Reading and Responding
What you must understand
Reading tasks use authentic-style texts: notices, emails, advertisements, articles, blogs, short literary extracts. You must locate explicit information, understand purpose and audience, follow chronology and cause-effect, and interpret attitude and implied meaning. Know text-type conventions: a narrative uses past tenses (αόριστος, παρατατικός, υπερσυντέλικος); an instructional or notice text uses imperatives and impersonal forms (Απαγορεύεται, Παρακαλούμε); an advert uses evaluative adjectives and direct address. Recognise connectors that carry logic: όμως, ωστόσο (contrast), επειδή, αφού (cause), επομένως, άρα (consequence), ενώ (contrast/simultaneity).
Traps
- Matching words, not meaning: an option repeats a word from the text but reverses the logic.
- Scope errors: the text says μερικοί (some) but the option says όλοι (all); watch quantifiers (πολλοί, λίγοι, κανένας, μόνο).
- Negation and hedging: δεν αποκλείεται means it is possible, not impossible.
- Time shifts: events described out of order; check tense and time markers (πριν, μετά, μέχρι, μόλις).
- Register clues (εσείς/εσύ, titles, sign-offs) that reveal the writer-reader relationship.
- Answering from general knowledge instead of the passage.
Rule of thumb
For each question, find and underline the exact sentence that decides it, then paraphrase that sentence in your own words before looking at the options. Eliminate options that add, remove or reverse information. If the answer needs inference, it must be supported by evidence in the text, not by plausibility.
Worked example
Text: Το μαγαζί θα είναι κλειστό τη Δευτέρα, εκτός από την πρώτη Δευτέρα του μήνα. Question: When is the shop open on a Monday? The phrase εκτός από (except) reverses the default, so the answer is the first Monday of the month - not every Monday.