A Winning Strategy: How to Approach Test Prep Like a Sports Season

As we start a new school year helping our clients conquer the challenges of the ACT® and SAT®, it's important to recognize that the journey to test-day success shares many parallels with a sports season. Both endeavors require dedication, practice, teamwork, and a gradual build-up of skills. By embracing these similarities and applying sports training principles to your test-prep sessions, you can ensure that your students are fully prepared for their ultimate challenge—game day (or in our case, test day)!

Level of Commitment

Just like athletes commit to training regimens, students must fully commit to their test-prep journey. Encourage your students to understand that achieving their target scores demands consistency, effort, and focus.

As soon as the first tutoring session, emphasize the long-term commitment required to achieve success. Much like an athlete's commitment to training throughout a sports season, you can’t expect winning results from an inconsistent, sporadic time investment. Just like sports, signing up for test prep is like registering for a sports season: you need to be prepared for all that comes with that obligation.

Read more about how accountability is the #1 predictor of test-prep score improvement.

Test Day Success Starts With Practice

Athletes hone their skills through repetitive practice, and the same holds true for test takers. Regular practice tests, drills, and exercises should mirror the way athletes refine their techniques. Provide your students with ample opportunities to tackle real test questions, building their familiarity and confidence over time.

Team Training = Tutor Sessions

Success in team sports relies on collaboration and effective communication. Similarly, your group tutoring sessions should foster a sense of teamwork, where students can learn from each other's experiences and challenges.

Encourage group discussions, problem-solving exercises, and collaborative activities to create an engaging and dynamic learning environment.

If you offer one-on-one tutoring to your clients, you can still make it a point to infuse teamwork into your practice. Be sure to take time to work alongside your student to help model problem-solving strategies and thought processes.

Individual Practice = Time In Between Sessions

Just as athletes continue to train on their own outside of team practices, students need to dedicate time to individual practice and study between tutoring sessions. Encourage them to use this time wisely: complete assigned homework, review notes, and attempt practice problems independently. This solo effort is essential for skill retention and development.

Clear Choice Prep’s test-prep curriculum includes digital and physical resources that make it possible to identify and assign the specific practice your students need. Rather than offering a one-size-fits-all approach, you can be sure students are maximizing their time between sessions with the individual practice they need most.

Read more about our recommended best practices for raising test scores in between test-prep sessions.

Your Students Need Multiple Types of Training

Just like in sports, test prep requires the development of a lot of different skills both in isolation and simultaneously. Your role as a tutor is to identify and target the individual skills your students need for success on test day. At the same time, you need to constantly be looking for ways to ensure the skills students develop integrate with each other and promote growth.

Strength Training

In sports, athletes focus on strengthening specific muscle groups and refining their techniques. Likewise, identify your students' weaknesses and design targeted exercises to address them. Consistent practice and repetition will help reinforce concepts and sharpen their skill sets.

Just like with strength training, there will be periods of noteworthy growth as well as inevitable plateaus. Your job is to help students capitalize on the former and push through the latter.

Increasing Speed and Endurance

Endurance and speed are key in both sports and test-taking. As students progress through their test-prep journey, gradually introduce time-based challenges to improve their pacing and stamina. This will help them manage the test's time constraints effectively and help reduce frustration and anxiety on test day.

Read more about how to train smarter, not harder in advance of the official test day.

Confidence Building

Athletes thrive when they believe in their abilities. Similarly, instilling confidence in your students is essential. Celebrate their wins, no matter how small, and help them recognize their progress. A confident test taker is more likely to perform at their best when it counts the most.

Often, we tutors tend to fixate on finding and fixing student weaknesses. Test day is always looming and it can feel like time is always running out. That said, making a purposeful effort to note and validate student strengths can help propel continued progress.

Game Day = Test Day

Game day is when athletes put their training to the ultimate test, for test takers, it’s test day. By simulating test-day conditions during practice exams and reviewing test-taking strategies, you can help your students feel more comfortable and confident when the actual test day arrives.

Treating SAT® and ACT® test prep like a sports season is a powerful approach that can yield impressive results. By emphasizing commitment, practice, teamwork, individual effort, targeted training, confidence building, and test-day readiness, you're not just preparing students for a test; you're equipping them with valuable skills that extend far beyond the test-taking experience.

Read more about the unsung benefits of standardized testing.

Your role as a test-prep tutor is akin to that of a coach. Your expertise, encouragement, and unwavering support will make all the difference in helping your students achieve their academic goals.

Let's make this test-prep season a victorious one!

We Are Ready for the Digital SAT®! Are you?

As the SAT® and ACT® transition to all-digital testing, we are ready to support your tutoring business with the first and best custom-branded, fully-digital test-prep courses. Our white-label, all-digital, adaptive Digital SAT® practice tests include accurate, algorithmic scoring. This gives your tutors and clients access to the actionable data they need for tailored instruction and score optimization.

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