The ACT Reading section is perhaps the most direct test of critical reasoning ability you will face on a standardized exam in high school. The ACT Reading section is designed to measure your ability to understand both what is directly stated in a passage, as well as how well you are able to draw inferences about it and pick up on implied meanings. As such, it tests one of the most important skills that you can have for any career path you hope to pursue: critical thinking! Whether you need ACT Reading tutoring in New York, ACT Reading tutoring in Chicago, or ACT Reading tutoring in Los Angeles, working one-on-one with an expert may be just the boost your studies need.

The ACT Reading section is similar to a number of other standardized exams in that it attempts to gauge your ability to take in information, analyze it, and draw conclusions based upon it. Unlike typical high school exams, the ACT Reading section is not meant to test your mastery of discrete facts. You will never be tested on the specifics of a book you read in English class during your freshman year. Instead, you will be tested on the skills you have developed by completing assignments throughout high school. Varsity Tutors offers resources like a free ACT prep book to help with your self-paced study, or you may want to consider an ACT Reading tutor.

Many students feel anxious about the ACT Reading section because it puts you on the spot. You have to read a passage, and in just thirty-five minutes, answer forty questions that are detailed, obscure, and often cumbersome. Even though every answer is provided in some way in the passage at hand, you are challenged with extracting and understanding it in the context of the question being asked. While this is stressful, you want to remember that the test gives you all the information that you need to answer every single question.

Because of this arrangement, you probably don’t want to focus your preparation on learning specific facts. Instead, practice and develop your ability to read, identify important meanings, and consider information in the specific context in which it is presented. A great way to prepare to excel on the ACT Reading section is to complete as many practice questions as possible. You can develop your ability to draw generalizations, comprehend the main message, and compare and contrast material presented in college-level compositions. Over time, you can learn to read unfamiliar material and simplify the main idea to a sentence or two quickly, a skill that can pay off on test day.

Practicing your reading abilities can help you excel on the ACT Reading section, but doing so can also serve you well through college, graduate school, and your career. Investing time during high school to properly prepare for the ACT Reading section can make life later far easier, as doing so can help you avoid spending the first years of college trying to make up for lost time. The skills the ACT Reading section tests are certainly not unique to English or the social sciences; every course in college, whether concerned with Shakespeare or advanced biology, will demand that you can read, critically analyze, and establish inferences from provided material. Moreover, employers highly value the ability to understand and communicate abstract ideas quickly and clearly. It is one of the few skills that cuts across fields, and distinguishes top performers in almost every career.

If you’re ready to start practicing for the ACT Reading section right now, try out Varsity Tutors’ free ACT Reading Flashcards. Each flashcard presents a passage from one of the genres that appear on the ACT Reading sections and an associated question. The time you take to read the passage and answer the question is tracked, and afterward, you can see a complete explanation about how to arrive at the correct answer. Our free ACT Reading Flashcards are organized by passage topic and question type, so once you identify your weak areas, you can focus on those exclusively. Registering for a free Learning Tools account will allow you to track your scores on Varsity Tutors’ free ACT Reading resources, making it simple to identify your progress and focus your time on the areas you understand least well.  In addition to the ACT Reading flashcards and ACT Reading tutoring, you may also want to consider taking some of our ACT Reading practice tests.The ACT Reading section focuses on testing abstract reasoning skills, so you may be unsure of exactly how ready you are for your exam: get a better look at your current skills with the help of Varsity Tutors’ free ACT Reading Flashcards!