English language and comprehension
English language and comprehension tests grammar, vocabulary, reading comprehension, sentence correction, idioms, synonyms and antonyms, cloze, and paragraph ordering. The aim is standard written English, not literary criticism.
Core rules and concepts
- Subject-verb agreement: a singular subject takes a singular verb; one of the + plural noun takes a singular verb. Neither/either takes a singular verb in formal usage.
- Tense consistency: use past perfect for the earlier of two past actions; use present perfect for an action with present relevance.
- Modifiers: a participial phrase must modify the noun it logically describes. Walking down the road, the tower was seen is wrong because the tower was not walking.
- Parallelism: items in a list or comparison must share grammatical form.
- Vocabulary: learn words in context; distinguish synonyms by connotation and collocation.
- Comprehension: identify the thesis, tone, and inference; do not import outside facts.
Worked example
Choose the correct sentence: One of the students has submitted the report. Reasoning: the subject is one, not students; one is singular, so the verb is has. One of the students have submitted is wrong. If the sentence were The students have submitted, the plural verb would be correct.
Traps
Dangling modifiers, mismatched comparisons (my salary is higher than my brother should be than my brother's), and collective nouns treated as plural without context. In cloze tests, a word can be grammatically possible but collocationally wrong. In comprehension, an option may be true in general but not supported by the passage.