English Language: Rules Over Instinct
English Language tests standard written English at a competitive level: a reading comprehension passage, a cloze test, error detection, sentence rearrangement, fillers and vocabulary items. Almost every question is rule-based, which means marks come from grammar you can name, not from what sounds right.
What is actually tested
- Reading comprehension: main idea, inference, tone, and true/false statements. Answers are located in the passage, not in general knowledge.
- Error detection: subject-verb agreement, tense sequence, prepositions, articles, pronouns and parallel structure.
- Para jumbles: find the opener (a sentence with no back-reference), then link using pronouns, connectors and repeated nouns.
- Cloze: collocation matters more than meaning - comply with, deprived of, take a decision.
Worked example
'Neither the manager nor the clerks was present at the counter.' In a neither...nor construction the verb agrees with the nearer subject. Here 'clerks' is plural and nearer, so 'was' is wrong: 'Neither the manager nor the clerks were present.' The same logic gives 'One of the branches has failed', because the subject is 'one', not 'branches'.
Traps that cost marks
- Choosing an answer that sounds formal but breaks a rule: discuss about, return back, more better.
- Forgetting that some questions carry a 'no error' option; not every sentence is faulty.
- Reading only the sentence containing the blank in a cloze test, when the previous sentence supplies the cue.
- Attempting reading comprehension last, after concentration has drained. Decide your order in mock tests and keep it fixed on exam day.