RC Issue Forum

[lennybriscoe]

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[lymenheimer]

I wouldn't start going against your instinct. Most people's first thought is usually the correct one. What is it about the wrong answer that looks appealing or the credited answer that looks incorrect? Is there a specific type of question that you miss most? Look for commonalities between your errors and then work to address them. Also, if you aren't doing so, spend some time blind reviewing. Take your time through each word of each question and you may see that the wording is much more clear than you originally thought.

[Blueprint Mithun]

While trying to get my RC score under control, I've noticed that the overwhelming majority of questions I get wrong are ones where I had eliminated it down to two responses and chose the incorrect one (TCR being the other response not eliminated).

Part of me thinks I need to start going against my instinct at this point. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to tackle that problem?

If you're consistently narrowing the answer choices down to two on any section, that's a good sign. It means that you've become fairly proficient at solving them, and that most of the common wrong answer choices aren't fooling you any more.

I wouldn't start acting against your instinct, because that's not a reliable strategy. Instead, you should dig deeper into the remaining answer choices. Sometimes it's just one word in an answer choice that keeps it from being correct, and this is where close reading pays off. You also may be tripping up on the same types of questions, as the previous poster suggested.

The secret to getting better at Reading Comprehension is to work on anticipating and finding the information you'll need to know during your first reading of the passage. At Blueprint, we tell students to actively think about and look out for the author's attitude, the main point, and the different perspectives (if there are more than one) as they are reading, because nearly every passage contains at least one question related to these factors.

[sd1111]

While trying to get my RC score under control, I've noticed that the overwhelming majority of questions I get wrong are ones where I had eliminated it down to two responses and chose the incorrect one (TCR being the other response not eliminated).

Part of me thinks I need to start going against my instinct at this point. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to tackle that problem?

If you're consistently narrowing the answer choices down to two on any section, that's a good sign. It means that you've become fairly proficient at solving them, and that most of the common wrong answer choices aren't fooling you any more.

I wouldn't start acting against your instinct, because that's not a reliable strategy. Instead, you should dig deeper into the remaining answer choices. Sometimes it's just one word in an answer choice that keeps it from being correct, and this is where close reading pays off. You also may be tripping up on the same types of questions, as the previous poster suggested.

The secret to getting better at Reading Comprehension is to work on anticipating and finding the information you'll need to know during your first reading of the passage. At Blueprint, we tell students to actively think about and look out for the author's attitude, the main point, and the different perspectives (if there are more than one) as they are reading, because nearly every passage contains at least one question related to these factors.

hahaha You just constantly/abruptly mention Blueprint, that is CUTE! Nice ad strategy. ; )