SAT – Writing Test
The Writing Section
Overview
| Time | Content | Item Types | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 60 min. | Grammar, usage, and word choice | Multiple choice questions (35 min.) and student-written essay (25 min.) | 200-800 |
The writing section includes both multiple-choice questions and a direct writing measure in the form of an essay.
Short Essay
- The short essay measures your ability to:
- Organize and express ideas clearly
- Develop and support the main idea
- Use appropriate word choice and sentence structure
- You’ll be asked to develop a point of a view on an issue, using reasoning and evidence — based on your own experiences, readings, or observations — to support your ideas.
- The essay will be scored by trained high school and college teachers. Each reader will give the essay a score from 1 to 6 (6 is the highest score) based on the overall quality of the essay and your demonstration of writing competence.Please note that the essay images seen by readers for scoring purposes are clearer than the images we can display for students and institutions on our website.
- Get more information about the essay:
Multiple-Choice
- The multiple-choice writing questions measure your ability to:
- Improve sentences and paragraphs
- Identify errors (such as diction, grammar, sentence construction, subject-verb agreement, proper word usage, and wordiness)
- Try multiple-choice questions: