There has been a lot of debate over using calculator in the SAT test. And the good news is that you should definitely make use of the calculator. After all, you take the SAT to get good scores and get admitted in your favorite college, and to show off your mental calculation skills.
The SAT test, as well all know, tests our reasoning skills. The Math section contains questions of different difficulty levels. While you might feel the need to use a calculator for simple questions, problems that involve lengthy calculations might eat up your time if you do not use a calculator.
When to use the calculator? If you are good at math, and you can do basic arithmetic in your head, you are lucky. However, if math problems do trouble you, using a calculator would be a good decision. Again, the same problem can attract use of calculator in different ways.
To give an example, let us see how a math problem can be solved in different ways using a calculator, and without it too.
If 16 × 25 × 36 = (4a) 2 Find a
Options: (A) 6 (B) 15 (C) 30 (D) 36 (E) 60
Approach 1: Too much use of calculator
Calculate 16 × 25 × 36 = 14400
See that (4a) 2 = 16a2
So, 16a2 = 14400
Use the calculator to divide 14400 with 16 to get a2 = 900
Again use the calculator to find the Square root of 900. Therefore, a = 30
Approach 2: Little use of calculator
16 × 25 × 36 = 16a2
The 16 on LHS can be cancelled with the 16 on the RHS
Multiply 25 x 36 using a calculator to get 900
So we get 900 = a2
Take the square root of 900 using the calculator. So the answer is a = 30
Smart Approach: No Calculator
Cancel the 16 on both side of the equation.
Also note that 25 x 36 = a2 can be written as 52 x 62 = a2
Hence a = 30
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