Reading Comprehension: Main Idea, Inference and Vocabulary in Context
The unseen passage tests whether you can find what is stated, deduce what is implied, and explain a word as the passage uses it. Typical items: choose the main idea, answer factual retrieval questions, draw an inference, and supply a synonym or meaning from context.
Core rules
- Skim the passage once for the topic, then read the questions before returning to the relevant lines.
- The main idea is usually carried by the topic sentence of the first or last paragraph. Test it: does it cover the whole passage, or only one paragraph? Only-the-whole-passage survives.
- Separate stated from implied. A retrieval answer is copied or closely paraphrased from the text; an inference answer must be forced by the text but not printed in it.
- Vocabulary in context: use the surrounding clues, including contrast ('unlike the old method, the new one was frugal'), definition or example. Distinguish the passage's sense of a word from its common sense.
Worked example
Passage: 'In the 1960s the mangrove belt along the coast was cleared for prawn farms. Thirty years later the same villages were replanting it tree by tree, having learned that the roots broke the force of the waves.' Question: 'Why did the villagers replant the mangroves?' The words 'having learned' mark cause, and 'the roots broke the force of the waves' supplies the reason, so the inference is that the cleared belt had left them exposed to storm damage. Naming only 'they wanted trees' misses the causal link the examiner is testing. For 'belt' in this passage, the sense is a continuous strip, not an item of clothing.
Marks-losing traps
Answering from general knowledge rather than the passage; choosing an option that repeats a passage word but distorts the sense; missing negatives such as NOT or EXCEPT; over-inferring beyond what the text forces; and exceeding a stated word limit.
When the question says 'in your own words', do not lift the sentence intact.