TOEFL PREPARATION COURSE

Reading Comprehension

Leonor Rosales Arellano Aulas 2-250 lrosales@itesm.mx

TOEFL Reading Section The TOEFL Reading section has five passages

with academic content. You will have to answer about 10 questions of

each passage . Overview items: main idea,main topic and mail purpose Vocabulary Referent Pronoun Detail and Factual information Inferences Negative questions Organization of passage

Passages1. Science and technology: astronomy,

geology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, zoology, botany, medicine, engineering and mechanics.

2. North American history, government, geography and culture

3. Art: literature, painting, scultpure, architecture, dance and drama

Social science: anthropology, economics, psychology, urban studies and sociology

5. Biography.

Very often, you’ll see that the topics overlap.

General strategies for reading section

Use your time wisely. You have 55 minutes to read five passages and 50 questions. Read each passage in 10 minutes and use the last five minutes to go back to difficult questions.

DON’T LEAVE BEFORE THE TIME IS OVER.

Strategies Acquire a large vocabulary of formal

and academic English. Reading passages are written in formal English and are general and academic.

Answer the Vocabulary Appendix on pages 427-454. Check answers in www.heinle.com

Practice general reading strategies such as skimming and scanning.

Strategies Skim the passage before you start

reading to get the main idea. Then, identify the types of questions

you will need to answer. This is, read the questions first. Don’t read the options, just focus on the information you need to concentrate on.

Build Good Reading Skills: Skim and Scan

Skimming means reading quickly for general meaning. You skim reading material to find out the main topic, the main idea and the general organization of the passage.

Build Good Reading Skills: Skim and Scan

Scanning means knowing what information you need to find before you read. You scan when you are looking for a fact of detail , a particular vocabulary word or the referent of a pronoun.

General strategies Choose the best answer to each

question from the four answer choices listed in the test book.

Figure out if the answer is too general, too specific, irrelevant, incorrect or correct. Eliminate wrong answers.

Overview items: Main idea Almost every reading passage will have a

question about the main idea, topic, subject, primary idea, or main idea.

Strategy Since the TOEFL passages are written in a

traditional organized manner, it is not difficult to find the main idea by studying the topic sentence, which is most probably found at the beginning of the paragraph

Overview items: Main topic When there is no main idea question, we

could have to answer a main topic question. The passage will ask you what the passage is generally about.

Strategy Scan the nouns in the passage, some of

them should belog to the same semantic field and will help you determine the main topic.

Overview items: Purpose

Purpose The purpose is the reason why the author

wrote the passage Strategies:

Focus on the first and last paragraph. Identify key words in the passage that could

give hints of the purpose of the passage. Answers are usually written in infinitive.

Overview items: Tone and attitude

Tone and attitude items require you to determine the author’s feelings.

Strategy: Scan for the adjectives in the passage.

They will show if the author’s feelings were positive, negative or neutral. See page 343.

Overview item: Organization of the passage

Some questions ask about the organization of the passage or the relation between two paragraphs: How is the information in the passage

organized? Strategy

Recognize signal words (transition words) in the passage and identify the organization patterns they represent.

Read the first line of each paragraph. Look the words that show the relationship

between the paragraphs.

Transition words: Transitions indicate relations,

whether within a sentence, paragraph, or paper.This list illustrates "relationships" between ideas,followed by words and phrases that can connect them.

Addition:also, again, as well as, besides, coupled with, furthermore, in addition, likewise, moreover, similarly

Consequence:accordingly, as a result, consequently, for this reason, for this purpose, hence, otherwise, so then, subsequently, therefore, thus, thereupon, wherefore

Generalizing:as a rule, as usual, for the most part,generally, generally speaking, ordinarily, usually

Exemplifying:chiefly, especially, for instance, in particular, markedly, namely, particularly,  including, specifically, such as

Illustration:for example, for instance, for one thing, as an illustration, illustrated with, as an example, in this case

Emphasisabove all, chiefly, with attention to, especially, particularly, singularly

Similarity:comparatively, coupled with, correspondingly, identically, likewise, similar, moreover, together with.

Restatement:in essence, in other words, namely, that is, that is to say, in short, in brief, to put it differently.

Contrast and Comparison:contrast, by the same token, conversely, instead, likewise,on one hand, on the other hand, on the contrary, rather,similarly, yet, but, however, still, nevertheless, in contrast

Sequence:at first, first of all, to begin with, in the first place, at the same time, for now, for the time being, the next step, in time, in turn, later on, meanwhile, next, then, soon, the meantime, later, while, earlier, simultaneously, afterward, in conclusion, with this in mind, Summarizing:after all, all in all, all things considered, briefly, by and large, in any case, in any event, in brief, in conclusion, on the whole, in short, in summary, in the final analysis, in the long run, on balance, to sum up, to summarize, finally

Overview items: Transition Some questions might ask you what would the

following or preceding paragraph could be about. How to identify the question?

The paragraph preceding the passage probably..

What is most likely in the paragraph following the passage?

Strategy The answer can be found in the first line of the

passage for a preceding question. The answer can be found in the last line of the

passage for a following question.

Detail and Factual information items

Detail items ask for specific information in the passage.

Questions about information in the passage: According to the passage, what…. According to the author, which… The author states in the passage that…

Strategies for Detail Questions

TOEFL items follow an order, so you should not waste time rereading the passage.

Answer choices will be a restatement of the information in the passage.

Locate a key word in the question. Scan the passage. Once you find it, read one sentence before and one sentence after.

Negative items Negative items ask you to determine which of

the four choices is not given in the passage. These items contain the words NOT, EXCEPT, or LEAST likey.

Questions about information that is NOT in the passage: All of the following are mentioned in the

passage EXCEPT…. Which of the following is NOT mentioned in

the passage?

Strategies for Negative Questions

Look for the information given in the passage and eliminate those options.

Choose the option NOT mentioned in the passage.

Check your time. If more that two minutes have passed, eliminate the options you found and guess. Use the last five minutes to go back to this question.

Inferences items Some TOEFL items ask you about

information that is given in the passage and you are required to make inferences. In order to answer them you must read between lines and make conclusions based on the information in the passage.

Strategies for Inference Items

Carefully read the sentence that contains the keyword.

The answer to the question will be information NOT given in the passage.

Incorrect answers will be information from the passage but restated.

Vocabulary items Vocabulary items ask about the meaning

of words or phrases in context. Some clues that can help you find the meaning of words are: Synonyms Examples Contrast Word analysis General context

Synonyms TOEFL passages are written for

academic purposes and the author must use synonyms and avoid repetition of words.

Search in the text. It is probable that the author used a synonym close to the vocabulary word in the question.

Word analysis Sometimes you can figure out the

meaning of the vocabulary word by knowing the meaning of the root and the prefixes and suffixes of a word.

Example: Unwillingly

Un (means no) Will (means want to) -ing (suffix for a noun) -ly ( suffix for an adverb)

Contrast If the vocabulary word is in a

contrast sentence, you might be able to figure out its meaning by finding the opposite word.

Example: Although buisiness partnership enjoy

certain advantages over proprietorships, there are drawbacks as well.

Examples If you do not know the meaning of the

word, check if the author gives an example. Possible words that will give you an example are: For example For instance Such as i.e (this is) e.g. (example given) Punctuation marks: parenthesis () or hypens - -

General context You can guess the meaning of a word

through general context. The barges headed across the lake A barge is probably which of the

following? A) a train B) a plane C) a bicycle D) a boat

Reference items Referece words are words in the passage

that refer to back concepts mentioned earlier in the passage.

Reference questions could be about: Subject pronoun: I, you, he… Object pronoun: me, them … Possessive pronoun: mine, his, ours Demonstrative pronoun: this, that, those Indefinite pronoun: someone, anyone Specified item: this concept, that dilema

Strategies for Referece Items

Find the pronoun on the passage. Look for nouns that come before the

pronoun. Read the part of the passage before the

pronoun carefully. Eliminate any wrong answers.