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Improving Sentences. Tips, Tricks, and Strategies. Anywhere from 12-30 questions in the Grammar section will be Improving Sentences Ask you to not only identify an error but fix it Choice A is always a reproduction of the underlined portion
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Improving Sentences Tips, Tricks, and Strategies
Anywhere from 12-30 questions in the Grammar section will be Improving Sentences • Ask you to not only identify an error but fix it • Choice A is always a reproduction of the underlined portion • If determine that there is an error, eliminate choice A; if you determine that there is no error, choose A • The sentence will be correct as written about 1/5 of the time • Sometimes more than one choice is “grammatically correct.” Your job is to choose the most effective choice (clear, precise, and free of awkwardness).
Basic Approach • Read the entire sentence before looking at the choices • Remember that the right answer will be the one correct version among the five choices • Read each choice along with the entire sentence • Look for common problem areas (verb agreement, parallelism, modifiers, etc.) • Read all five version of the sentence aloud while practicing • Read more slowly than you normally do • Mark each question that you don’t answer so that you can go back to it
More Strategies • Identify the error as you read the underlined part of the sentence by running through a “grammar checklist” in your head • Once you’ve identified the problem, scan the choices and eliminate any that don’t fix that particular error • If more than one answer choice fixes the original problem, check to see if there is a secondary problem or if either choice introduces a new problem
Back-up Plan • If you can’t tell whether or not there is an error in the original sentence, scan your answer choices to see what is being corrected in each …are… …is… …are… …is… …has been… • We know that the verb is being corrected, so we just have to determine which form of the verb is correct
If you’re stuck or down to two or three choices, use these guidelines to eliminate answers: • Avoid answers that contain: • The word “being” or other “-ing” verbs • Are wordy or redundant • Contain unnecessary or ambiguous pronouns • Change the meaning of the sentence • If you’re down to two choices that seem to be error-free, choose the shorter one
Review • Read the sentence carefully, listening for a mistake • Identify the error(s) • Predict a correction • Check the choices for a match that doesn’t introduce a new error