PointsBooster® Method Overview

The PointsBooster® Method, also known as The Dalton Method™, employs particular tricks, strategies and mnemonics to teach standardized tests. The method has been demonstrated to produce significant score increases. All tutors and instructors are trained in The PointsBooster® Method for the subject areas they teach.

Only Your Score Booster teaches The PointsBooster® Method.

PointsBooster® Method Details

The PointsBooster® Method, also known as The Dalton Method™, teaches students not only the curricular material for standardized tests but also tricks, strategies, and mnemonics to help students remember how to apply the techniques. The method has been demonstrated to produce significant score increases, with many students achieving the 99th percentile. All Your Score Booster tutors and instructors are certified in The PointsBooster® Method for the subject areas they teach.

The method helps students develop automaticity – an automatic response on how to recognize question types and apply a particular approach for each question type. Quizzes focusing on the question types reinforce the strategies. Full-length practice tests help students apply the automaticity they have learned. The practice tests identify the student’s results by question type, helping us gauge the student’s progress and focus our teaching on the areas where students still need help.

Reading

The PointsBooster® Method involves teaching students a reading technique that best suits the student’s reading speed and comprehension. The method helps students understand the various passage types, the question types and specific methods to answer each question type. The method also helps students avoid wrong answers by recognizing the typical trap answer choices test-writers include to lure students to the wrong answer.

Writing (Grammar)

The PointsBooster® Method helps students recognize clues in the answer choices so they can identify the grammar topic being tested. By identifying the grammar topic, students can apply one of our techniques for the grammar topic. The method also offers insider tricks: For example, if the answer choices list three pronouns and one noun, then the grammatical topic being tested is likely pronoun clarity – whether the pronoun is ambiguous – in which case the answer choice that is a noun should be strongly considered as the correct answer.

Math / Quantitative

The PointsBooster® Method involves both strategies to exploit the multiple-choice format of math sections. We customize the technique to each student. Advanced students may solve questions algebraically. Others may use one of our strategies, some of which enable students to answer questions correctly, even if they don’t fully understand the mathematical concepts, by working backward from the answer choices, by choosing real numbers for variables, or by simplifying the numbers in the question to uncover patterns that help them answer with the larger numbers in the actual question. Even advanced students benefit because the techniques help students reduce making errors or catching errors before completing the question.

Science

For exams with a science section, such as the ACT, the method involves teaching the various science question types and how to attack each question type, and how to get through the text more quickly — what students can skip in the text and what is important. The method also helps students understand how to read the various types of graphics.