Iran Konkur Languages cheat sheet

Main-idea items: the correct answer must cover the whole passage; an option true of only one paragraph is a detail, not the main idea.

Tone/attitude items hinge on evaluative adjectives and modals (e.g. "allegedly", "unfortunately", "should"); neutral reporting verbs signal objectivity.

Inference items require a mandatory step from stated text; if the option needs outside knowledge, it is out of scope.

Vocabulary-in-context: substitute each option into the sentence and keep the one preserving the passage's logic and register.

Pronoun/reference items: the referent must agree in number and gender and must be recoverable from the preceding sentence.

EXCEPT/NOT items: three options are explicitly supported; locate the line for each before rejecting the fourth.

Extreme quantifiers (all, never, only, always) in options are usually wrong; hedged options (some, may, often) more often match academic prose.

Order-of-events and paragraph-function items: map each paragraph to one role (claim, evidence, counterargument, conclusion) before answering.

Subject-verb agreement: the verb agrees with the head noun, not with a prepositional phrase ("The list of items is"), nor with "each/every/either" (singular).

Tense sequencing: after "by the time" use past perfect for the earlier action; after "since" use present perfect for a state continuing to now.

Conditionals: type 2 = if + past simple, would + base; type 3 = if + past perfect, would have + past participle; inversion "Had I known" replaces "If I had known".

Relative clauses: "that" never follows a comma or a preposition; "whose" marks possession; "where" replaces a place adverbial.

Gerund vs infinitive: prepositions take -ing; "used to + base" = past habit while "be used to + -ing" = be accustomed; "look forward to" takes -ing.

Collocation pairs to memorize: make a decision, do research, take responsibility, pay attention to, draw a conclusion, raise an issue.

Dependent prepositions: interested in, capable of, responsible for, dependent on, similar to, regardless of, comply with, consist of.

Confusable pairs: affect (verb) / effect (noun); lie-lay-lain (recline) vs lay-laid-laid (place); economic (of the economy) vs economical (thrifty).

First pass: read the whole passage ignoring gaps to fix topic, tense, and register; the register decides formal vs informal word choices.

Classify each gap before looking at options: grammar gap (function word), meaning gap (content word), or collocation gap (fixed partner).

Cohesion markers predict the missing connector: contrast (however, whereas), cause (therefore, hence), addition (moreover), concession (although, nevertheless).

Reference chains: a gap filled by a pronoun or synonym must agree with the noun already introduced earlier in the passage.

Word-form suffixes: -tion/-ment/-ness/-ity make nouns; -ive/-ous/-al/-able make adjectives; -ly makes adverbs; -ize/-ify make verbs.

Choose the form demanded by syntax: after a determiner comes a noun; after a linking verb comes an adjective; modifiers of verbs take adverbs.

Negative prefixes: un- (unfair), in-/im-/il-/ir- by assimilation (impossible, illegal, irregular), dis- (dishonest), non- (nonstop), mis- (misunderstand).

Parallelism inside a gap sentence: a blank joined by "and/or" must match the grammatical form of the parallel item.

Identify the target language from the prompt before answering; the exam offers French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Russian variants of the same skill set.

Cognate strategy: Romance and Germanic cognates give fast gist, but watch false friends (French "actuellement" = currently, German "bekommen" = to receive, Spanish "embarazada" = pregnant).

Grammatical gender and agreement are frequent distractors: the article, adjective, and past participle must agree in gender and number with the noun.

Verb endings encode person and tense; locate the subject pronoun or noun first, then match the ending rather than translating word by word.

Formal vs informal address (French vous/tu, German Sie/du, Spanish usted/tú, Russian вы/ты) determines the correct pronoun and verb form.

Negation patterns differ: French ne...pas, German nicht/kein, Spanish no...nada/nunca, Italian non...mai; double negatives can be grammatical.

Ordinal and number words, days, and dates are high-frequency items; learn them as fixed lexical chunks.

For unknown words, use morphology: prefix + root + suffix often yields the meaning without a dictionary (e.g. German "un-ver-ständ-lich").

Syllogism rule: a conclusion follows only if it holds in every model satisfying the premises; a valid form is All A are B + All B are C ⇒ All A are C.

Two negative premises yield no valid conclusion; two particular premises yield no universal conclusion.

Contrapositive is equivalent: "If P then Q" equals "If not Q then not P"; the converse (If Q then P) is not equivalent.

Necessary vs sufficient: P is sufficient for Q when P⇒Q; P is necessary for Q when Q⇒P (equivalently ¬P⇒¬Q).

Analogy items: state the relation in a phrase (part-to-whole, cause-to-effect, degree, function) and test it in the same direction.

Odd-one-out: find the single shared property of the majority (word class, semantic field, letter pattern) and reject the exception.

Seating/ordering puzzles: draw a line or table and place the most constrained item first; each new clue must be applied to existing placements.

Blood-relation and direction puzzles: convert sentences into a labeled diagram; "my father's only son" = the speaker (if male).

Percent change = (new − old)/old × 100; successive changes of a% then b% give a net factor of (1+a/100)(1+b/100), not a+b.

Percentage points vs percent: a rise from 20% to 25% is 5 percentage points but a 25% relative increase.

Ratio scaling: if a:b = 3:5, write parts as 3k and 5k; the total is 8k, so k = total/8.

Average = sum/count; if one value changes by d across n items, the mean changes by d/n.

Work rates add: combined time = 1/(1/a + 1/b); for two workers the shortcut is ab/(a+b).

Speed: distance = speed × time; for equal distances at speeds u and v, average speed = 2uv/(u+v), not (u+v)/2.

Simple interest = P·r·t; compound amount = P(1 + r)^t; doubling time by the rule of 72 ≈ 72/r percent.

Data interpretation: read axis units and the legend before computing; verify a percentage against the base stated in the question, not the table total.

Scan for the keyword of the question stem first, then read the sentence before and after it; answers rarely sit in the keyword sentence alone.

Passage structure signals: "however/yet" marks a turn where the author's real claim often appears; "for example" marks support, not the claim.

A paraphrase answer is correct only if it preserves scope, quantity, and certainty of the original sentence.

When two options seem right, the one requiring fewer assumptions from the text wins.

Passive voice: be + past participle; the object of the active sentence becomes the subject, and by-agent is dropped when unknown or unimportant.

Reported speech backshifts one tense (present→past, will→would) and adjusts time/place words (now→then, here→there).

Inversion after negative adverbials: "Never have I seen", "Hardly had he left when..." - auxiliary before subject.

Articles: "a/an" for first mention and countable singulars; "the" for unique or already-identified referents; zero article for generic plurals.

Purpose: so that, in order to, with a view to (+ -ing). Result: so, therefore, consequently, as a result.

Contrast: however, nevertheless, whereas, on the other hand, despite + noun/-ing, although + clause.

Condition: unless = if not; provided that, as long as, in case (precaution) vs if (condition).

Common verb-noun collocations in cloze: play a role, take measures, meet demand, gain access, pose a threat, reach a conclusion.

French: passé composé uses avoir or être; être verbs (aller, venir, partir, naître, mourir) agree the participle with the subject.

German: case system - nominative subject, accusative direct object, dative indirect object; two-way prepositions take accusative with motion, dative with location.

Spanish: ser for inherent traits and origin, estar for states and location; por vs para distinguishes cause/route from purpose/destination.

Italian: articulated prepositions contract article + preposition (di+il = del, a+la = alla); learn the contraction table as a unit.

"Some A are B" does not imply "Some B are A" is false - it is in fact equivalent and convertible.

"No A are B" converts to "No B are A"; "All A are B" converts only to "Some B are A" (assuming A exists).

In ordering puzzles, a clue such as "A is immediately before B" fixes a block of two; treat the block as one unit when counting arrangements.

If a condition says "either X or Y but not both", test both branches; a branch that breaks another clue is eliminated.

Mixture replacement: after removing and refilling with water n times, pure liquid left = initial × (1 − removed/volume)^n.

Profit and loss: profit% is computed on cost price unless stated otherwise; selling price = cost × (1 + p/100).

Partnership/proportional division uses investment × time as the weight, not investment alone.

In tables, "total" rows can hide rounding; recompute from the raw rows when an option is close to two candidates.

Author's purpose items: choose among inform, persuade, compare, or criticize; match the verb to the dominant verb tense and hedging in the passage.

Detail items: the correct option uses synonyms of the passage, while the trap repeats exact words with a changed quantity or subject.

Sentence-insertion items: the inserted sentence must connect to both the preceding and the following sentence via a pronoun or connector.

Summary items: the correct summary names the topic plus the author's stance; a summary that lists details is too narrow.

Noun/adjective pairs: economy/economic, benefit/beneficial, influence/influential, success/successful, anxiety/anxious.

Verb + preposition idioms: account for, result in (cause) vs result from (be caused by), depend on, refer to, object to.

Formal academic verbs preferred in cloze: conduct, obtain, demonstrate, indicate, establish, examine, propose.

Linking adverbs of degree: considerably, substantially, slightly, marginally - match the adverb to the size of change stated.

Fill every gap; an unanswered gap has a 0% expected score while a reasoned guess has about 25%.

Eliminate options that are grammatically impossible in the slot first, then choose among the remaining by meaning.

Check that the completed sentence reads with correct punctuation: a connector like "however" needs a comma after it inside a clause.

If two options are synonyms, neither is usually the key unless one collocates with the surrounding words.

Skim for proper nouns, numbers, and cognates to build a topic map before reading the questions.

Match the question's interrogative to the text: qui/wer/quién/who → person; quand/wann/cuándo → time; pourquoi/warum/por qué → reason.

Tense of the question dictates the tense of the answer; a past-tense question will not be answered by a present-tense sentence.

Watch for the negative question ("Which is NOT mentioned?") - the answer is the one absent from the text.

Letter-series rule: check differences of positions (A=1), then alternating series, then products or squares.

Coding-decoding: derive the shift per letter from one example and apply it uniformly; shifts can alternate by position.

Statement-assumption: an assumption is unstated but required for the statement to make sense; reject restatements of the statement itself.

Cause-effect items: the cause must precede the effect in time and be sufficient to produce it.

Divisibility: by 3 if digit sum divisible by 3; by 9 if digit sum divisible by 9; by 4 if the last two digits form a multiple of 4.

HCF × LCM = product of the two numbers.

Sum of first n natural numbers = n(n+1)/2; sum of first n odd numbers = n².

If a number increases by p% then decreases by p%, the net change is a decrease of p²/100 percent.