The PSAT to me is just a routine assessment I take twice a year. I personally don’t take the PSAT as serious as I need to. Now being an upperclassman, I realize now the benefits of taking these seriously. In fact, when I hear the PSAT is coming up, I get excited for it because I know there will be a half day of no school, just testing. There are scholarships involved, and these practice assessments are meant to help students out in the future. Realizing that now, I wish I took it more seriously.

During these tests, I tend to zone out and start to think about other things. Many times I have to re-read certain paragraphs because I didn’t give my full undivided attention into the passage I was meant to be reading. I am now a junior, about to take the real assessment in January. The PSAT would have been more helpful to me if I acted like it was real. I am not going into the test completely blind because of certain tutoring I will be taking, but as far as the testing format, I’m not as prepared as I should be. I wish I actually took the time to read through all the questions and work through the problems I had trouble on. For me, the hardest part is the grammar, those ones where they ask you if the change is needed or not to the sentence. It’s those “pick the best answer to complete this question” type of questions doesn’t make sense to me.

I personally don’t think students understand how helpful these practice test though can be, including myself. In upcoming January, I’m going to wish I made a little extra effort on the PSAT because it would have helped me out in the long run. My advice to lowerclassmen is to actually get into the testing zone and to take things seriously. You shouldn’t come in on PSAT days with a mindset to just get the assessment over with but to actually go into the classroom with confidence to see how well you can do on this test. These test will determine your whole future ahead of you, if you don’t take them seriously now, you want in the future.