Paragraph Comprehension
The four question types
- Main idea or author's purpose: what the passage as a whole is about.
- Detail: a fact stated directly in the text.
- Inference: a small, necessary conclusion the text supports.
- Vocabulary in context and tone: what a word means here, or how the author feels.
Method
Read the passage once at a normal pace for the gist, then read the stem and locate the relevant lines. For main idea questions, check the topic sentence (often first or last) and test your answer against every paragraph. If it only fits one paragraph, it is a detail, not the main idea. For vocabulary in context, substitute each option back into the sentence and see which preserves the meaning.
Traps
- True statements the passage never makes. Every answer must be traceable to the text.
- Extreme wording: always, never, all, proves. These are usually wrong on inference and tone items.
- A detail offered as the main idea, or a broad summary offered for a detail question.
- Answering from outside knowledge instead of the passage.
- Misreading stems that contain EXCEPT or NOT.
Worked example
Passage: Desert plants conserve water in several ways. Some store it in thick stems. Others have small or waxy leaves that limit evaporation. A few drop their leaves entirely during drought.
Question: what is the main idea? Desert plants have multiple water-saving adaptations fits all three sentences. Some desert plants drop their leaves is a detail, and deserts are the driest biome is outside the text.