Tottori Prefectural Public High School Entrance Examination - English common mistakes
Tottori Prefectural Public High School Entrance Examination - English · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
The candidate starts listening before reading the question, so they decode the audio word by word and grab whichever content word they hear last. On a question like 'What will Ken do first?', they write down the final action mentioned in the dialogue instead of the first one.
The listening passage in this exam is played at natural speed and is heard only a limited number of times. Candidates who do not use the reading time feel they are 'falling behind' after the first unknown word and stop tracking the structure of the dialogue. Their attention shifts from the question to individual sounds.
What to do instead
Use the reading time for a fixed routine. Underline the interrogative (who / what / when / where / how many / why) and any sequencing words (first, next, then, finally, before, after). Predict the kind of answer expected, such as a place, a time, or a person's name. If you miss a word, skip it; keep listening for the part that answers the underlined slot. After the dialogue, write the answer immediately before the next question begins.
The candidate records the first number, time, or price they hear and does not update it when the speaker corrects themselves, for example 'The bus leaves at seven ten... oh, sorry, seven thirty.' They also confuse thirteen and thirty, or fourteen and forty.
Numbers in connected speech are reduced and blended: /θ/ and /t/ are weak, and -teen and -ty are unstressed. The candidate cannot tell them apart at speed. They also treat the first figure mentioned as the final answer, even though exam dialogues often use a first figure as a deliberate distractor.
What to do instead
Train the -teen and -ty and the -ty and -ty minimal pairs separately, with stress marked (thirTEEN, THIRty). Practise listening for correction signals: 'actually', 'no wait', 'I mean', 'sorry', 'let me check'. Whenever you hear one of them, cross out the previous figure and write the new one. Keep the answer line as a running tally, not as a single entry.
The candidate finds a word in the question that also appears in the passage and chooses the option containing that sentence, without checking what the pronoun in the question refers to or whether the option is a paraphrase or a distortion.
Word matching requires no grammatical analysis, so it feels safe under time pressure. Distractor options are often built from real sentences in the passage, but they change one element: the subject, the tense, or a quantifier such as 'all' or 'some'. The candidate recognises the words and stops reading.
What to do instead
Locate the keyword, then read the sentence before and after it. Identify what 'it', 'this', 'they', or 'such' points to before judging the options. Check every option against the passage for one changed element: person, number, time, or certainty. Reject options that use stronger words than the passage does, such as always, never, or must.
On a 'What is the main point of this passage?' or 'Why did the writer write this?' item, the candidate chooses an option that is factually true according to the passage but is only a supporting detail, and misses the option that restates the writer's conclusion.
The candidate reads for information, not for argument structure. Japanese-style paragraph organisation often places the conclusion at the end, and the candidate's attention is already exhausted by then. True-but-minor options feel correct because they can be verified in the text, and verification feels like proof.
What to do instead
Read the last sentence of each paragraph first, then the first sentence. Write a five-word summary of each paragraph, either in Japanese or in English, in the margin. Choose the main-idea option only if it covers all paragraphs; eliminate options that match only one paragraph. For 'why did the writer write this' items, look for the sentence containing 'so', 'therefore', 'we should', or 'I hope'.
On word-order (並べ替え) items, the candidate produces sentences that copy Japanese word order or drop an auxiliary, for example 'He very likes tennis', 'I have ever been to Nara', or 'Do you what want to eat?'
The candidate builds the sentence by translating each Japanese word into an English word in sequence. Function words such as do, does, have, and be carry little meaning for them, so those words drop out. Adverb placement rules were memorised as single examples rather than as a pattern.
What to do instead
Build in chunks, not in words: [subject] + [auxiliary] + [adverb] + [main verb] + [object] + [place] + [time]. Memorise a small set of high-frequency frames: 'have already + past participle', 'be always + -ing', 'do usually + base verb', 'How long does it take to ...?'. After arranging the words, run three checks: Is there a subject? Is the verb in the correct form for that subject? Is there a question word in the correct position?
The candidate misuses tense and aspect, typically attaching the present perfect to a finished past time ('I have visited Kyoto last year'), using the present tense in a past narrative, or confusing the past tense with the past participle in 'I was interesting in music'.
Japanese has no direct equivalent of the present perfect, so the candidate maps '行ったことがある' and '行った' onto the same English form. Passive and participial adjectives (-ing and -ed) are also taught as vocabulary pairs, so their grammatical function is not internalised.
What to do instead
Memorise the time-marker triggers and apply them mechanically: last year, yesterday, ago, in 2019 → past simple; since, for, already, never, ever, just, twice → present perfect; now, at the moment, look → present continuous. For -ing and -ed, apply the test: does the noun cause the feeling (-ing) or experience it (-ed)? The film is boring; I am bored.
The candidate writes the English composition by translating a Japanese plan sentence by sentence, which produces subjects that drop out, doubled subjects ('My brother he likes'), and sentences that run out of space before the required content has been covered.
The candidate composes in Japanese and translates, so the English is shaped by Japanese grammar. Planning time is spent on vocabulary hunting rather than on structure, and no time is reserved for checking whether the composition fits the answer lines.
What to do instead
Spend two minutes on a skeleton before writing anything: opinion sentence, first reason, example, second reason, closing sentence. Use fixed frames that are known to be safe: 'I think that ... because ...', 'For example, ...', 'Also, ...', 'Therefore, ...'. Write short sentences with an explicit subject and one verb each. Count the lines the draft will need before starting. Leave the last two minutes for a subject-verb agreement check.
The candidate ignores the conditions stated in the prompt: the prompt asks for an opinion plus two reasons, and the answer gives one reason and repeats the opinion; or the prompt situates the writing as a message to a host family, and the answer opens with 'Hi, buddy!' and asks casual questions.
Under exam pressure, candidates read the situation only once and then write from memory of a previously practised composition. Conditions are embedded in Japanese instructions that surround a short English prompt. The candidate therefore treats the English prompt as the whole task.
What to do instead
Before writing, underline and number each condition in the instructions (opinion? reason? number of reasons? word or line limit? who is the reader?). After drafting, tick each numbered condition off explicitly. Fix the opening and closing to suit the reader: 'Dear Mr. Brown' and 'Yours sincerely' for a formal reader; 'Hi, Emma' and 'See you soon' for a friend. Keep one register throughout.
On situational-response items, the candidate chooses a reply that is grammatical but functionally mismatched, for example answering an offer with 'Yes, I do', replying 'You're welcome' to 'How are you?', or answering 'Thank you for your help' with 'Never mind'.
Candidates match on a single shared word rather than on the communicative function of the utterance. The pairs of functions that are easy to confuse (offer, invitation, request, permission, apology, and compliment) are rarely practised as pairs, and the expected responses are memorised formula-by-formula without their trigger conditions.
What to do instead
Label the first speaker's utterance before looking at the options: is it an offer, an invitation, a request, an apology, a compliment, or an opinion? Then, select the reply that matches that function. Memorise the diagnostic pairs explicitly: offer → 'Yes, please' or 'No, thank you'; invitation → 'I'd love to' or 'I'm afraid I can't'; request → 'Sure' or 'Of course'; apology → 'That's all right' or 'Never mind'; thanks → 'You're welcome'.
On dialogue-completion items, the candidate chooses the line that sounds natural in isolation but contradicts the sentence that follows. For example, the next line begins with 'But...', while the chosen line already expresses agreement, and the candidate never notices the mismatch.
The candidate reads only up to the blank and stops. Cohesive devices such as 'but', 'so', 'that's why', 'instead', and 'actually' carry the logic of the exchange, but they are function words that receive little attention. The candidate selects by topic rather than by logical flow.
What to do instead
Read the whole exchange through once with the blank in place. Then, look at the sentence immediately after the blank and find its cue word. If the cue is contrastive (but, however, actually), the missing line must set up an opposite position. If the cue is consequential (so, that's why, then), the missing line must be the cause. Insert each candidate line and re-read the exchange aloud in your head; reject it if the flow breaks.