Association between Respiratory Diseases and Dust events in United Arab Emirates

Abstract The proposed study aims at establishing if there is a relationship between dust events and respiratory diseases in United Arabs Emirates. This is will help bring to light the prevalence rate of respiratory diseases in the region as well equip relevant stakeholders with vital information concerning dust and its effects on human health.Advertising We will write a custom proposal sample on Association between Respiratory Diseases and Dust events in United Arab Emirates specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Existing literatures draw association between dust storms and respiratory diseases. Mixed research approach will be used in the study. Both questionnaires and records from hospitals will provide the researcher with the desired data. Before the study begins, the researcher will get approval from Independent Regulation Board from the collage as well as obtain informed consent from the subjects. Introduction and problem statement The study seeks to establish the association between respiratory diseases and dust events in the United Arab Emirates. It is worth noting that UAE is in a region where dust storms occur regularly. Ideally dust is composed of very tiny solid particles floating in the air. This is capable of getting past the lung’s natural defense and build up resulting in serious health complications (Qiu, Zou Zhan, 2006). Scholars have tried to link dust events and incidences of respiratory diseases. Research shows that when an individual is exposed to air pollutants, they are at higher risk of contracting respiratory related illnesses for instance asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer as well as allergies. Since UAE is in a dry region, the greatest pollutant is dust caused by wind and storms. This poses a great danger particularly to children, teenagers, infants, asthmatic individuals, pregnant women, healthy adults who exercise vigorously in the fields, people sufferin g from cardiovascular diseases and the elderly in the society. In the United States of America, a study carried out in 6 cities considered to be the most polluted by dust concluded that residents from these cities were at higher risk of being hospitalized as a result of respiratory illnesses. Similarly majority died due to lung cancer as compared to others residing in cities that are less polluted. Additionally children in these areas were 5 times more likely to suffer from low lung functions. It is worth noting that dust events can worsen health conditions of people who suffer from respiratory related diseases (Host et al., 2008). World Health Organization has shown that chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is a global health issue and is one of the major causes of chronic morbidity and mortality in the entire world (Kanatani et al., 2010).Advertising Looking for proposal on environmental studies? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn Mo re It is ranked sixth as a leading cause of death globally. Since it is one of the respiratory diseases caused by air pollution, it is estimated that it will continue causing death as well as increase prevalence of respiratory diseases in the coming years (Brunekreef Forsberg, 2005). Significance of the study The proposed study is of importance as it will evaluate whether or not the relationship between dust events and respiratory diseases exists. The findings will be significant to various stakeholders such as institutions of higher learning, individuals, health organization, and ministry of public health among others. It is worth noting that the findings will make those individuals who thought there was no relationship between dust events and respiratory diseases think twice and take necessary preventive measures. Similarly, health sector in UAE will embark on a campaign to educate people on how to avoid being victims of dust events related diseases. Similarly the government wi ll develop policies aimed at reducing dust events particularly those caused by human activities. This will help reduce the frequency of dust events. Not carrying out this research will clearly depict that the association between respiratory diseases and dust events in the UAE will not be brought to light. This will mean that there will be no action taken to save the lives of the vulnerable population. Scope of the study The scope of the study is to establish the relationship between respiratory diseases and dust events in the UAE. Similarly issues relating to the types of respiratory disease individuals suffer from, prevalence rate and how best to curb the situation are all of interests in this study. Based on this, recommendations will be brought forth to help guide the relevant bodies on the way forward in dealing with the menace. The study will take place in the UAE. Aims and objectives and research questions The aim of the study is to investigate the association between dust eve nts in UAE and respiratory diseases. The specific objectives are; To find out the association between respiratory diseases and dust events among the UAE population. To establish the prevalence rate of respiratory diseases in UAE. To establish the strategies that can be adopted to curb respiratory diseases in the UAE. Research questions Is there a relationship between respiratory diseases and dust events among the UAE population? What is the prevalence rate of respiratory diseases in UAE? What strategies can be adopted to curb respiratory diseases in the UAE? Literature review Most of the Asian part is either arid or semi arid. This has made the soils dry and loose; this coupled with the fact that winds are more prevalent makes it possible for dust to be carried out from the ground and deposited elsewhere resulting in air pollution. In Middle East the Shamala winds originate from Turkey, Iraq as well as Saudi Arabia. As the wind gain momentum across the Gulf of Arabia dust are ki cked up.Advertising We will write a custom proposal sample on Association between Respiratory Diseases and Dust events in United Arab Emirates specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Numerous studies have linked dust events and the high rate of respiratory diseases. In one study carried out by Kwon, et al., 2002 investigating the effect of Asian dust on daily deaths in South Korea between 1995 and 1998. He established that the relationship between dust events and deaths from heart diseases was strong. Additionally individuals suffering from respiratory diseases are susceptible to dust events in Asia. Similarly another study carried out in Taipei revealed that there was a higher specificity in associating dust effects with respiratory deaths. It is worth noting that a study carried out by Lei, et al., 2004 using rat model examined the inflammation markers in the lung as well as peripheral blood after the animals were exposed to dust stor ms particles. The outcomes revealed that dust has the potential of increasing lung inflammation as well as injury in pulmonary vein in those rats deemed to be hypersensitive (Peng et al., 2008). According to Chen et al., 2004 dust events tend to impaired human visibility leading to accidents. Biologists have shown that people who live in areas prone to dust events breathe in particles which float in air. Luckily not all these particles get their way through human nose. However smaller particles usually get their way through the nose reaching the lungs. Human respiratory systems have cilia and mucus which help trap dust. In case dusty air reaches the alveoli it is the responsibility of macrophages to remove the dust. Additionally lungs can produce protein to neutralize dusty air. In situations where the dust escapes all these mechanism of purifying air, then there are a number of diseases man will suffer from depending on whether the dust is organic or inorganic (Kanatani et al., 201 0). For instance inorganic dust leads to asbestosis, silicosis, coal pneumoconiosis among others. On the other hand, organic dust results in farmers’ lung, sewage sludge disease among others. It is worth noting that particles which are less than 10 microns in diameter might contain dust, smoke, silica, soot enter human lung and cause these problems. Interestingly dust events can impair animals’ health, corrode buildings as well as impair growth in vegetation (Husar et al., 2001). According to Abdelkarim et al., 2011 changes in weather conditions which are characterized with dust events exacerbate chronic lung diseases particularly in those individuals deemed to be suffering from asthma. A study on children suffering from respiratory diseases in this region showed that the prevalence rate among children aged between 6 and 19 years stood at 13.0% (Choi et al., 2011).Advertising Looking for proposal on environmental studies? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Asthma in the region has been known to be responsible for higher morbidity rate as well as high rate of absenteeism in schools. Other causes of respiratory diseases in this region include cigarette smoking, genetic history of illnesses such as asthma, low birth weights among others (Wang et al., 1997). It is worth noting that the relationship between dust events and respiratory diseases in UAE is not well documented. Methodology Mixed research approach will be used to guide the study. Thus both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection will be utilized. Data which show the number of patients suffering from respiratory diseases will be collected from health care centers and hospitals in UAE. As suggested by Beiske, 2002 this will allow the study to have exact number of individuals who sought medical attention as a result of suffering from respiratory diseases. It will also allow me to establish the prevalence rate of respiratory disease in the region (Ko et al., 2007). Additionally questionnaires will be distributed to patients who are in hospitals or have recently been discharged. Questionnaire covers a large population at a time as they would be distributed to different participants at a time and be collected later or at the same day depending on the willingness of the respondent in addressing the questions, due to it being standardized they are more objective, data collected from questionnaire are easy to analyze, due to familiarity with the tool, respondents will not be apprehensive, it is also very cost effective compared to face to face interviews and the tool also reduces bias (Robson, 2007). According to Malig Ostro, 2009 the major problem with questionnaires as a tool of data collection is that there is tendency of respondents to forget vital information, they may answers the questions superficially when it is a long one, to counter this I will develop a short but very inclusive questionnaire, due to standardization, there is no room for explanation incase respondents misinterpret or do not understand the questions. The collected data will be analyzed using SPSS version 12.0. Both descriptive and inferential statistics will be done. Ethical issue Before starting the study, I will seek approval from the University’s Independent Regulation Board. Similarly I will seek personal informed consent from the participants (Robson, 2007). Study time line References Abdelkarim, W. et al., (2011). Respiratory disorders in the Middle East: A review. Respirology, 16(5): 755–766. Beiske, B. (2002). Research methods: Uses and limitations of questionnaires, interviews, and case studies. Manchester: University of Manchester Publishers. Brunekreef, B. Forsberg, B. (2005). Epidemiological evidence of effects of coarse airborne particles on health. Eur. Respir. J., 26(1), 309–18. Chen, Y. et al., 2004. Effects of Asian dust storm events on daily mortality in Taipei, Taiwan. Environ Res., 95(3), 151–155. Ch oi, H, et al. (2011). Asian dust storm particles induce a broad toxicological transcriptional program in human epidermal keratinocytes. Toxicol. Lett., 200(1), 92–99. Host, S, et al. (2008). Short-term associations between fine and coarse particles and hospital admissions for cardio-respiratory diseases in six French cities. Occup. Environ. Med., 65(1), 544–51. Husar, B. et al. (2001). Asian dust events of April 1998. J. Geophys. Res., 106(2), 18317-18330. Kanatani, K. et al. (2010). Desert-dust exposure is associated with increased risk of asthma hospitalization in children. Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med., 182(2), 1475–1481. Ko, F. et al. (2007). Temporal relationship between air pollutants and hospital admissions for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in Hong Kong. Thorax, 62(1), 779–784. Kwon, H. et al., (2002). Effects of the Asian dust events on daily mortality in Seoul, Korea. Environ Res Sec A., 90(1), 1–5. Lei, Y. (2004). Effects of Asia n dust event particles on in ammation markers in peripheral blood and bronchoalveolar lavage in pulmonary hypertensive rats. Environ Res., 95(2), 71–76. Malig, J. Ostro, D. (2009). Coarse particles and mortality: evidence from a multi-city study in California. Occup. Environ. Med., 66(4), 832–839. Peng, D. et al. (2008). Coarse particulate matter air pollution and hospital admissions for cardiovascular and respiratory diseases among Medicare patients. JAMA, 299(22), 2172–2179. Qiu, Z., Zou, K. Zhan, C. (2006). Research on impact of dust event frequency on atmosphere visibility variance: a case study of typical weather stations locating in the dust route to Beijing. Environ. Sci., 27(1), 1046–51. Robson, C. (2007). How to do a research project: A guide for undergraduate students. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Wang, X. et al., 1997. Respiratory impairments due to dust exposure: a comparative study among workers exposed to silica, asbestos, and coalmine du st. Am J Ind Med., 31(1), 495-502. This proposal on Association between Respiratory Diseases and Dust events in United Arab Emirates was written and submitted by user Guillermo Larson to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.

Best ACT Prep Books 2019

Best ACT Prep Books 2019 SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips There are numerous â€Å"Best ACT Books† lists out there. But we think most of them aren’t very good or thorough, so I’ve tried to write a much better guide here. You’ll learn which books are absolutely critical for your ACT prep, which focus on improving individual sections, and which you'll need if you're aiming for a top score. Most importantly, you’ll learn how to use these top-notch ACT prep books for effective studying. This guide is pretty detailed, so here are some quick links you can use to jump around to different topics. That said, I recommend reading the whole article if you can! What's Better About This Guide to the Best ACT Books? Who Is This ACT Prep Books Guide For? Critical ACT Prep Books Best ACT Books by Subject Best Additional Books for Top ACT Scorers Best All-in-One Book for Less Motivated Low Scorers Other Free Resources for ACT Prep Is Using ACT Prep Books the Best Option for You? What’s Better About This Guide to the Best ACT Books? Because your ACT score is important for getting into collegeand you’ll probably spend a good amount of time studying, it’s important you get the right advice. Follow the wrong advice, and it might be too late to improve your score before you need to apply to college. You'll need to vet the advice you get (including ours) before deciding on your ACT prep plan. As you read each article in your research, ask yourself:why should I trust this person online giving me advice? To be transparent, here’s why we believe our ACT prep books guide is better than others online: I explain in detail why good books are good and what each book's flaws are.You probably haven’t heard of some of the books we recommend because they're either newer or less well known. By contrast, most other ACT book guides just list a few books without much rationale about what makes them worth buying. I believe it’s important to target your weaknesses and where you need to prep.I’ll point out books that are best for training specific sections, and books that are better depending on whether you’re scoring high or low. Other guides tend to assume all students are the same. I don’t get paid for promoting these books over others. I’ve studied dozens of books for ACT prep, and these are the books I'd be using if I myself were prepping. Other sites, such as about.com and reviews.com, are often paid to adjust their rankings and get kickbacks from publishers. I like to think that I know what I’m talking about.I scored a perfect 36 on the ACT and have worked personally with thousands of students prepping for the ACT. I’ve worked with students of all levels, from those scoring below 12 to those aiming for 34+. Other writers don't always have the expertise needed to differentiate between ACT prep books and thus recommend books as an afterthought (and you can probably tell). One important disclaimer: I’m co-founder ofPrepScholar, an online ACT prep program. I believe we’ve built the best prep program available. Itdiagnoses your strengths and weaknessesand gives you a structured all-in-one program, combining the best aspects of the books below, so you know exactly what you need to study at every point in your prep. However, I want to stress that you don’t need a program to excel at the ACT. In fact, writing this guide might lose us some customers if you decide you don’t need a program at all. But if you'd rather not have to manage 10 books and would prefer an integrated, complete program with the greatest chance of raising your ACT score,check out our comprehensive ACT program. No matter what you ultimately decide, if you’re serious about ACT prep like I think you are, keep on reading. Who Is This ACT Prep Books Guide For? First, this guide is for students who are serious about ACT prep.You must be motivated to get a high score, and you need to be willing to put in hard work. Getting through these books will take dozens of hours, simply because the ACT covers so much material. If you plan to study just five hours or so,your choice of book won't make much difference. You should focus your time mainly on taking an ACT practice test and reviewing your answers. With such a short amount of prep time, your score won’t go up much- and you shouldn’t expect a miracle. Buying high-quality ACT prep books is the first and easiest step of ACT prep. You'll need to put in serious work to actually get the score improvements you want. We'll explain below the best ways to use ACT prep books. Secondly, this guide is for students who want to improve their scores by more than 2 points. To make consistent improvements at this level, you need more than just tricks. You need to understand the contentbeing tested- the underlying math concepts and grammar rules- rather than just ineffective "tricks" that make you feel like you've learned something when you actually haven't. Now, if you’re looking to improve by only 1 point, you might be able to do that simply by retaking the test, especially if you’ve taken the ACT only once. Overall, as long as you’re serious about score improvement and want quality ACT books to study with, this is the guide for you. The Best ACT Prep Books of 2019 We’re going to divide the best ACT books into a few categories: Critical Books: These are absolute must-have books for your ACT prep, no matter your skill level or weaknesses. Subject-Specific Books: These are the best books to use for the ACT sections: English, Math, Reading, and Science. Books for Top Scorers:These books are challenging and guaranteed to push you over the top. Books for Low Scorers and Low Motivation: If you want to study for only a handful of hours and improve your ACT score by just a little bit, these are the best books to use. That said, we don't recommend putting such little time into your prep! Critical ACT Prep Books These must-have books are what I believe everyone should have, regardless of your current score or what you need to improve. This category is extremely hard for books to qualify for. In fact, there are only two ACT books out of the dozens I’ve tested that I think are worth buying. TheOfficial ACT Prep Guide 2019-2020 We’ve written at length about theimportance of official ACT practice questions. The ACT is weird and tests concepts in ways you’ve never seen in school before. This means that you need to train with realistic questions so you can learn the patterns of the ACT. Official ACT practice tests released by ACT, Inc., are the gold standard for ACT practice questions. Each test contains real questions given to students at previous test administrations. The quality of official questions is far better than those written by unofficial sources such as Kaplan and The Princeton Review. This particular prep book, informally called the "Red Book," is by far the best source of ACT practice tests. Pros It has the best set of ACT practice tests you can get anywhere, period. The book's five full-length practice tests offer a sufficient amount of practice for most students. Since each test takes at least four hours to complete and review, that's already 20 hours of material! Includes 400 additional practice questions. Answers for each question are available in the book. Cons You can get the same number of official practice tests for free online (although these don’t have answer explanations). Answer explanations in the book are not particularly helpful for self-learning. Most explanations say something like this: â€Å"A is wrong because A is wrong. B is correct for these reasons.† They don't show you how to solve the question from step one, which is what most students need; you need to understand yourself well to be able to learn from your mistakes. Five tests isn't enough for ambitious students. You'll need to supplement your prep with other free practice tests or the official online ACT program, which is good only for the extra test it offers. It doesn’t provide other instructional material. If you’re bad at algebra, you can’t rely on this book alone. You're really only buying it for the tests, and ACT, Inc., knows this. Taking practice tests without learning strategy isn’t going to improve your score, and the book doesn’t provide guidance on how to do this effectively. Most of thisbook is identical to the 2018-19 edition (except for the extra practice test), so if you already ownthat book, it's probably not worth buying this newest version. ACT Prep Black Book, Second Edition This is the only other critical book I recommend for ACT prep. Just using theBlack Bookalone, you’ll likely need supplemental help as I explain below. But what it does have is so good that I believe every student using ACT prep books in their studies should read it. What you’ll get from the Black Book is a way to think about the ACT.But what does this mean? Here are a couple of examples of what you'll learn: The ACT is designed to be a predictable, standardized test. It needs to test basic concepts so that it can be administered nationwide to all students, but it also needs to be difficult, so it distorts the questions in weird ways. Every answer must be unambiguously correct, or else students would complain that their incorrect answers are correct. This means that your strategy should be to rule out all incorrect answer choices, which is especially important on ACT Reading. Some of the concepts in this book were things I understood intuitively back when I took the ACT, but the author here articulates them in a crystal clear way. It’s influenced the way that I think about teaching our students at PrepScholar. Of all books on the market, this book aligns most closely with my personal philosophy on the ACT and how to succeed on it. Pros It offers a very lucid take on the ACT. The ideas in it will change your view on the ACT and hopefully motivate you to work harder, knowing that any student can excel on the test. It contains practical strategies that are more helpful than those in most other ACT books; you don't simply learn to rely on tricks. The book doesn’t assume that all students are the same. It offers a few alternatives for strategies, and then suggests that you try them out to see which one works best for you. It offers a solid set of answer explanations for the hardest questions in the Official Guide (see previous book). The author breaks down the best way to approach each question in a straightforward way. Cons This book requires a ton of self-discipline and insight to use effectively. Because you’re learning from your mistakes and no one is there to guide you, you need to be self-driven to experiment with different strategies and find out which one works best for you. For some students, following a set of straight guidelines could be less confusing. Question explanations are based on the old third edition of the Red Book. If you don't have that book, large parts of this book will be either difficult to use. Most question explanations cover the hardest questions in the Red Book. These serve as good examples for how to think generally about ACT questions, but if you’re scoring at the 8-26 score level on a section, these questions can be pretty confusing. The fundamental content is lacking. If you’re weak in algebra, for example, this book alone will not help you master the subject area. I believe more in recognizing your weaknesses and, throughfocused prep and specific practice questions, mastering that skill. This book is more about teaching an approach to prepping for the ACT. Its English and Science sections are not as strong as its Reading and Math sections are. This is largely due to the nature of the English section, in which it’s less about understanding how the test works and more about mastering grammar rules. Best ACT Books by Subject Beyond the critical books above, you’ll most likely need supplemental help on specific sections. This section discusses the best books for ACT English, Math, Reading, and Science. These books all follow my prep philosophy: Divide ACT content into skills, and get focused training on those skills. Use realistic, high-quality questions to prep effectively for the ACT. Cover only what you need to know- not advanced material that's not on the ACT. Best ACT English Prep Book The best way to excel at ACT English is to understand the grammar rules and how they appear on the ACT. You also need to do a lot of focused practice questions to make sure you learn the patterns of the ACT. That’show we designed our online ACT prep program to teach you grammar. My recommendation for best ACT English book is The Complete Guide to ACT Englishby Erica L. Meltzer. The book is fantastic at distilling grammar into exactly what you need to know for the ACT; you won’t have to learn any arcane grammar concepts that won't appear on the test. As for the rules thatare tested, Meltzer presents them all clearly and covers the essential foundations for those who want to brush up on basic grammar knowledge. Pros This book articulates grammar rules clearly and accurately. It covers only what you need to know for the ACT and cuts out extraneous material. Practice questions use a realistic ACT-passage format. They're also all grouped by topic so you can get repeated practice with the same skill. Cons It's a bit pricey for a book that covers just one ACT section (around $30). Testing a single grammar skill in this format can be misleading practice for the real test. For example, if you know the section is focusing on subject/verb agreement, you might be biased toward recognizing that error on a practice quiz but not on the actual test. Best ACT Math Prep Book My philosophy on ACT Math is thatthe best way to significantly improve your math score is to learn the underlying math content. Learning some simple strategies like plugging in answer choices can get you a little progress, but you’ll quickly run into a ceiling if you have gaps in your underlying math skills. Ultimately, you need to learn algebra, geometry, and number theory to be able to do well on the ACT. Your best bet, therefore, is to find a book that can bothteach you math content in an organized wayand give you practice problems to test individual skills. For these reasons, I recommend theUltimate Guide to the Math ACTby Richard F. Corn. This is a well-written ACT prep book that forces you to buckle down on your weakest math areas. Pros Its lessons teaching math concepts are clear and helpful. They stay focused on math you need to know for the ACT and don't dive into any irrelevant topics. The book divides math into more manageable sub-topics. For example, algebra is divided into solving equations, FOILing, word problems, etc. This division into smaller skills lets you concentrate on and attack specific points in your prep. It contains higher-level strategies on how to prep effectively. Cons Answer explanations are lacking. They show you why an answer is correct but don't teach you how to recognize the problem and solve it. Though high quality, questions could be more creative. The ACT has a host of questions that are unique and unusual, and having this variety is important to mastering the test. The book doesn't distinguish by difficulty level. On the ACT, the hardest questions are much more challenging than the easiest questions. If you're scoring in the average score range, you don't actually need to know how to solve the hardest 20% of questions. Trying to understand these can be a waste of time when you should instead build your fundamental skills. If you’re struggling with ACT math concepts at a basic level (say, scoring 16 or below), I recommend that you supplement your work withKhan Academy, a free online program that offers an engaging way to train your most basic math skills. Note that it's not customized for the ACT specifically, so this program alone won't be enough for your ACT prep. Best ACT Reading Prep Book In my experience with thousands of students, ACT Reading is the most difficult section to improve. It uses logical reasoning skills that aren’t as easy to master as math concepts and grammar rules are. It’s very important to figure out what types of Reading questions will be asked and how you can approach these questions in a systematic way. My recommendation for best ACT Reading book is once again by Erica L. Meltzer: The Complete Guide to ACT Reading.This book dissects the ACT Reading section by both question type and skill. Meltzer does a great job teaching the core of what the question is asking and how to work with the passage to arrive at the correct answer. Of all writers, Meltzer aligns most closely with my philosophy of drilling questions skill by skill to recognize patterns. Pros It offers a great breakdown of the Reading section on a skill-by-skill level.You'll get some of the most helpful strategies for every Reading question type. The book has lots of realistic, high-quality passages and questions.Meltzer uses passages extremely similar to those you’ll see on the ACT. It contains useful strategies on skimming and how to approach Reading passages. Cons For a book that covers just one section, it's a bit pricey ($30). The writing style is dry and clinical, like an academic textbook. I personally prefer this- cut out the fluff- but it can be quite dense for the average student. Its lack of creative page layouts and tendency to use a lot of text on large pages can get tiresome. BestACT Science Prep Book Despite the fact that many students find the Science section to be the most challenging part of the ACT, until recently there were no books specifically dedicated to helping you on ACT Science. At PrepScholar, we know all the tricks for making ACT Science easier, so we decided to compile them into a book. Because it's the only book on the market specifically dedicated to ACT Science, we made sure to make The PrepScholar Guide to ACT Science exceptional.This bookcovers every topic, skill, and question type you'll see on ACT Science, which means that nothingon this section will come as a surprise on test day. Most importantly,this bookalsoincludes all of our best ACT Sciencetest-taking tricks.Many students get tripped up ontheScience section because it's so different from the science tests they've taken in school. However, this book shows you how to identify all the tricks inACTScience and learn how toavoid getting fooled by them. Pros The book contains a complete breakdown of every type of passage and question type you'll see on ACT Science. It includes a list of every science fact you could be tested on, so you're only studying the science you need to know. It also containsmultiple strategies for tackling Science passages so you can choose the method that works best for you. It has lots of expert test-taking tips and strategies. Cons There's no final quiz or exam section at the end of the book. To fully practice everything you've learned from this book,we recommend takingfull-length Science sections. Best Additional Books for Top ACT Scorers Looking at the list above, you can see that you already have your work cut out for you. With nine full-length practice tests and five books at your disposal, you'll be studying for well over 80 hours. If you go through all of your practice using the guidelines we recommend, you’ll likely make huge improvements. If you still want additional practice, though, I recommend Barron’s ACT books- especially if you’re aiming for a near-perfect score. I remember using these books during myown prep in high school, and while Barron's questions are inferior to those in official ACT practice tests, they’re a solid backup source to use if you've finished everything else above. Pros These books offer a lot of content.With Barron's you get thousands of practice questions and detailed lessons with several examples. They're extremely thorough, covering every nook and cranny you need to know. You can be confident that very little is tested outside of what’s contained in these books. Cons Topics can sometimes be too difficult than what you need to know for the ACT. Some questionsget unrealistically hard in a way you’d never see on the actual test. If you’re not an ACT expert, you won’t be able to detect when this happens and might end up wasting time studying content that doesn't ultimately matter. The books often lack clear direction on what’s important and what's not. For example, a grammar rule that appears once every test gets the same number of pages as a grammar rule that appears eight times every test. Again, this is the flip sideof being thorough. As a result, these aren't the books to use if you have limited study time. Not all of their strategies are good.For instance, I have mixed feelings about the reading advice in Barron's ACT 36 (pictured above). Best All-in-One Book for Less Motivated Low Scorers My recommendations have so far been for the ambitious student who really wants to improve his or her score. But I know some students just want to put in five hours, get some exposure to the test, and then take the ACT and forget about it. I personally believe that for most students, improving your ACT score is thebest way to improve your chances of college admission. If you feel like you don't want to put in much effort to studying for the ACT, I strongly suggest reexamining your approach. That said, if you’re stuck in the mindset of simply getting the ACT over with, the book I recommend isKaplan’s ACT Prep 2019. It’s an all-in-one book that covers all four sections and contains practice questions and tests. It doesn’t excel at any of what it’s doing, but it covers the most important bases. It also tends to have more reasonable content than other all-in-one books, such as the ACT book by The Princeton Review. I'll be honest: I don’t love this book. I don’t even really like it. To be frank, I don’t recommend it if you seriously want to improve your ACT score and are willing to put in study time. But if you just want a single source that can do an OK job and is easily digestible, this is the best book out there. Pros It covers all four ACT sections and has a total of three full-length practice tests (two of which are online). At about $17, this book is pretty affordable in terms of the breadth it covers. It offers some helpful, basic strategies that can get you a few easy points if you get stuck answering questions. Cons Practice questions tend to be unrealistic. They often don’t phrase questions the way the ACT would, and they don’t test concepts the right way, either. Questions also don’t trick you in the same ways the real test does. The strategies are not very helpful once you move beyond a 24-score level on a section. Other Free Resources for ACT Prep More important than buying ACT prep books is knowing how to use them effectively. The more books you have, the more important it is to understand how to build a unified study system. We've written thorough guides to walk you through your ACT study plan: 5 Strategies That Will Get You 4+ Points on the ACT How to Get a Perfect ACT Score, by a 36 Full Scorer When Should You Take the ACT? Best Test Dates Is Using ACT Prep Books the Best Option for You? There are a lot of ACT prep methods available to you, and book studying is only one of them. Just to explore all of our options, let's quickly examine whether studying with ACT books is right for you. People who choose to study with books do so for different reasons. Some do it for cost reasons. As I noted above, the best ACT books can get expensive. If you buy all of the top books, you'll be spending around $200. This is already close to the cost of ouronline ACT prep program, which goes beyond books by guiding your studies step by step and motivating you to put in the time. Others study with books because they're self-motivatedand like teaching themselves. If this isn't you, books can be a disappointing way to spend your time- and you probably won't improve, either. By far one of the most important ways to improve your ACT score is to study your mistakes and learn from them. If you can't do this reliably, you'll need extra help to get started. We've written a free guide tocompare other methods of ACT prep. Click the image below to download this guide so you can compare the different methods and see which one is best for you. What's Next? Understanding your ACT target score is critical.Get started by reading ourstep-by-step guide to figuring out what ACT score you need to aim for. Check out our industry-leading online ACT program. We've designed it to cover all of the advantages of ACT books and tutors- and more- at an affordable price. Featuring in-depth strategy lessons and thousands of practice questions, our program uses content from the leading books. We even include the Official ACT Prep Guide above as part of your program. Beyond that,our programacts like your personal tutor. It guides you step by step through what you should be working on at every moment to best improve your score. It customizes to your strengths and weaknesses, and then gives you focused practice so you learn the patterns on the ACT. Furthermore, it motivates you to study so that you put in enough time. There's a 4-point guarantee, too- meaning that if you don't improve your score by 4 points or more, you get all of your money back!