Vocabulary and Usage
What this domain tests
Vocabulary and Usage tests whether you can choose words that fit the sentence in meaning, grammar, and collocation. The answer is not always the word with the closest dictionary meaning. It must also combine correctly with nearby words. Expect items on phrasal verbs, prepositions, word families, countability, and common school and daily-life topics.
Core rules
- Read the whole sentence and identify the topic before looking at options.
- Check the word's part of speech: noun, verb, adjective, or adverb.
- Learn verbs with their particles: hand in, hand out, take off, put on.
- Check countability: much or many, a few or a little, information as uncountable.
- Use the words around the blank as a collocation clue: make a decision, do homework, take a bus.
Worked example
Please ___ your homework by Friday. Options: hand in, hand out, take off, put on. Reasoning: The object is homework and the deadline is by Friday, so the meaning is submit. Hand in means submit. Hand out means distribute, which reverses the direction. Take off and put on relate to clothing, not homework. The particle in is the decisive clue.
Traps that cost marks
- Choosing a similar-looking word without checking its part of speech.
- Ignoring the preposition or particle that changes a phrasal verb's meaning.
- Using many with an uncountable noun such as information.
- Confusing do and make in common phrases.
- Selecting a word that is grammatically possible but semantically odd.