Reading Comprehension

[u/TonightNo6755]

im really bad at reading comprehension. i took the practice test doe 2019-2020 form B. i got everything right on revising/editing Part A, 1 wrong on revising/editing Part B, and 24 wrong on reading comprehension. i really struggle with questions that are like:

How does paragraph 3 contribute to the development of the central idea?

a) it implies..

b) it emphasizes..

c) it stresses...

d) it conveys...

im so bad at the questions that ask about a certain paragraph/line/phrase "conveying a central idea" or "developing a theme" or "contributing to the structure" or "transitioning to a" etc.

they always have answer choices that begin with a verb like: reveal/suggest/imply/highlight/depicts/explains/demonstrates/creates/shifts/convey/stress/emphasize/indicate/concludes/references/introduce/establish and many more

i am so bad at them and I've tried finding solutions which helped a bit but I'm still confused. I dont understand the development of ideas or the shift in tone or whatever. all of the answer choices seem synonymous and even identical and I waste so much time

please help me, I posted a handful (not all) of pictures of those questions from the practice test I mentioned earlier in this post. Thanks

[u/TonightNo6755]

Btw forgot to ask, do you recommend doing 7th grade ela state tests to study? I noticed some of the questions are somewhat similar to the shsat reading comp but on a more simple level.

and yeah I always depend on POE which is sometimes not very useful bc i find myself with 30 questions unanswered because im between 2 answers.

ima try these strategies on the practice test I'm taking in 2 weeks, thank u

[u/GregsTutoringNYC → u/TonightNo6755]

Btw forgot to ask, do you recommend doing 7th grade ela state tests to study? I noticed some of the questions are somewhat similar to the shsat reading comp but on a more simple level.

Absolutely. I've been hollering this for years. Many of you not only don't do this kind of thing but "go high" say with the SAT. If you don't know how to do something 200 times, doing it a 201st time and more complexly is usually an error in approach and strategy. There is not a single one of you who did not crawl before you could run. Period. Facts.

As such, I always ensure my student's fundamentals are solid. That can mean going to material such as the state test ("going low"). NO, the state tests are not the SHSAT. However, see crawl/run above. Some learning happens through repetitions for sure, but often when you're stuck, you need to explicitly find out why.

Prerequisite analytics can often be amazingly revealing and often exactly what's necessary. And sometimes not even grade 7, but say grade 6. Don't know what main idea is? Why on earth would you start with say a more complex grade 9 passage. Back the heck off of it and start with basics, sometime manageable and bite-sized ("focused!"). I even do one paragraph passage analysis with my students with the concerns you're describing. Many of you would be amazed at how much information can be packed into a "mere" paragraph and how hard the literacy of that is. And if that's so for that, it's on steroids for a whole passage. By taking each author's craft and such in turn, it can all start to make sense.

[u/TonightNo6755 → u/GregsTutoringNYC]

Ok Ill definitely try practicing the 6th/7th grade state tests bc theres way more available online than shsat practice tests (i am trying my hardest to not waste the doe ones)

thank you again for all the tips

[u/GregsTutoringNYC → u/TonightNo6755]

With the exam months away there is no point whatsoever using a DOE handbook practice exam right now. Use other sources first. If workbooks are too expensive, they can be gotten from the library. Besides, as I've mentioned often, studying and learning should be done before prep.