Miyazaki Entrance English flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Main idea

The central claim that all paragraphs of a passage support. It is broader than any single detail but fully supported by the text, not by outside knowledge.

Licensed inference

A conclusion that follows necessarily from stated evidence in the passage. Options requiring an unstated assumption or outside facts are not licensed and should be eliminated.

Antecedent check

For pronoun questions, the antecedent must match the pronoun in number and make logical sense in the sentence; the nearest noun is frequently a distractor.

Author's purpose verbs

Argue and claim signal persuasion; describe and outline signal exposition; recount signals narrative; criticize and satirize signal evaluation. Match the passage's dominant verb pattern.

Tone evidence

Tone is judged from evaluative wording: contrast markers like however and unfortunately, and judgment adjectives. A passage lacking evaluative language is usually neutral.

Collocation

The habitual pairing of words that native usage expects, such as make a decision, do research, heavy rain, and highly qualified. Substituting a synonym often sounds wrong.

Phrasal verb particle shift

The particle changes meaning: turn up means arrive, turn down means refuse, turn out means result, and turn in means submit. Learn each combination separately.

Fixed idiom

An expression whose wording cannot be altered without breaking it, such as a piece of cake for something easy or on the fence for undecided.

Word family confusion

Related forms differ by part of speech and meaning: economy is the system, economic means relating to it, economical means money-saving, and economist is the person.

Affect versus effect

Affect is usually a verb meaning to influence; effect is usually a noun meaning a result. Advice is the noun and advise the verb, following the same pattern.

Register choice

Formal academic prose prefers children, obtain, and numerous over kids, get, and a lot of. Exam items usually reward the more formal option in written passages.

Preposition partners

Verbs and adjectives select fixed prepositions: interested in, responsible for, capable of, similar to, depend on, and consist of. Memorize them as whole units.

Subject-verb agreement rule

The verb agrees with the head noun, ignoring intervening prepositional phrases: the list of items is long. Each, every, everyone, and nobody take singular verbs.

Present perfect restriction

Have or has plus past participle links past action to the present and rejects finished-time markers. Use past simple with yesterday, last week, or in 2019.

Passive formation

Passive is be plus past participle, with the tense carried by be. Use it when the doer is unknown or unimportant, as in the bridge was built in 1990.

Reported speech backshift

When the reporting verb is past, the reported clause shifts one tense back, and time words adjust: today becomes that day, tomorrow becomes the next day.

Third conditional

If plus past perfect, then would have plus past participle, expressing an unreal past situation: If I had studied, I would have passed.

Relative pronoun choice

Who refers to people, which to things, and whose to possession. Non-defining clauses take commas and cannot use that as the relative pronoun.

Indirect question order

Embedded questions keep statement word order: Do you know where he lives? is correct, while where does he live inside the question is wrong.

Uncountable nouns

Information, advice, furniture, and equipment take singular verbs and no plural -s. Use much or little rather than many or few with them.

Topic sentence

The sentence stating a paragraph's single controlling idea, usually placed first. Every supporting sentence in the paragraph must relate to it.

Thesis test

A thesis must be specific and arguable. Technology is important fails because nobody could dispute it; a claim about a particular effect passes.

Cohesion devices

Connectors that signal relationships between sentences: first and moreover for addition, in contrast for opposition, as a result for consequence, for instance for example.

Comma splice

Two independent clauses joined only by a comma. Repair with a coordinating conjunction, a semicolon, or a full stop and new sentence.

Paraphrase versus summary

A paraphrase restates a specific passage in new wording and structure; a summary compresses the whole source to its main points. Both require citation.

Academic register

Written academic English avoids contractions, slang, and second-person you, preferring impersonal subjects such as researchers found rather than I think.

Listening signal words

First, then, and finally mark sequence; however and although mark contrast; so and therefore mark conclusion; for example marks illustration. They reveal the structure of the audio.

Self-correction trap

Speakers often revise numbers, times, and names mid-sentence. Note the corrected value, since the first version heard is usually the distractor.

Negation reversal

Words like hardly, rarely, and not unlikely reverse or soften plain meaning. An option stating the plain positive is wrong when the speaker used a negative form.

Second-speaker rule

In short dialogues the second speaker usually supplies the answer, while the first speaker's line sets up the situation. Focus attention on the reply.

Polite request scale

Can you is informal, could you is more polite, and would you mind plus -ing is most formal. Would you mind takes not at all to mean agreement.

Agreement formulas

I couldn't agree more means complete agreement. I see your point, but softens disagreement. Would you like invites, while do you like asks about preference.