BSEH SS English Core flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Note-making format

A title followed by headed sub-points written as noun phrases or reduced clauses, using consistent indentation and abbreviations, with no full sentences copied from the passage.

Inference versus restatement

An inference follows necessarily from the passage plus ordinary logic; a restatement merely repeats words already present. Options that add unsupported real-world facts are distractors.

Vocabulary in context

The meaning a word carries in its specific sentence. Test each option by substituting it back into the original line and checking whether sense and collocation survive.

Summary length rule

A summary is roughly one-third of the original passage, written in the third person, omitting examples and quotations, and adding no opinion of the writer.

Notice format essentials

Institution name, the word NOTICE, date, a short caption, a body of about fifty words, and the issuer's name and designation, all enclosed in a box.

Formal letter sequence

Sender's address, date, receiver's address and designation, subject, salutation, three-paragraph body, complimentary close, and signature block, in that order.

Report writing conventions

Heading, reporter's byline, place-and-date dateline, past tense, third person, factual sequence of events, and no personal opinion or direct address to the reader.

Article opening hook

The first sentence or two that seize attention through a question, statistic, or striking claim, before the byline and body paragraphs develop one controlling idea each.

Complaint letter structure

State the problem with specific evidence such as dates and order numbers, describe the inconvenience caused, and close with a clear, reasonable request for redress.

Reported speech tense shift

Present becomes past, present perfect becomes past perfect, past simple becomes past perfect; will becomes would, can becomes could, may becomes might, must becomes had to.

Reported yes-no questions

Introduced by if or whether, with statement word order restored and no question mark, for example asking whether he had finished the work.

Subject-verb agreement traps

One of the boys takes a singular verb; each, every, either and neither are singular; the number of is singular while a number of is plural.

Modal perfect forms

Should have plus past participle expresses regret or criticism; must have expresses deduction about the past; needn't have expresses an unnecessary past action.

Gerund after prepositions

A verb following a preposition takes the -ing form, as in good at solving, instead of arguing, and before leaving, regardless of the main verb's tense.

Bare infinitive rule

After make, let, see, hear and feel in the active voice, the following verb drops to: they made him apologise, not they made him to apologise.

Error correction method

Locate the single faulty element, name its class such as article, preposition, or verb form, then rewrite the entire sentence with only that correction applied.

The Last Lesson setting

Alphonse Daudet's story is set in Alsace-Lorraine after Prussian annexation, when an order from Berlin bans French in schools and M. Hamel gives his final lesson.

Lost Spring two stories

Anees Jung contrasts Saheb, a ragpicker in Seemapuri, with Mukesh, a bangle-maker's son in Firozabad, exposing child labour and the exploitation behind glass-blowing.

Deep Water overcoming fear

William Douglas conquers a childhood fear of water through an instructor's systematic training, repeated practice, and finally swimming alone across Lake Wentworth.

The Rattrap transformation

In Lagerlöf's story, Edla Willmansson's trust reforms a cynical peddler, who returns the crofter's stolen money with a note signed Captain von Stahle.

Indigo Champaran campaign

Louis Fischer recounts Gandhi's 1917 Champaran struggle against the tinkathia sharecropping system, showing that self-reliance rather than patronage brings freedom.

My Mother at Sixty-six

Kamala Das's single-sentence free-verse poem compares the dozing mother to a corpse and a late winter's moon, voicing the daughter's fear of loss behind a smile.

Keeping Quiet theme

Neruda urges counting to twelve and pausing all activity so that fishermen spare whales and warmongers stop, arguing that stillness is not death but renewal.

A Thing of Beauty source

Keats's lines come from Endymion and assert that a thing of beauty is a joy forever, whose loveliness increases and never fades into nothingness.

Aunt Jennifer's Tigers contrast

Adrienne Rich sets the fearless tigers prancing on the panel against Aunt Jennifer's fluttering fingers and the massive weight of her wedding ring.

Poetic device answer pattern

Name the device, quote the exact phrase, then state the effect it creates in the poem; identification alone without quotation rarely earns full credit.

The Third Level twist

Charley believes a Grand Central corridor leads to 1894; the psychiatrist calls it wish fulfilment, but Sam's letter in a first-day cover leaves it unresolved.

The Tiger King irony

Kalki's Maharaja kills a hundred tigers to defeat a prophecy, then dies from a sliver of a wooden tiger, showing the futility of resisting fate.

On the Face of It pairs

Susan Hill contrasts Derry, disfigured and bitter, with Mr Lamb, who has a tin leg and an open garden, teaching acceptance before his sudden death.

Novel character tracking

For each major character record motivation, change across the narrative, and relation to the central conflict, so comparison questions can be answered point by point.

Narrative point of view

Whether the story is told in first or third person, and whether the narrator is omniscient or limited; this shapes what the reader can know and trust.

Listening self-correction cues

Speakers often revise themselves with actually, sorry, or I mean; the corrected value, not the first number or name spoken, is the intended answer.