Confessions of a High School Word Nerd edited by Arianne Cohen

Somewhere along the way the big standardized test (ACT & SAT) became this academic boogy man. I didn't have a hard time with them, but then I've always had a talent for test taking. Most of the students I teach really struggle with them - really smart kids too, some of them. Sometimes I think it's more about the specter of the test than its actual difficulty.

Anyway, this anxiety has spawned all sorts of prep materials. Most of us are familiar with the ubiquitous study guides, but there are also a bunch of books that are geared at vocabulary acquisition. Confessions of a High School Word Nerd is one of those books. It's a collection of short stories or memoir pieces about the high school experience and shoe-horned full of SAT words.

I'm a firm believer in the idea that the best way to acquire new vocabulary is through exposure. Since most people don't trot out their vocabularies in everyday speech, that means reading for most of us. Ideally, that vocabulary is built up over a large amount of time - years. However, books like this are designed to be a sort of catch up tool.

While I did not laugh off my gluteus as promised by the book, the stories were moderately amusing and well written. The writers did a good job of integrating some pretty diverse vocabulary without being awkward. On the downside, there is so much vocab pressed into these stories that is a little like listening to astrophysicists try to talk about the weather.

Anyway, it's decent for what it is, but I don't think I would hand it to a kid whose actively studying to sit the ACT or SAT.