The Laugh Out Loud Guide to the SAT

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit, Neatorama Only on January 19, 2009 at 3:02 pm


The following is a guest post by Charles Horn, Emmy-nominated writer of Robot Chicken and author of The Laugh Out Loud Guide: Ace the SAT Exam without Boring Yourself to Sleep!

Whenever I tutor for the SAT, I invariably see either a boredom factor or a stress factor come into play. If they’re bored, they just won’t put in the effort, and if they’re too stressed, their learning ability becomes impaired. Comedy helps in both regards, because it reduces stress and keeps them interested and engaged. The other remarkable thing about comedy is that it actually increases recall as well, so they’ll remember the information better on test day (and apply the same concepts to the more boring SAT questions).

I won’t lie – Robot Chicken is still way more fun than studying for the SAT. But I figure if they’re going to be forced to take the dreaded test, at least they deserve to have a little fun along the way.

The Laugh Out Loud Guide: Ace the SAT Exam without Boring Yourself to Sleep! uses comedy to prepare students for the dreaded SAT. Here are a few sample questions. How would you do?

1. Yo Momma so _______, when you mail her a letter, you need two zip codes.

(A) diaphanous
(B) luminous
(C) ravenous
(D) grisly
(E) corpulent

2. At a Saks Fifth Avenue store, Winona Ryder examines four distinct blouses, five distinct dresses, and two distinct handbags. How many different combinations of items can she shoplift if she takes exactly one blouse, two dresses, and a handbag?

3.My parents, Brad and Angelina, went to Vietnam and all they got me was this lousy brother.

(A) went to Vietnam and all they got me was this lousy brother
(B) went to Vietnam, all they got me was this lousy brother
(C) went to Vietnam, this lousy brother was all they got me
(D) went to Vietnam; and all they got me was this lousy brother
(E) went to Vietnam; and this lousy brother was all they got me

4. On a scale of 1 to 10, Warren’s hotness can be expressed as a , where a and b are positive integers and ab. If Warren’s hotness is equal to 2, what is the value of a – b?

(A) -10
(B) -1
(C) 0
(D) 1
(E) 10

5. Loading The Toddmeister onto a gurney, the emergency
        A
medical technicians, who happened to be Kappa Omega
                                       B
Kappa brothers themselves and the winning team of the
                              C
2000 Chug-a-thon, was relieved to see that the
                                    D
championship drinking trophy was still out on display.

No error
     E

6. In the figure, if x = 5 - y, what is the value of y2 + 25?
(A) 7
(B) 32
(C) 39
(D) 56
(E) 64

7. After a _______ investigation, the inspector _______ that faulty wiring was foshizzle the cause of the fire that burned down Snoop Dogg’s hizzouse.

(A) lengthy, realized
(B) complete, prognosticated
(C) cursory, ruled
(D) thorough, determined
(E) copious, charged

 

ANSWERS:

  1. E
  2. 80
  3. A
  4. D
  5. D
  6. B
  7. D

Charles Horn is the author of The Laugh Out Loud Guide: Ace the SAT Exam without Boring Yourself to Sleep!

He is an Emmy-nominated comedy writer with credits including Robot Chicken and the Robot Chicken: Star Wars special, as well as The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. He also has a Ph.D. from Princeton University. Charles writes a blog and a comic strip. You can also check out his education-themed and other fun t-shirts.

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COMMENT

20 comments to "The Laugh Out Loud Guide to the SAT"

  1. GailW
    January 19th, 2009 at 4:08 pm

    Indeed, quite funny!

  2. sw
    January 19th, 2009 at 5:52 pm

    that is awesome! they should do an advanced version for the gre; maybe i would have studied.

  3. moovingcow4u
    January 19th, 2009 at 6:03 pm

    Is there one for the ACT?

  4. arrghiamapirate
    January 19th, 2009 at 8:16 pm

    Now I just need one for the the PE and I can bees an engineer!

  5. Kitten
    January 19th, 2009 at 9:29 pm

    #3 can't be A.. betches. it needs a comma. It has to be D or E

  6. just a guy
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:39 pm

    I'm boggled by 4 and it's ticking me off.

    They say:
    "Warren’s hotness can be expressed as a*Squrt(b)" and:
    "Warren’s hotness is equal to 2*Squrt(12)"

    So aren't they pretty much defining a=2 and b=12?
    and 2-12 doesn't = 1 !

    what am I missing. :c

  7. Math Guy
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:16 am

    For 4 you cant just subtract 12 from 2 because it says a>b. therefore you have to do this:

    2*sqrt(12)=2*sqrt(4)*sqrt(3)=2*2*sqrt(3)=4*sqrt(3)

    now a = 4 and b=3
    therefor 4-3=1

    you can check this one a calculator

  8. Lars
    January 20th, 2009 at 2:47 am

    What part of #2 am I missing? One blouse, two dresses, and two handbags should work out to 4 * (5 * 4) * 2, no? Four distinct blouses, five distinct dresses, and two distinct handbags should yeild 160 possible combinations, but the answers say there are only 80 combinations.

  9. Lars
    January 20th, 2009 at 2:48 am

    Oops... Read five dresses above, not two. Grr!

  10. Iru
    January 20th, 2009 at 4:49 am

    Nice, but for us non-empire locals, what the h... is the SAT ??????????

  11. birdfeed
    January 20th, 2009 at 9:53 am

    Lars, I am wondering the same thing. I got 160 as well.

  12. sw
    January 20th, 2009 at 10:54 am

    HA! This post made people do math!

  13. Charles
    January 20th, 2009 at 11:23 am

    Thanks for the comments!

    @ moovingcow4u: The SAT book is the only one so far. I hope to write other books in the series (including one for ACT), but that probably won't help you if you're taking the test soon. However, there is a ton of overlap in material between the two tests, so it would still be okay to use this book -- AS LONG AS you don't make it your primary ACT test prep book. One of the perfectly valid ways to use the book is to use it in conjunction with other test prep books -- to reap the comedy benefits whenever you need to take a break from whatever other stodgy book (or class or other test prep) you're using. It will feel like a break, but you'll still be learning.

    @ Kitten: Choices D and E improperly use a conjunction after the semicolon.

    @ just a guy: Math Guy (in the next comment) is correct. Thanks, Math Guy.

    @ Lars and birdfeed: If Winona Ryder shoplifts a Versace dress and then a Prada dress, it is the same as if she shoplifts a Prada dress and then a Versace dress. In both cases, she ends up with a Prada and a Versace.

    @ Iru: SAT is a standardized test taken by students who hope to attend an American university. Most American universities require SAT scores, but there is an ongoing debate concerning many aspects of the test.

  14. txag04
    January 20th, 2009 at 3:14 pm

    On #2:

    One blouse: 4 choices
    Two dresses: C(5,2) choices = 5!/(3!2!) = (5*4*3*2*1)/((3*2*1)(2*1)) = 5*2 = 10 choices
    One handbag: 2 choices

    4*10*2 = 80

    Pretty funny "test"!

  15. obsessivetwilightfansbro
    January 20th, 2009 at 7:41 pm

    i got 3/7 i feel smrt
    @Charles: In #3 there is no correct answer because if answer A were true then the sentence would read "My parents, Brad and Angelina went to Vietnam and all they got me was this lousy brother." What is missing is a comma after Angelina because the phrase "Brad and Angelina" is an appositive phrase and appositive phrases require a comma before AND after the phrase.

    VAMPS DO NOT SPARKLE!!!
    (even if Alex lives near a house where part of Twilight was filmed)

  16. Charles
    January 21st, 2009 at 2:00 am

    Thanks, txag04.

    @ obsessivetwilightfansbro: Those two commas are not underlined. Both of those commas would remain in the sentence.

  17. Word Choice
    January 21st, 2009 at 3:15 am

    Why can't 7 also be A?

  18. just a guy
    January 21st, 2009 at 4:58 am

    thanks Math guy, that makes sense, and i thought about doing reduction on the sqrt, but it was just sticking in my head that they were saying a=2 and b=12 in their givens, for some reason. XP

  19. Charles
    January 21st, 2009 at 12:49 pm

    That's a good question, Word Choice. I left off the directions to the questions because it would take up too much space, but basically you're supposed to choose the BEST choice among the answer choices. It's true that choice A describes how some offbeat TV detectives seem to work, but the better choice overall is D.

  20. Gramp
    September 27th, 2009 at 8:43 am

    Lol I didn't notice that she Shoplifted until a comment pointed it out.


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