General ACT tips
Punctuation Rules
Concision
Verbs
Hanging Words & Fakes
100
?In addition reading the the underlined portion and each answer choice, you must read this to get the question right.
What is the entire sentence?
100
These 3 things make a sentence complete.
What is subject, a verb, and a complete thought?
100
This answer choice is often-- but not always-- the correct choice in a concision question.
What is the shortest answer choice?
100
You must do this to get subject and verb agreement questions right.
What is find the true subject and match it to the verb?
100
this type of word turns a complete into an incomplete.
What is a hanging word?
200
No change is the correct answer this percentage of time.
What is 25%
200
These are the 3 most common ways to join ?(or separate) complete sentences.
What is a comma/fanboys, a semi-colon, and a period? Also acceptable-- a colon or a dash
200
This abbreviation helps you remember how to get concision questions right.
What is KISS?
200
You must do this to get maintaining verb tense questions right.
What is look for other verbs in the sentence or paragraph and match them?
200
These are the two ways to fix a complete made into an incomplete by a hanging word.
What is remove the hanging word or attach the incomplete to a complete with a comma?
300
This is the number of questions on the ACT English test.
What is 75?
300
This punctuation mark most commonly joins a complete to an incomplete.
What is a comma?
300
One type of concision question tests your ability to remove words that say the same thing twice. For example, I might say "I am happy and joyful" when I could really just say "I'm happy."
What is repetition or redundancy?
300
This is not this skill: Jonathon likes playing baseball, to whine incessantly, and staring at bountiful buttocks. This is this skill: Jonathon likes to play baseball, whine incessantly, and stare at bountiful buttocks.
What is parallel structure?
300
This hanging word, which may start a sentence despite the lies your grammar school teachers told you, is one of the few hanging words that does not need a comma if it introduces an incomplete at the end of a sentence instead of the beginning.
What is BECAUSE? Because the ACT is tomorrow, you should get some sleep tonight! You should get some sleep tonight because the ACT is tomorrow!
400
This is the number of questions do you need to get right to be considered college ready on the English test.
What is 40?
400
This punctuation mark is like a comma but signifies a longer pause and may also join 2 completes.
What is a dash?
400
This type of concision question uses too many words to get an idea across-- like saying "Due to the fact that she is late" instead of just saying "she is late"
What is wordiness?
400
3rd person present tense singular verbs end in this letter.
What is an S? If both plural subjects and verbs ended in S, it would simply be too SSS-y!
400
Fake hanging words (aka transitions) sure do look like real hanging words, but they do not turn a sentence to an incomplete. However, they do require something.
What is a comma?
500
This is the name of questions that require you to reread the entire passage or multiple paragraphs.
What is a time waster?
500
This punctuation mark must be preceded by a complete sentence but can have a list, a word, a title, or another complete sentence after it.
What is a colon?
500
The last type of concision question-- and the hardest-- asks you to remove material is off-topic.?? For example, if I am writing an essay on endangered species, it would be off-topic for me to include that I have a fake cheetah fur jacket.
What is irrelevancy?
500
Another, anybody, anyone, anything, each, ??either, everybody, everyone, everything, little, much, ??neither, nobody, no one, nothing, one, other, ??somebody, someone, & something all take this kind of verb.
What is singular? Examples-- Everybody wants something Nobody is here
500
There are many more official categories, but these 3 categories help distinguish one fake hanging word from another.
What is AND, BUT, & SO? (will accept time too)
M
e
n
u