Reading comprehension (short passages)
What this domain tests
Short-passage items - notices, e-mails, timetables, and one-paragraph explanations of roughly 60–150 words - test precise location rather than overall gist. Typically one or two questions follow: a blank to fill, a true/false on content, a pronoun referent, or a small table to read off.
Core rules
- Read the question stem before the passage and label its type. Each type has a fixed procedure: blank → find the sentence and identify what logical link is missing; content match → locate the sentence carrying that information; referent → look at the previous sentence, not the following one.
- Blank-filling in short texts almost always tests cohesion, so check three things in order: a connector (therefore, otherwise, meanwhile, nevertheless), a pronoun or demonstrative, and a word repeated later in the text.
- Match by paraphrase, never by shared vocabulary. The correct choice says the same thing in different words; the distractor copies the original wording and changes one detail.
- In notices and timetables, convert every condition into a check: date, eligibility, fee, exception (except, only if, students with a valid ID).
Worked example
"The chemistry lab will be closed for maintenance on Friday. ______, samples that need refrigeration should be moved to Building 2 by Thursday." Choices: Therefore / Otherwise / Meanwhile / Nevertheless. Reasoning: the closure is presented as settled fact, and the instruction is its consequence, so Therefore fits. Otherwise would mean "if the lab were not closed", which contradicts the first sentence. Meanwhile marks parallel time, Nevertheless marks contrast - neither is present.
Traps
- Choosing a connector by its usual Japanese gloss (however = しかし always) instead of by the logical relation.
- Answering from general knowledge rather than from the text.
- Skipping negative and quantity words (not, only, at least, by Thursday), which is where the wrong choices are built.