Reading and Responding: Text Types and Careful Reading
What you must be able to do
Reading tasks use authentic-style texts: emails, notices, advertisements, timetables, short articles, blogs and letters. You must locate specific information, understand gist, and infer simple meaning. Skills to practise: scanning for a name, date or price; matching headings to paragraphs; deciding whether a statement is true or false and justifying it with a quotation; and recognising text purpose (Anzeige, Einladung, Entschuldigung).
Reading method
First read the questions, not the text. Underline the key word in each question. Then scan the text for that word or a synonym - Arzt for krank, günstig for billig. Read the sentence around the match, not just the match. For true/false items with justification, copy a short phrase exactly as it appears; do not paraphrase. If a word is unknown, use the surrounding words and word-building: un- negates, -los means without, -chen makes a diminutive, and compound nouns take their gender from the last element.
Traps to watch for
Questions often use different words from the text, so a literal word match can mislead. A text may say Das Konzert ist leider ausverkauft while the option says Man kann Karten kaufen - false, but tempting because the topic matches. Watch negation (nicht, kein, nie, ohne), restrictive words (nur, erst, schon) and modal verbs that soften or strengthen a claim (man darf versus man muss). In matching tasks, one option is usually extra and unused.
Worked example
Text: Die Bibliothek ist montags geschlossen, aber von Dienstag bis Freitag von neun bis achtzehn Uhr geöffnet. Question: Kann man am Montag Bücher ausleihen? Answer: Nein, die Bibliothek ist montags geschlossen. Note the method: locate the day, read the whole clause, and quote the reason.
Rule of thumb
Find the evidence sentence, read it completely, and check for a negation or a limiting word before you choose.