The best thing to so is use what you’ve learned in your own schooling to answer the SAT Essay prompts.

There are no age-limits on the SAT so you can take the test again if you wish.

Yes you can get a high score without using high-level vocabulary. However, MIT research did show an increase in score from using big words. So although I hate when students do that and don’t teach it, using big words does appear to improve the score so you may want to try this strategy.

The essays don’t need to be spectacular to get a high score. If you read the SAT Essays the College Board releases you’ll see that the top scoring essays are good but not great. That’s because the students are writing in only 25 minutes with no chance for revision. Also, research from MIT has shown that just writing a long essay will virtually guarantee you a top score. Ninety percent of essays over 400 words get the highest score of 6 from each grader.

Just about everything in life is easy for some people and hard for others. And yes it’s very common to be nervous about the SAT. Most students are. If you are feeling a lot of test anxiety I suggest using mindfulness-based techniques to help you cope with your fear. You can find some scientifically validated ideas on how to deal with anxiety in a book by Russ Harris called “The Confidence Gap.”

The best literary examples to use are those you know best. If you know a book or story well, you can bring up details relevant to your thesis more effectively than if you use something you are less familiar with.