taken a test about which you don' know details in advance.

Reading comprehension is your ability to understand a text you have read and make inferences from it. Skill in reading comprehension allows students to absorb and process large quantities of information in their chosen fields of study. You can improve your reading comprehension skills by reading books and articles about topics that interest you, summarizing them, and responding to them. Ask the basic questions: Who? What? When? Where? Why? How? Ask yourself about the purpose of what you read, or why the author described something in a certain way.

The best way to improve your writing is to write on a regular basis about topics that interest you and show what you write to friends, family members, and teachers. Ask them to evaluate the clarity of your writing, and to summarize what you wrote in their own words. Did you get across what you wanted? What was clear, and what was less clear? If you receive formal feedback from a teacher, resist the urge just to look at a grade. Instead, pay close attention to the teacher's corrections and comments, and make a list of a few aspects of your writing to improve next time.

Tackle challenging math problems by being patient, trying multiple approaches, looking for similar, simpler problems, and explaining each step that you take to solve the problem. The same mathematical concept can often be explained in many ways. If you feel stuck try to approach the problem from another angle. Practice "translating" between words and numbers by finding an equation that fits a situation or a situation that fits an equation. Collaborate with classmates when this is permitted by the teacher, but be sure to work together rather than simply give each other answers. You'll know when you truly understand a mathematical concept when you can explain and teach it to someone else.

Before you start trying to learn any new skills or information, it is important to review what you have already learned. TestPrep-Online offers a variety of basic practice packs, giving you the opportunity to practice with actual test-like material under actual test-like circumstances. Using our timed practice tests, you can simulate actual test-taking conditions and answer a series of questions before checking your answers and reading explanations on every question, enriching you with new ways of thinking, various strategies, and solving tips that could help you solve similar questions in the near future.

Each pack includes hundreds of questions, on a variety of different topics. Want to strengthen all your skills across English, math, and reading comprehension topics? Try our English, Reading, & Math Practice Pack, which includes all the questions we offer, together with detailed explanations and a variety of study guides.

With the packs’ online format, you are free to study wherever you’d like, whenever you’d like.

Back to top