Procrastinate (or if you cant handle the question now, dont)

Occasionally Ill be working through a section usually a Reading section with a student, and Ill come across a question that just makes my head spin. Usually its an all of the following EXCEPT or a which of the following would most undermine the authors assertion that or a which of the following is most analogous to the situation in lines 35-47? At that point, I generally turn to my student and declare that I just cant deal with it right then. Were moving on. I dont care if my student wants to try it. I dont want to end up with smoke pouring metaphorically out of my ears, which is frankly what will happen if I try to muddle through. Either that, or Ill sit and stare at it uncomprehendingly for about five minutes, trying to figure out what Im supposed to be seeing and not quite managing to make logical sense out of the letters on the page. In other words, exactly the same thing that happens to most of my students when they look at a question like that. I do this because 1) I am a self-confessed procrastinator, a skill that I honed assiduously (diligently, sedulously) throughout high school and college, and, more seriously, 2) I want to make a point: know what you can handle at a given time, and if you cant handle it, dont even try. Leave it, do something else, and come back to it when and if you can handle it. Surely if I can do it, they can do it. I really do my best to insist on this: a big part of beating the SAT, quote-unquote, is about not letting the test wear you down. If you try to do everything, in order, and refuse to budge, youre most likely going to get tired and end up missing things you know perfectly well how to do. One of the biggest differences between the 500/600-range students and the 700-range students is that the latter are more aware of what they *dont* know how to do they know their weaknesses and plan accordingly. If they see that something is going to give them trouble, they make a strategic choice and just save it for later. Besides, sometimes all you need is a few minutes off. Sometimes, on CR, answering other questions can actually point you in the right direction for a question that originally seemed impossible. But even if you dont end up having time to come back to a question at the very least, youll be able to work calmly through questions that you might otherwise have had to do twice as fast.