Reading Comprehension: Short Passages and Dialogues
This domain tests reading comprehension of short passages and dialogues: notices, emails, messages, conversations, and brief descriptive texts. Tasks ask for literal details, the main idea, the writer's purpose, a pronoun's referent, or the best reply in a dialogue. The texts are short, so the difficulty is usually in precise interpretation rather than speed.
Core rules and concepts
- Identify the text type and relationship first: friend-to-friend, teacher-to-student, shop-to-customer. This fixes tone and expected content.
- For dialogue questions, read the whole exchange before choosing; the final line often changes the meaning of an earlier one.
- Watch pronoun reference: it, this, that, they, one. Replace the pronoun with the noun and test the sentence.
- Treat negative questions and tags carefully: 'You didn't ..., did you?' expects confirmation of a negative.
- Distinguish what is stated from what is suggested. A true statement is wrong if it does not answer the question.
Worked example
Dialogue: A: 'Have you finished the report?' B: 'I wish I had. The printer jammed twice.' Question: What does B mean? Reasoning: 'I wish I had' is a regret form meaning 'I have not finished it, but I wanted to.' The printer detail explains the delay. It does not mean B finished and then printed. The correct meaning is that B has not finished the report. Answer: B has not finished the report.
Traps that cost marks
- Reading 'I wish I had' as a yes answer.
- Choosing an option that is factually true in the text but does not answer the question.
- Missing a negative in the question stem.
- Attaching a pronoun to the nearest noun without checking logic.
- Over-reading a short text and inventing a motive not supported by the words.