What is the ACT?

Article Type: Connect

We understand your love for standardized testing. There's nothing quite like the smell of a freshly-sharpened No. 2 pencil, or the luster of graphite in a perfectly-filled-in oval. Getting into college is just the cherry on top of the treacle tart that is the standardized test. Heck, we'd turn down an invitation to Hogwarts: we read those books, and no one ever offers Harry a Scantron.

We admit that when we're talking about college entrance exams, the SAT® is usually the first thing that comes to mind. That is, of course, for good reason. The SAT has been both the Elder Statesman and the Kingmaker of the standardized test biz for a long time. Some schools looked down their snobby noses at the ACT® exam because it tested "achievement" (what you actually learn in school) instead of "aptitude," or, your ability to puzzle out more advanced concepts.

The experts originally thought that the SAT was a better judge of how students would perform in college, but that opinion is changing. In 2005, the ACT developed a set of College and Career Readiness Standards, and then they gave these a fancy makeover in 2015. These standards let them translate scores into predictions about whether students are college-ready. Today, every four-year college in the U.S. accepts either test, but some strongly prefer one over the other. Be sure to do your research before applying. You don't want to show up to the admissions party in the wrong ensemble...

What is the format of the ACT?

This particular standardized test looks, well, pretty standard. Come Test Day, you'll be sitting down in front of four multiple-choice tests and one (optional) writing test. Here's how that will all shake out:

That's 2 hours and 55 minutes of pure bubbling goodness. Make that 3 hours and 35 minutes if you opt to take the Writing Test, either because it's required by one of the schools you're applying to, or because you want to impress admissions committees. Three and a half hours may sound like a long time, but it's shorter than most Netflix binges.

How do old ACT exams differ from newer ACT exams?

Starting in 2015, the ACT gave its writing section a makeover. Where the test used to focus on arguing for or against a given topic, now it's all about engaging with multiple perspectives. In real life, things aren't always as simple as, say, whether or not bubble gum ice cream is an abomination, so the new Writing Test comes with three perspectives on the given topic, and asks writers to engage with more than one. Even better, the enhanced Writing Test comes with guidance for planning and pre-writing, so test-takers will have a better idea of how to go about writing their essays.

Beginning in the fall of 2016, the ACT redesigned its score reports. They created new reporting categories that broke down the different skills being tested in each of the subject areas. These new reporting categories conform to the ACT's College and Career Readiness standards, which in turn are closely associated with the Common Core State Standards.

The test has also seen some other tweaks in the past decade. You'll notice in the science section of older exams that there are typically seven passages; these days, there are typically six passages. Also, the Math Test has shifted towards more multi-step word problems—the focus is less pure mathematical knowledge; it's more applied math now. The ACT has also started including more statistics and probability questions, and fewer geometry/trigonometry problems. Circles and sine waves definitely think that was pretty square of them.

What does the ACT test on?

The good folks at the ACT have collected a set of standards they believe are necessary for students to be ready for "adulting"…or rather, the essential skills necessary for kids to succeed in college and their future careers. (Ability to do your own laundry, however, is not among these skills. Your college roommate, on the other hand, will definitely be judging you on your laundry's smelliness factor.)

Each section of the exam has its own set of readiness standards, which we break down in detail below. Here's the basic run-down of what you'll be tested on:

• English Test: How good of a writer are you? Are you good at spotting organizational flaws? How well do you know the English language (with all its weird conventions and obscure grammar rules)?
• Math Test: How fluent are you in the common core curriculum? How well do you work with numbers and quantity? Can you tango algebraically with variables and the like? Do you understand what a function is? Can you figure out multi-step word problems, integrating skills from different areas of math? Do you know the basics of statistics and probability?
• Reading Test: Can you read carefully and closely, and reason through texts? Can you mix, match, and compare information from multiple texts?
• Science Test: How do you measure up in the skills you need in the science classroom: interpretation, analysis, evaluation, reasoning, and problem-solving?

They've crunched some numbers to see how ACT scores correlate with obtaining decent grades in college-level courses. If your score meets one of their benchmarks, the researchers at the ACT predict you'll have a 50% chance of getting a B or higher in a college course. For example, if you meet a benchmark of scoring a 23 on the ACT in Science, they'd be willing to place a bet on your grade with a college admissions officer that you'll probably pass your college biology class. With so much research going into these predictions, this bet's at least a little less risky than a game of blackjack.

For more on scoring, check out our guide on ACT scores.

What can I expect to see on the ACT English Test?

Get ready to throw around some commas and cut out some unnecessary words as you open the exam. First up to bat on test day will be the English Test, with 75 multiple-choice questions and a 45-minute time limit. If we crunch the numbers, that averages out to about 1.7 questions per minute, but we'll round up and say two questions per minute.

We say this all the time (because it's true, mostly), but the ACT English test is a particularly special case. Anyone who has busted out a four-colored pen in class to do some peer editing has studied for the ACT English Test. In fact, anyone who has read over their own writing and made a few changes has studied for the ACT English test. Best of all, anyone who has spoken English and corrected themselves was also studying for the ACT English Test.

This section of the ACT exam is all about editing writing to make it better. That's it. Students are asked to correct passages for style and grammar. You'll see five different passages on the ACT English Test, with 15 questions each. They'll come from a variety of flavors: you might see some natural science, social studies, literature, personal narratives or essays, or history passages.

Through the magic of multiple-choice, you'll want to show that you understand the nuances of this crazy language well enough to turn out a respectable term paper on Elizabethan politics or the merits of the standard poodle. More specifically in regard to the ACT exam, we see three different types of questions:

• Production of Writing (29 to 32% of the test, with a median number of 23 questions. Math!). Get ready to act the part of the queen bee (or tyrannical president) of this grammar club—you'll be presented with the option of expelling certain sentences, pairing up other sentences, re-arranging them, and throwing in some fun new ones into the mix. You'll also be tested on your ability to get the main point of a passage, and to decide when that point is being developed effectively or not.
• Knowledge of Language (13 to 19% of the test, with a median number of 12 questions.) Hopefully you've been practicing talking to yourself in inaudible whispers…these questions tend to test you on your ear for what sounds nice in the English language.
• Conventions of Standard English (51 to 56% of the text, with a median number of 40 questions.) This section is where all your grammar knowhow comes in. Get those commas in the right place, work out the kinks in subject-verb agreement, and sprinkle in the right punctuation between words.

Of course, since the ACT English test is a standardized test and is therefore sneaky, this really means answering questions on the following topics:

• Writing strategy, topic development, and organization/cohesion
• Diction, style, and tone
• Punctuation, grammar and usage, and sentence structure

That's right. We said grammar—a word that strikes fear into the hearts of even the most hardcore peer reviewers.

Don't sweat it, though, Shmoopers. As competent speakers of English, we use grammar every day without thinking twice, like subject-verb agreement or how to punctuate modifiers. We know our way around a basic sentence, and we've been writing and revising great essays for years.

What do questions on the ACT English Test look like, exactly?

The ACT English test consists entirely of multiple-choice questions, so the correct answer is always right in front of you. The test always includes five short passages, and test-takers are asked to answer 15 questions about each one. The questions correspond to underlined portions of the passage. Here's what that looks like.

1. Its easier to demonstrate what we mean with an example.
A. NO CHANGE
B. Its' easier
C. It's easier
D. Its easier,

The correct answer is (C).

Doesn't look too bad, right? Most of the questions on the ACT English Test take this form, although some of the questions ask about the passage as a whole, how to organize a certain paragraph, or whether we can identify the effect of a certain editing choice. However, these are always clearly indicated in the question.

The passages on the ACT English Test are usually only about 325 words each, and they can include personal anecdotes, persuasive essays, and expository articles about relatively simple topics in science, social science, proper toenail clipping etiquette, hottest hot wings consumed by a human in one sitting, and other related fields.

While it's important to understand the meaning of each passage, the ACT English Test isn't as concerned about testing what is read as much as how it's written. It's completely fine if the passage is less enthralling than, say, any bad reality television show we shame-love and never admit to watching. That's why these passages are fairly simple: They have introductions, topic sentences, four to five paragraphs consisting of four to five sentences each, and conclusions.

This should sound familiar. They're a lot like the essays written for your high school English classes. Coincidence? We doubt it.

What can I expect to see on the ACT Math Test?

Math is kind of a big deal on the ACT exam. Put your worry lines away, though, because we've got the straight scoop on this section. In fact, your brain will be so full of math-y genius that the ACT Math Test will have no option but to kneel before you in abject misery and offer up its humblest apologies for terrorizing your early years. Suffice it to say that it will be a good day.

The ACT Math Test covers such riveting mathematical wonders as lines, angles, other shapes, equations, harder equations, and a splash of trig. You should rest easy at night that ACT Math doesn't test on such subjects such as differential equations, multivariable calculus, or advanced combinatorics. After advanced combinatorics, a little coordinate geometry should feel like a breezy spring walk in the land of "This is so much better than combinatorics." It's all about perspective, really.

From our perspective, ACT Math is pretty great. As with the ACT exam overall, this section doesn't endeavor to test any of your finer abstract qualities, but only things (presumably) learned in class over the last few years. In the possible event that maybe, for 2.3 minutes one day last year, you were allegedly, maybe, possibly taking a nap, our ACT Test Prep includes detailed reviews of all the subjects you might've missed.

Now wipe the drool off that chin and rub the sleep out of those eyes. We're about to shake things up like a fine, fine pair of maracas.

What is the format of the ACT Math Test?

Math is the second of four non-optional sections on the ACT exam. It consists of a 60-question multiple-choice exam, and students have 60 minutes to complete it with a basic calculator. That may not seem like a whole lot of time, but the content is all stuff students learn by junior year. Knowledge of some basic formulas is required, but complicated formulas and complex computations don't appear on the exam. The exam is concept-driven, not computation-driven.

This doesn't mean that you don't need to compute anything, but it does mean that the computations aren't incredibly difficult. Phew.

Not a huge fan of math? We've got some good news: scores on this section only account for a quarter of the overall test score. Reading, English, and Science make up the other three quarters. Everyone has his or her strong suit, and math isn't always it. That's okay! Study your heart out, do the best you can, and don't forget that standardized tests (and life in general) are all about playing to your strengths.

The topics on the exam are broken up into eight reporting categories. Students receive an independent score for each of these eight categories, as well as an overall score. The reporting categories are divided as follows.

• Preparing for Higher Mathematics (57 to 60% of the test, with a median number of 35 questions). This is actually an overarching reporting category, with five reporting categories nestled beneath it, like baby penguins under a penguin mother:
  • Number & Quantity (7 to 10% of the total test, with a median number of 5 questions.) This covers real and complex number systems, exponents, vectors, and matrices.
  • Algebra (12 to 15%, with a median number of, with a median number of 8 questions.) Loads of algebra stretching all the way from pre-algebra to intermediate algebra, which is usually called Algebra II.
  • Functions (12 to 15%, with a median number of, with a median number of 8 questions.) How you can put one thing into the function and get something else out of it: this reminds us of what happens to your laundry if you accidentally wash a red sock in a hot stew of white ones. You'll probably be dealing with inputting x's into equations and getting values for f(x) in return—so just be grateful that this is unlikely to make an unexpected alteration in your wardrobe.
  • Geometry (12 to 15%, with a median number of, with a median number of 8 questions.) There's both plane and coordinate geometry. Plane geometry is all about shapes and formulas. Formulas for perimeter, area, and volume: There's a chance they could all make an appearance. Coordinate geometry covers life on the standard (x,y) coordinate plane, which is code that there's graphing. Another way to think about coordinate geometry is as a not-so-veiled way to sneak in even more algebra. We say bring it on! Yep, even the trig questions. We're not scared (okay, maybe we're a little scared...)
  • Statistics & Probability (8 to 12%, with a median number of of 6 questions.) rounds out the "higher math" portion of the exam. We're talking averages, distributions, data collection, and probabilities.
• Integrating Essential Skills (40 to 43%, with a median number of 25 questions.) This section covers math concepts that most students will have covered before the 8th grade. Rates, percentages, surface area, volume, average, median, and so on.

As you can tell, each of the Preparing for Higher Math content areas covers topics that students will have covered more recently in high school. Integrating Essential Skills means you can do the problems with 8th grade math and below, but that doesn't make these easier to answer. These questions might require you to mix and match your pre-high school skills in new and challenging ways. A little over a quarter of the total number of questions that fall under the Preparing for Higher Math and Integrating Essential Skills reporting categories will also fall under this final category:

• Modeling (>25%, with a median number of 22 questions.) These questions will involve producing, interpreting, evaluating, and/or improving models.

Although the test generally starts with pre-algebra questions and gets progressively harder, the problems don't appear in any sort of predetermined order. It may help you to try to classify what type of problem you're dealing with when you first read the question.

Before you start thinking that this is a laundry list of, oh, everything you've ever learned in math, and that sinking feeling of impending doom sets in, relax. Mountain climbers don't prance to the top of Mt. Everest, and swimmers don't splash their way across the English Channel. They all have to practice, practice, practice. With ACT Math, we practice³.

What can I expect to see on the ACT Reading Test?

The Reading Test is divided into three reporting subcategories, which are also a great way of knowing how many questions of different types to expect. Check it:

• Key Ideas and Details (55 to 60%, or a median of 24 questions.) These questions test your ability to identify key ideas and themes, summarize passages, and make inferences based on explicit and implicit ideas.
• Craft and Structure (25 to 30%, or a median of 11 questions.) These questions are all about language and form: they test diction, rhetoric, text structure, purpose and perspective and POVs.
• Integration of Knowledge and Ideas (13-16%, or a median of 5 questions.) These questions challenge test-takers to evaluate authorial claims, distinguish between fact and slant, evaluate evidence, and synthesize multiple texts.

That's a skills-based breakdown, but what about content areas? Well, of the 40 questions on the ACT Reading Test, 20 of them deal with social science or natural science. The other 20 questions are on Prose Fiction (or Literary Narrative) and Humanities.

The four passages will always pertain to these four subject areas, and in this order:

• Prose fiction (short stories and novels) OR literary narrative (prose fiction or literary nonfiction, a.k.a. essays and memoirs)
• Social studies (history, archaeology, biography, business, education, economics, psychology, political science, anthropology, and sociology)
• Humanities (art, music, architecture, dance, language, literary criticism, philosophy, ethics, and theater)
• Natural science (biology, anatomy, astronomy, botany, chemistry, ecology, physics, geology, medicine, meteorology, microbiology, zoology, technology, physiology, and natural history)

Before each passage, you'll find the passage's subject area and its author. You might even receive some background information. See how considerate the test writers are? They are such dears. We should write them a note or maybe even bake them something. Remember: You'll never be asked about information that isn't directly included in the passage.

For most of the passages, you can expect to see primarily questions on Key Ideas and Details and Craft and Structure. But, back in 2014, the ACT started playing matchmaker and introduced paired passages to the test. This means that for one of the subject areas, you'll get a two-for-one deal: you'll have two passages totaling 750-ish words. This pair of passages may appear in any one of the four subject areas. For matches-made-in-ACT-heaven, you can expect to see 3–4 questions treating each passage as a separate entity, and then 3–4 questions that treat these two passages together. These questions are generally of the compare-and-contrast sort. They task students with drawing logical conclusions about the relationship between the passages.

Don't freak out on these passage pairs. You may be seeing double, but you won't have to do any extra reading or answer any extra questions. Even better, the strategies taught in our guide for single passages all totally work for paired passages. Shmoop is here to make sure you don't wind up the third wheel on one of these prose dates.

What is the format of the ACT Reading Test?

On the ACT Reading Test, you'll have 35 minutes to read 4 passages and answer 10 questions per passage. That may not seem like a lot of time, but it'll be enough. We promise! Coincidentally, we're not in the habit of making promises we can't keep, so you know we're "for serious" about this.

To recap:

• 35 minutes to read 4 passages.
• Each passage has 10 questions.
• There are 40 questions total.
• If you take 2–3 minutes to read each passage, you'll have 35 seconds to answer each question.
• If you take 5 minutes to read each passage, you'll have 25 seconds to answer each question. Math skills for the win!

Each passage is about as difficult as something that you might read in your first year of college. That means no ultra-esoteric dissertations on string theory are involved. The passages are roughly 750 words long, so you're not exactly joining Oprah's Book Club, either.

What can I expect to see on the ACT Science Test?

We know that not everyone is science's biggest fan, but we at Shmoop strongly believe that every one of you has a budding scientist within—an inner Bill Nye, if you will. He's in the recesses of your mind somewhere, lab coat, goggles, and all, just waiting to show off his newest red polka-dot bow tie and tell you that inertia is a property of matter. Sorry, no lab portion on this exam, Bill! Sad for him, but excellent for you.

Science is a miracle worker, but that's not to say that all this stuff just happened overnight. Good scientific reasoning includes approaches from a variety of perspectives and the use of logical skill, all of which—totally by coincidence—we're about to cover for you here.

Just kidding; it's on purpose.

The ACT Science Reasoning test covers three major topics.

• Earth and space sciences (e.g. geology, astronomy, meteorology...)
• Physical science (this includes Physics and Chemistry, natch)
• Biology

You might be thinking, "Oh, thank goodness, Chemistry is not on that list! I can breathe again." However, before you get ahead of yourself, you should know that "Physical science" is a coy way of saying, "chemistry and physics." Wah-wah. Turn your frown upside down! We've got good news. All you need is the basic background of these subjects that you should have already received in class. You will not need to do any groundbreaking, Nobel-prize winning research to finagle a good score on this section, so you can put the beaker and the platypus down now.

The fabulous news is that this is simply a reasoning test, so you don't need heavy technical knowledge; you need skills. This is not to be confused with dating skills, clarinet skills, or hockey skills. We're specifically referring to the skills of interpretation, analysis, evaluation, reasoning, and problem-solving.

The way the ACT tests these skills is they translate each skill into a kind of question. These skills cut across the four subject areas above, like a majestic blue whale through Pacific waters. The question type breakdown is based on the three reporting categories of the exam:

• Interpretation of Data (45 to 55% of the exam, or a median of 16 questions.) These questions challenge the test-taker to analyze, find trends among, and extrapolate upon scientific data offered in the form of tables, graphs, and diagrams. Yep, you may have do some math here.
• Scientific Investigation (20 to 30% of the exam, or a median of 10 questions.) These questions test the understanding of the tools, procedures, and design of a scientific experiment. You may be asked to add to or amend an experimental procedure, or even predict results.
• Evaluation of Models, Inferences, and Experimental Results (25 to 35% of the exam, or a median of 14 questions.) These questions ask you to evaluate the validity of scientific information, and make inferences based on that.

However (and this is a hugely big however), there are only three major skills that you need to ace the test. Conveniently, these skills also correspond to the three major passage types spread across six passages (or sometimes seven) on the ACT Science Reasoning test.

• Data Representation – 2 passages per test
• Research Summary – 3 passages per test
• Conflicting Viewpoints – 1 passage per test

If you notice, this list is not subject-based, meaning that any subject can fall into any of these categories. The result of this is that a data representation passage is as likely to be about microbiomes in India as it is to be about the combustion of fuel into a contained chamber for gas composition analysis. You may see all kinds of new words and unfamiliar concepts.

Despite the topic, you'll be sure to see these characteristics among the three different science passages.

Data Representation: This passage type is all about data (shocking!), graphs, tables, more graphs...and more tables, but not like the kind you get from the Amish Furniture store. (What craftsmanship!) In most cases, the ACT Science Reasoning test will lay out some data from a real science experiment, and you'll be asked to read and understand both the experiment performed and the results. On a basic level, you will need to know how to review graphs and understand the plotting of data for 12-16 questions.

Research Summary: This section requires you to think about experiments. What's the scientific method? A control? A hypothesis? If something goes wrong, what did the experimenters do or what can they do to fix it? Just like the data representation section, all the information you need is in the passage and that big brain of yours for these 18-22 questions.

Conflicting Viewpoints: Many students find this passage type the most difficult. Luckily for you, there is only one passage of this type on the test, and fewer than 10 questions. Sigh of relief. This section asks you to compare the outlooks of more than one individual (they could be students, scientists, astute four-year-olds, we don't know…) with differing viewpoints on the same topic. You won't need to pick sides, but you will need to be able to interpret the items of disagreement and analyze the different viewpoints for 6-8 questions.

Words of advice: don't let the science jargon bully or intimidate you. First of all, bullying is wrong. Second of all, the ACT Science Reasoning test will test you by presenting you with all sorts of complicated information that was never covered in any of your high school science classes, but that doesn't mean you can't solve the problem.

How do you decide on the correct answer? Easy. Look at the surrounding text and the information available in the passage. You will need some good reading and note-taking skills combined with a bit of stealthy reasoning. We'll show you that the subject matter of the passage doesn't really matter at all. In fact, you'll find that the more passages you read, the easier answering the questions becomes.

What we're getting at is, don't be intimidated. You know that the ACT Science Reasoning test is basically testing common sense analytical skills. Those sneaky ACT exam writers know that science feels like an iffy subject at best for many students, and they will not hesitate to throw a lot of technical terms your way to throw you off course like a NASCAR track covered in greasepaint.

You will need to be on alert for unfamiliar stuff, like words, phrases, concepts, and data that you had no idea people even bothered to gather or create, much less publish into scientific research. That's where Shmoop comes in. We'll help you develop your science reasoning skills so that you can look at the context of the unfamiliar items to help you decipher their meanings and attack this thing like a hippo: that is, hungrily.

What can I expect to see on the ACT Writing Test?

Like the mighty hippogriff or the friendly hobbit, the ACT Writing Test is a unique beast. Although other sections of the ACT are filled with dozens of multiple-choice questions, the Writing Test is only one question long. That's it. However, because it's an essay question, students have 40 minutes to answer it.

Because it's timed and there are no length requirements, scorers aren't looking for the next Pulitzer winner. The ACT Writing Exam is all about clearly answering and interacting with the prompt.

Speaking of which, the prompt itself looks a little different than it did when your older brother/next door neighbor/eccentric aunt took the ACT back in the day.

Before 2015, the Writing Test presented students with a controversial issue and asked them to write a persuasive essay arguing either for or against the topic at hand. However, the team behind the ACT realized a major flaw in this strategy: There are very few arguments in life that only have two cut-and-dry sides. It would be like asking students to write an essay about their favorite ice cream flavor and only letting them choose between chocolate and vanilla. What about strawberry? Mint chocolate chip, anyone? For Shmoop's sake, who could forget Cherry Garcia?

The updated version of the test still presents students with a controversial issue. However, rather than asking them to pick a side, it provides three sample perspectives on the topic. Students then join the discussion by writing a persuasive and analytical essay that engages with the given perspectives.

If that sounds more complicated, it's because it is. Don't worry, though. With Shmoop on your side, you'll be ready to dominate the new test. Plus, in recognition of their new, more complex format, the ACT has increased the time limit on the Writing Test from 30 minutes to 40 minutes. Score. Oh, and on that note…

Scoring

ACT multiple-choice scoring, like UPS's policy on turning, is rights only. That means you won't have points deducted from your score for choosing the wrong answer on a question. The points you earn for correct answers on each section are added up and converted into a scaled score of 1-36. Those scaled scores are added up again, averaged with your three other section scores, and voila, a 1-36 point ACT score emerges from the confusing cocoon.

New for 2015 are a whole slew of extra reporting: a STEM score, English Language Arts score, career readiness indicator, and an Understanding Complex Texts subscore—more fun stuff for test-takers to look forward to receiving in the mail. These scores are compiled based on student performance on the ACT, but they don't affect how the test itself is scored. They all contain useful information, but there's no need to sweat over them while preparing for the ACT. Just focus on doing your best on each of the five sections, and the rest will sort itself out.

As for the ACT Writing Test, each essay is read by two graders, and each grader scores the essay on a six-point scale in four areas:

• Ideas and Analysis 
• Development and Support
• Organization
• Language Use

When both graders' scores are added together, students have four domain scores that range from 2-12. All of those scores combine into one super score: the Subject-Level Writing Score. This number is the overall score of the essay, and of the Writing Test as a whole.

Through some ACT abracadabra, this score will get combined with your Reading and English scores to produce an overall ELA score on the 1-36 scale. Before the budding mathematicians out there start writing angry letters, we are aware that 4 domain scores × 12 points each = 48, which is kind of hard to measure on a 1-36 scale. Just trust that the powers that be at ACT know what they're doing, and that they have some top-secret algorithm making all these numbers work together.

The good news is that as long as students perform well in the areas covered in this guide, their Writing Score should be good—even if it's hard to say exactly how that score is calculated.

For more information about how the ACT Writing Test is scored, check out this freakishly detailed breakdown. For more information about the ACT Multiple-Choice and Composite scores, check out the ACT's website.

ACT is a federally registered trademark of ACT, Inc. Shmoop University is not affiliated with or endorsed by ACT, Inc.

SAT is a registered trademark of the College Board, which was not involved in the production of, and does not endorse, this product.

•  Back
• More