Reading Comprehension
Reading Comprehension opens the BSE Odisha HSC First Language English paper. You meet unseen material - usually a prose passage of about 250 words, sometimes with a shorter factual or poetic extract - followed by items that move from literal to inferential: picking out detail, working out a word's meaning from context, naming the main idea, judging the writer's tone, and answering 'why' questions that need a reason rather than a quotation.
Question types and what each rewards
- Detail/fact: answer in a phrase; do not copy the whole sentence.
- Vocabulary ("give a word from the passage which means..."): the exact word from the passage, in its passage form. A synonym of your own scores nothing.
- Inference ("why", "what does the writer suggest"): a statement plus a because-clause.
- Tone/purpose: one adjective plus the evidence that proves it.
- Word limit ("in about 30 words"): one sentence of roughly that length, not two.
Worked example
Extract: "Although the bus was scheduled for six, it was past seven when the conductor pulled the rusty gate shut, and the passengers, who had long stopped complaining, settled into their seats."
Q. Why had the passengers stopped complaining? Model: "Because the delay was clearly routine; experience had taught them that protest changed nothing, so they accepted it." Reasoning: the phrase had long stopped complaining signals habit, not contentment, and the past perfect places the resignation before this journey. Writing "because they were happy" or lifting the entire sentence earns no credit beyond the first mark.
Traps that cost marks
- Answering a two-mark "why" with "yes" or with a bare fact.
- Long lifted chunks; examiners reward compression.
- Confusing what the writer says with what the writer implies.
- Missing negatives: "not unusual" means usual.
- In a word-meaning item, using an outside synonym instead of a passage word.