English and Verbal Ability
Reading Comprehension Tips; Sentence Improvement; Fill in the Blanks — Strategy; Spotting Errors
C-CAT
Reading Comprehension Tips
19.1 Strategy
- Skim the passage first (get the main idea in 1 minute)
- Read questions before reading passage carefully
- Read carefully the passage (focus on main ideas, author's tone, key facts)
- Answer questions by going back to specific parts of passage
Eliminate wrong options (too extreme, out of scope, opposite meaning)
19.2 Types of Questions
| Question Type | Strategy |
|---|---|
| Main idea/theme | Find what the whole passage discusses |
| Detail/fact | Scan for specific information |
| Vocabulary in context | Use surrounding sentence for meaning |
| Inference | What can be logically concluded? |
| Author's tone | Positive/negative/neutral/critical/satirical |
| Title | What best captures the whole passage? |
19.3 Common Wrong Choices
- Too broad: Goes beyond what the passage says
- Too narrow: Only covers part of the question
- Opposite: Says the opposite of what's in the passage
- Irrelevant: True but not related to the question
- Half right: Part true, part false → eliminate!
Sentence Improvement
20.1 Common Improvements
- Tense consistency: Don't mix tenses unnecessarily
- Parallel structure: Use same grammatical form in a list ("She likes swimming, running and dancing")
- Subject-verb agreement
- Redundancy: Remove unnecessary repetition ("repeat again" → "repeat")
Dangling modifier: "Walking down the street, the trees were beautiful." → (Who was walking? Must be specified)
20.2 Parallelism Examples
Wrong: She likes to swim, running and dance. Correct: She likes to swim, to run and to dance. / She likes swimming, running and dancing.
Fill in the Blanks — Strategy
21.1 Approach
- Read the entire sentence first with a blank
- Look for context clues — words around the blank
- Identify if the word needed is positive/negative based on context
- Check grammar: what Part of Speech is needed?
- Eliminate options that don't fit grammatically or logically
21.2 Contrast Indicators
Words that signal an OPPOSITE meaning will fill the blank:
- "Although..., he was ___" → blank = something contradictory
- "Despite her fear, she was ___" → blank = brave/bold
"not only...but also" → similar tone
21.3 Similar Tone Indicators
- "Because of..., he was ___" → blank = expected result
Spotting Errors
22.1 Common Error Areas
| Error Area | What to Check |
|---|---|
| Subject-Verb Agreement | Does verb match subject in number? |
| Pronoun Case | Use objective after preposition/object |
| Tense | Is tense consistent? Correct for context? |
| Articles | A/An/The used correctly? |
| Prepositions | Right preposition with verb/adjective? |
| Comparison | Correct degree of comparison? |
| Redundancy | Any repeated meaning? |
| Parallel Structure | Are items in series in same form? |
22.2 Common Error Patterns
| Error Type | Wrong | Right |
|---|---|---|
| Double comparative | more better | better |
| Wrong preposition | married with | married to |
| Wrong pronoun | between you and I | between you and me |
| Redundancy | revert back | revert |
| Unnecessary article | the honesty is best policy | honesty is best policy |
| Wrong verb form | He don't know | He doesn't know |
Continue learning
Related notes
Definition of AI; Need of AI
Artificial Intelligence
Introduction to Data Engineering; Big Data — The 5 V's; Types of Data
Big Data and Data Engineering
Introduction to C Programming; C Program Structure; Data Types and Variables
C Programming
What Is a Computer?; Machine Cycle: Fetch–Decode–Execute; CPU Organization
Computer Architecture
Put this topic into timed practice
Open mock tests when you want full-exam pacing, or keep drilling in practice mode.