Originally Posted by Grinity
Originally Posted by sydness
How do you even sign up you 10 (or whatever) year old to take SATs...and what if she bombs...Does the school then think I'm nuts and then not work with me on anything ever again?
Any age below 13 the way to sign up for the SATs -
Go to the guidance office at any high school and ask for a SAT booklet. You will see a scannable application in the middle - fill it out and mail it to College Board company.

My son couldn't bear to sit through it at 11, but loved the experience at age 12 and 13. The school won't see the scores unless you show them, and the scores magically dissapear each June. So you don't have to worry about doing harm. I wouldn't send a 9-11 year old unless they had already done a practice test at home and scored at least 500.
We signed our oldest up through WATS/RMATS (our local talent search) when she was in middle school. She took the SAT twice, at ages 10 and 11 and she didn't do the practice tests at home before b/c it is hard to talk her into doing that type of stuff. She still wound up in that 500+ area in critical reading and writing. I do think that having taken the EXPLORE the year earlier through talent search prepped her for the idea of a hard test, though. I, too, probably wouldn't have sent a kid that age to test on the SAT if she had no prior above level testing experience, but I don't know that I'd hold fast to a certain point on a practice test in order to consider the real test.