Shiga Public High School Entrance Examination - English common mistakes
Shiga Public High School Entrance Examination - English · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
On word-order questions, the candidate arranges the given words into a grammatically valid sentence but ignores the meaning the Japanese prompt requires, e.g. placing the question word or the negative at the wrong slot so the sentence answers a different question than the one asked.
The candidate treats the scrambled-word task as pure syntax assembly and never checks the finished sentence back against the Japanese cue. Because Japanese word order is flexible and the cue is in Japanese, the candidate's mental translation drifts toward a literal Japanese order rather than the fixed English order the prompt demands.
What to do instead
Before writing, underline the Japanese cue's key element (who does what, to whom, when, and whether it is a question or negative). After assembling, read the completed English sentence aloud and ask whether it is a truthful translation of the cue. Practise by rewriting the same cue into two different English orders and deciding which one the prompt's given words permit.
The candidate answers a reading passage's detail question with a fact that appears in the passage but does not answer the specific question, because the question stem is a paraphrase rather than a quotation.
Under time pressure the candidate scans for a matching word and stops at the first hit, treating lexical overlap as evidence. Shiga-style long passages often repeat a keyword in several paragraphs, so the first match is frequently a distractor paragraph rather than the answering sentence.
What to do instead
Read the question stem first and rewrite it in the candidate's own words before scanning. Locate every occurrence of the keyword, then eliminate each occurrence by asking 'does this sentence answer my rewritten question?' Only the sentence that survives elimination earns the answer.
The candidate selects an inappropriate response in a situational dialogue because it is polite or grammatically correct, without checking whether it fits the specific function demanded (refusing, apologising, asking for repetition, offering).
Candidates learn formulaic phrases in isolation and default to the politest one. Japanese school English materials emphasise politeness, so 'I'm sorry' or 'Yes, please' gets chosen even when the prompt calls for a refusal or a clarification request.
What to do instead
Classify each dialogue prompt by function before looking at the options: is the speaker asking, offering, refusing, apologising, or checking? Then eliminate any option whose function mismatches, even if it is fluent. Build a personal list of paired functions, e.g. offer-accept versus offer-decline, and rehearse them in two-line exchanges.
On listening items, the candidate writes the number or fact heard first rather than the one that is finally correct, because the passage self-corrects or the speaker changes plans mid-exchange.
Novice listeners commit to the first plausible number or time and stop processing. Exam scripts deliberately include a stated value followed by a correction ('Actually, make it...' or 'No, that was last year'), and the candidate has already written the discarded value.
What to do instead
Train a habit of holding the answer until the speaker finishes the turn, and mark tentative answers with a pencil dot to revise. In practice, listen to short dialogues and note every number mentioned, then circle only the final one after the audio ends.
The candidate translates an English sentence into Japanese by rendering each word in order, producing Japanese that is grammatically possible but unnatural, or missing the tense, plural, or article meaning carried by the English.
The candidate maps English words to single Japanese equivalents without restructuring into Japanese clause order, and drops information that English encodes grammatically (articles, plurals, perfect aspect) because Japanese often leaves it implicit.
What to do instead
Translate in two passes: first identify the English sentence's core meaning elements (subject, action, time, quantity, definiteness), then rebuild the Japanese sentence in Japanese order, explicitly deciding how to express number and time. Compare with a model translation and note which English features were rendered by context rather than by a word.
The candidate's guided composition is a list of short, disconnected sentences that technically answer the prompt but omit a reason or example, so it loses content marks despite correct grammar.
Candidates under time pressure write the minimum to avoid errors, treating the task as a grammar test. Shiga composition tasks typically specify content points (opinion plus reason, or experience plus feeling), and each unspecified point is a lost mark regardless of accuracy.
What to do instead
Before writing, list the prompt's required content points as a checklist and allocate one sentence to each, then add one linking word between them ('because', 'for example', 'however'). After writing, tick each content point and count sentences; if any point lacks a sentence, add it before proofreading grammar.
The candidate misreads a function word in a cloze or grammar item, choosing an answer that fits the meaning but not the grammatical slot, e.g. a preposition where the verb requires a particle, or 'because' where the clause needs 'although'.
Function words carry little semantic weight, so the candidate skims them and relies on overall sentence meaning. Japanese learners also transfer Japanese connective logic, which does not map one-to-one onto English conjunctions and prepositions.
What to do instead
For every cloze item, identify the grammatical relationship the blank must express (cause, contrast, condition, time, purpose) before reading the options, then check the word class the slot requires. Keep a personal error log of function words grouped by relationship rather than by translation.
The candidate answers an inference or main-idea question with a sentence copied from the passage, because copied text feels safer than a paraphrase.
Candidates conflate 'supported by the passage' with 'stated in the passage'. Inference and main-idea items are designed so that the literal sentence is a detail, while the correct option restates the writer's point in different words.
What to do instead
Label each option as 'stated', 'implied', or 'not supported' before choosing. For main-idea items, write a one-sentence summary of the passage in the candidate's own words first, then pick the option closest to that summary rather than to any quoted line.
The candidate leaves a listening or reading item blank or half-answered because a single unknown word stalled them, losing marks on questions they could otherwise have answered.
School English training rewards complete comprehension, so candidates treat an unknown word as a stop signal rather than a gap to route around. Exam passages and audio deliberately include unfamiliar vocabulary that is not needed for the answer.
What to do instead
Adopt a rule: never spend more than a few seconds on one unknown word; note it, infer from surrounding context, and continue. In practice, do passages with one word blacked out and answer anyway, building evidence that the surrounding text usually suffices.
The candidate describes what a highlighted English expression means by translating it word-for-word into Japanese, missing idioms and phrasal verbs whose meaning is not the sum of their parts.
Meaning-explanation items target expressions like phrasal verbs and fixed phrases, but candidates apply literal decomposition, which produces a plausible but wrong Japanese gloss and loses the point.
What to do instead
When explaining meaning, first decide whether the expression is literal or idiomatic by testing it in a different context. If idiomatic, supply a Japanese equivalent for the whole phrase, not for each word, and add a short paraphrase in simpler English to confirm the sense.