Thursday, March 19, 2020

Samwise Gamgee Essays - Forest Ecology, Biology, Botany, Ecology

Samwise Gamgee Essays - Forest Ecology, Biology, Botany, Ecology Samwise Gamgee What exactly is a rain forest, you say? Well, on the outside, a rain forest has a wall averaging 20 feet thick that is made of a tangle of vines that love light. This wall seals off the interior creating the illusion that the whole jungle is this thick. But if you find an animal path or stream to follow, you can slip through and enter this mysterious world. Once you're inside, you can look up and see a tree canopy that's as high as a 17 story building! And it's pretty dark too, a perpetual twilight. Only 1% of the sunlight ever actually touches the floor of the forest. And moonlight, even a full moon, doesn't get through at all. You'd better have a flashlight with you if you plan on reading any comics. Rain forests have different layers that support different animals and insects. Some plants and animals occupy specific layers, while others live and feed wherever they can. I live in the lower canopy of the South American rain forest because a lot of the fruit I like to eat is found there. The tallest trees in the canopy layer grow up to 200 feet high. Some of the trees that poke through (called the "emergents") have been known to grow as high as 270 feet. It is not uncommon for the expansive umbrella crown of an emergent tree to cover an entire acre. Now there's a good spot for a treehouse. Many types of indigenous people live in rain forests. The environment is perfect for tribes of hunter-gatherers. Local materials are used to make their blow guns, spears, and arrows. The forest also provides building and roofing materials, wild cotton for clothing, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and more. In fact, just about every need can be met by the rain forest. For these people, the rain forest is like living in a gigantic mall. Amazonian deep-forest Yanomamo are a group of forest people that can literally run up heavy trunked emergent trees (over 200 feet) without breaking a sweat. It's because of their remarkably wide feet, which also have advantages running around the muddy rain forest floors. The Pygmies are a tribe of honey gatherers that rely almost exclusively on the help of a bird called the Greater Honeyguide to direct them to the beehives. This little bird leads the Pygmies with its rasping, churring chatter and its white outer tail feathers to point out the proper tree. The bird lives on beeswax, so after the Pygmies climb the tree with a bundle of smoking leaves to put the bees to sleep, they take the honey and leave the beeswax behind as a reward for the bird. Here you'll find bats with wingspans up to 5.5 feet, moths with wingspans of 12 inches, frogs so big they could eat rats, and rats themselves weighing up to 100 pounds. Let's take a closer look at just a few of the interesting animals and insects that live in the rain forrest. Piranha, The piranha is a small fish that is activated into a feeding frenzy by the smell of blood. Their teeth are so sharp that they can strip a 100 pound animal to the bone in a minute. No telling what they could do to a person unlucky enough to go for a swim at the wrong time! Large electric eels live in tropical rivers. Their bodies can generate enough electricity to knock a person senseless and, in some cases, can cause drowning. "Shocking" ... but true. Anacondas can even swallow a crocodile. The anaconda is a water boa and it is the largest snake in the world at 37.5 feet long and weighing over 500 pounds. They've been known to eat people now and then, although they don't make a regular diet of humans. Boa, oh boa that's a lotta snake! In every rain forest there are many kinds of plants. Many, many, many kinds of plants. In fact, inside a single hectare (2.47 acres) you can find up to 750 types of trees and 1,500 types of plants! But this entire range of species can easily be broken down into four categories, grouped by how they

Tuesday, March 3, 2020

How Many Questions Can You Miss for a Perfect SAT Score

How Many Questions Can You Miss for a Perfect SAT Score SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips Every year about 500 students get a perfect score on the SAT. How many questions can you get wrong and still be among this elite group? Find out here in a complete breakdown ofthe Math and Evidence-Based Reading and Writing sections across eight official SAT practice tests. How Is the SAT Scored? To understand how many questions you can get wrong and still achieve a perfect 1600, you need to understand how the test is scored. I'll give a brief summary here, but if you're interested in more details about the scoring process, check out ourguide onhow to calculate SAT score. For the whole test, you receive one point for correct answers, and you receive zero points for a wrong answer and questions skipped. Since you’re not penalized for wrong answers, skipping or answering a question incorrectly results in the same score. NOTE:The essay is not factored into your composite SAT score (400-1600 scale), so I will not discuss it further in this article. However, for more information on the new SAT essay, read our other guide. To calculate your Math section, you start by calculating a raw score, which is simply the number of questions answered correctly (if you answered 50 correctly, your raw score is 50). For the Evidence-Based Reading and Writing section, you start by calculating two raw scores: one for the Reading portion and one for the Writing and Language portion. Just as in the Math section, the raw scores are just the number of questions answered correctly. For both sections, each raw score is then converted into a scaled score - the exact conversion varies by test date. However, the College Board provides this example chart intheir SAT practice testas an estimate: Let's go through how the scoring works for each section in a bit more depth.For Math, the raw to scaled score conversion is very simple. Let’s say you miss two questions (you got 56 correct out of 58 questions); your raw score will be a 56. You then find the corresponding scaled score for Math on the chart, which is 790. Your Math section score would be a 790. For Evidence-Based Reading and Writing, the conversion is a little more complicated since you get two raw scores. If you missed three questions in Reading (got 49 of 52 correct), your raw score would be 49. If you missed ten questions in Writing (got 34 of 44 correct), your raw score would be 34. You then find the corresponding scaled score for each of those sections: Reading: 49 questions right = 38 scaled score Writing: 34 questions right = 32 scaled score Next, you add together the two separate scaled scores and multiply by 10 to get your Evidence-Based Reading and Writing section score. (38 + 32) x 10 = 70 x 10 =700 Your Evidence-Based Reading and Writing section score would be 700.Now let’s get back to the original question. Exactly How Many Questions Can You Get Wrong or Skip and Still Get a 1600? Since the scores on the individual sections are simply added together to create your composite SAT score, you need to score 800 on the two sections (Math and Evidence-Based Reading and Writing) to get a score of 1600. In the chart below, I have analyzed eight official SAT score charts and determined the number of questions you can get wrong or skip on each part of the test for an 800 in the section. These official practice SAT were written by the same people who write actual SATs. This means they're a great resource for analysis because you can be sure they'll be very similar to the SAT you take on exam day. NOTE: Since you’re not penalized for wrong answers, skipping vs. answering a question incorrectly results in the same score. Number of Questions You Can Get Wrong in Each Section and Still Get a Perfect Score Math Reading Writing Total Test 1 0 1 0 1 Test 2 0 0 0 0 Test 3 0 1 0 1 Test 4 1 0 0 1 Test 5 0 0 1 1 Test 6 0 1 0 1 Test 7 0 0 0 0 Test 8 1 0 0 1 Typically, to get an 800 in Math, you cannot miss any questions because you need to get a raw score of 58 (out of 58 questions). Occasionally, an SAT will allow you to get one wrong answer in Math as you can see on Tests 4 and 8. However, I would not count on that, as it is not the norm. If you're aiming for 1600, strive for perfection in Math. To get an 800 in Evidence-Based Reading and Writing, you cannot get any questions wrong on the Writing and Reading portions. Occasionally, an SAT will allow you to get one wrong or to skip one as you can see on Tests 1, 3 and 5 for the Reading section, or Test 5 for the Writing section. However, as with Math, that is not the norm. If you're aiming for 1600, prepare to get zero wrong in Evidence-Based Reading and Writing. Overall, on the SAT, you should aim to get no questions wrong if you want a perfect score.This is no easy feat, but it is possible. After all, about 500 students do it each year! What Does This Mean If You'reTrying to Get a 1600? You need to make sure that you can finish the entire test in the allotted time since you cannot afford to skip or miss any questions. For Math, you need to be basically perfect. You can see, through my analysis, on six out of eight Math sections, you cannot get any questions wrong if you want an 800. For Evidence-Based Reading and Writing, you also need to be basically perfect. On three out of eight Reading portions, you could get one wrong and still get 800, but you can’t rely on having that opportunity. On seven out of eight Writing sections, you cannot get any questions wrong if you want an 800. What's Next? Trying to get a perfect SAT score? You should check out our SAT study guide. Taking the SAT soon and need to improve your score in a hurry? Read our SAT cramming guide. Aiming for the Ivy League? Read our guide to getting in! Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points? Check out our best-in-class online SAT prep classes. We guarantee your money back if you don't improve your SAT score by 160 points or more. Our classes are entirely online, and they're taught by SAT experts. If you liked this article, you'll love our classes. Along with expert-led classes, you'll get personalized homework with thousands of practice problems organized by individual skills so you learn most effectively. We'll also give you a step-by-step, custom program to follow so you'll never be confused about what to study next. Try it risk-free today: