Analysing Different Text Types
Reading comprehension has always been a difficult topic to crack in the OC and Selective Test, but these tips can transform your turbulent trip to the smooth-flying, first class journey of your dreams.
So let’s pretend you’ve grabbed your pencil and flipped open the Reading exam, ready to tackle it. Unfortunately, you’ve been hit with a difficult poem, a gnarly scientific article, a messy biographical piece, a poorly drawn cartoon, a cloze passage from a political speech, and some confusing extracts about an abstract topic that you just don’t understand.
Luckily for you, a distant memory of an article with oddly specific tips that target the exact problem in question peeks out in your mind.
This is that article.
Poems
Poems are probably the hardest text types for many students but with these tips, they can be easily tackled.
Pay attention to the title of the poem! This can help you gather any hidden/metaphorical meanings beyond the literal writing.
If you don’t understand a line, read the line before and after, and try to slowly figure out the flow of logic. If you can pinpoint the overall context for each stanza, each individual sentence will become easier to understand too.
For extremely difficult poems, try to look for clues in the multiple choice questions. Even though you might not know what the correct answer is, sometimes keywords from the multiple choice options will give you a little hint as to what the symbols/words in the poem mean.
The more poetry/poets you know about, the more you’ll realise that many poems are really talking about the same thing. If you can identify which time period the poem was written in or written about, that gives you clues to what the major issues were at the time, and by extension, what important events the poet may have been writing about.
Scientific Article
Scientific articles will often try to confuse you with technical terms and long paragraphs but if you keep your head steady, you’ll be able to weed out all the unnecessary information!
Underline all the keywords and summarise each paragraph. By doing so, you can easily come back and find key information when answering questions.
There is no need to stress if the scientific process is very difficult to understand. The article will either explain what it means or they won’t ask you an in depth question regarding the process itself.
Keep calm when you see sophisticated words or jargon as you won’t need to understand all of it. If it’s meant to be understood, you can generally work it out using your contextual clues!
Biographical Piece
Biographical pieces are historical articles about a certain person’s life. These can be tackled in a similar way to scientific articles.
Once again, underline the keywords and events. These articles generally mention a lot of key dates and underlining them makes them easier to identify when answering a question.
While questions may ask about a major world event during this person’s life, the exam doesn’t expect you to know this already. Any information you need will be in the article.
Many questions will ask for specific details, meaning the exact answer is somewhere in the text. Most of these questions will not require any inferential thinking.
Cartoons
Cartoons might look easy but they can be unexpectedly tricky.
Identify the illustrator’s main purpose. Are they trying to comment on a social issue? Are they just trying to make a joke? This is crucial for understanding the hidden meaning in the cartoon.
Brush up on your visual techniques. Make sure you know techniques such as juxtaposition, chiaroscuro, vectors, salient images, and symbols. (These are just a few!)
Categorise what type of cartoon it is. Depending on the categorisation, the intent can be wildly different e.g. If the cartoon is clearly propaganda, we can understand the illustrator is trying to either recruit people to join the army or make the enemy feel very scared.
Speeches
Speeches are very similar to other non-fiction text types but are in first person and usually try to persuade people in some way.
Like the other texts, find out the speaker’s intention and their stance on the matter. This is immensely helpful for understanding the small details within.
Speeches are usually very literal so much of what they are saying can be taken as is. They might, however, use some metaphors in between to better illustrate their point.
Look out for techniques like high modality language. These can help you figure out what the speaker really believes in.
Cloze passages
Cloze passages should be one of the easier text types to understand (along with extracts which will be explained next).
Start by summarising each paragraph. The missing sentence must have something to do with what the paragraph is about.
Read the sentence before and after the missing sentence. Identify the flow of logic through this to find the missing sentence.
A reminder that just because you’ve filled in question 16 with B, doesn’t mean question 17 can’t be B. Students often think they’ve put a sentence in the best possible place and completely rule it out as an option in future questions which leads to them getting almost all of them wrong. To avoid this, double check whether or not an answer fits in another slot better.
Extracts
Extracts are probably the easiest and fastest section to tackle in the Reading section.
Start by summarising all the extracts! This will determine whether or not you perform well in this section as it will make it easier to match questions to extracts.
Many students benefit from reading the questions before reading the extracts in order to obtain a good grasp of what is being asked. Try this technique and see if it works for you.
Understand the subtle differences between each extract. They may be about the same topic but could have minor differences that completely change the main idea of the paragraph. E.g. Two extracts could both be about fear - one argues that fear is there for a reason and that you should avoid things you are scared of to keep yourself safe. However, the other explains that fear is the only obstacle holding you back, and the only way to improve on yourself is to transcend the psychological barrier and explore the unknown. Although the topic is the same, the ideas are vastly different.
And there we have it - your quick guide to success for reading comprehension! Make sure you give some of these tips a go if you’re struggling with a particular text and we hope they will help you achieve the grades you’re aiming for.
If you would like extra help with Reading, we offer an Intensive English class for Selective Test Preparation.
Published 21 March 2021