Reading and Comprehension
What this section tests
Comprehension passages in Setswana - stories, notices, letters, and short informative texts - require you to find stated facts, infer meaning, identify main idea, and understand sequence and cause. You must also read instructions and advertisements accurately.
Concepts to master
- Skimming for gist: identify the topic sentence, usually first in a Setswana paragraph.
- Scanning for detail: names, dates, places, numbers; Setswana dates use kgwedi (month) and letsatsi (day).
- Reference words: yena (he/she), bona (them), se (it/that), fa (here/when) - know what each points back to.
- Connectives: mme (but/and), gonne (therefore), ka gore (because), le fa go ntse jalo (nevertheless). These carry the logic for inference questions.
- Inference vs statement: an inference is not written directly; it follows from clues.
Common traps
- Choosing an option that is true in real life but not in the passage.
- Confusing mme as “and” with mme as “but”; context decides.
- Missing negation: ga a a tla (he did not come) versus o tlile (he came). Small particles change meaning entirely.
- Answering from the first line when the question asks about the conclusion.
Rule of thumb
Underline the question word first: eng (what), mang (who), leng (when), ka goreng (why), jang (how). Then return to the passage and find the sentence that answers exactly that word. Eliminate options that answer a different question word.
Worked example
Passage: “Neo o ne a tsamaya ka dinao go ya sekolong ka gore bese e ne e sa tle.” Question: Why did Neo walk? The clue is ka gore (because) plus bese e ne e sa tle (the bus did not come). Answer: the bus did not arrive - not “he likes walking”, which is not stated.