7 Exam-Smart Tips for English Comprehension (Open-Ended)
The Comprehension Open-Ended section of English Paper 2 is probably the section that stresses students out the most. It’s as if the Comprehension is placed as the last section as it is the hardest hurdle to overcome.
Well, don’t fret, there are exam-smart ways to tackle this component. The point of Comprehension Open-Ended is to test a student’s ability to understand what they are reading. Some questions challenge you to think on a deeper level, but for most of the questions, you just have to give the examiners what they are asking for – specifically and concisely. Keep that in mind as you read the following tips!
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- How to read the passage
- How to annotate properly
- How to answer questions accurately
- Referencing for answers
…and more!
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1. Read the Passage Twice at the Start if You Need to
Getting a good grasp of what every sentence in the passage is trying to say is half the battle won.
If you can’t understand the whole passage after reading it for the first time, read it again. Spend extra time on the complicated paragraphs if you have to. Once you understand the passage as a whole, you will know which part or paragraph to look at specifically when finding the answer to a question. You will only waste more time if you have to reread the passage for every question. So, reading the passage twice at the beginning can actually save you more time later on!
What if you are still stumped after reading the passage twice? Then, go ahead and read the questions to get an idea of which parts of the passage are important. Take some time to understand those key parts.
Another benefit of reading the passage twice: you can leave the annotating for the second read. Try to do the first read without interruptions. It is okay to skim through on the first read, then annotate on the second read.
2. Annotate the Passage
To annotate a passage is to write a note or comment next to the text. It’s a way to keep track of your thoughts and ideas, so it helps when you are trying to figure out the difficult parts.
When you come across a word that requires you to refer to a previous sentence for context, underline it. Then, circle the word or phrase that gives clues or meaning to the context and draw an arrow to link the two. In other words, link related ideas together. You should also annotate metaphors and idioms by writing their meanings down.
Let’s look at Example 1 and annotate it.
A common question you get in Comprehension is “What does [word] (line no.) refer to in the passage?” Some answers are more obvious than others. For example, it is obvious that “it” refers to Morris’ comic strip if you have read the passage and annotated it carefully enough.
To ‘change one’s tune’ is an idiom that means to change one’s opinion, which has been annotated with its meaning written above it.
Consider this question example:
Q: What does “obvious reasons” in the last paragraph refer to?
This question requires some inferential skills to answer, and annotation can help with that. After underlining the phrase “obvious reasons”, circle the clues.
First clue: “there’d be a cheque.” Morris’ father asked about monetary payment.
Second clue: “he mocked.” From this, we know that Morris did not like his father’s tone because he felt his father was mocking him.
‘“Cheque?” + mock’ is written down as an annotation. The answer requires one more layer of understanding – why was Morris’ father mocking his son about the cheque?
Based on the description in the paragraph, one can tell that his father is trying to imply that Morris is only considered a ‘successful’ cartoonist if he is paid!
Therefore, the answer would be: The phrase “obvious reasons” refers to Morris’ father constantly scoffing at him, and that irritated Morris.
Annotation is a way to put your ideas down in words. It forces you to sort out your thoughts and arrive at an answer in an organised way. You will also understand the passage at a deeper level. Try it next time!
WARNING! Be careful not to go overboard with annotation. Although it’s helpful, it may take up a considerable amount of time. Practise annotating on practice passages and time yourself before applying this method during exams. One rule of thumb is to just annotate 1-2 points per paragraph.
3. Always Check the Passage Before Answering
Always, always reference from the passage before writing down your answer. If you have properly understood the passage from when you read it, you should know which part to look at, so you don’t have to worry about ‘wasting time’ scanning for the answer. (See, this is why understanding and annotating the passage first is important!)
Giving an answer straight from memory (without referencing) will just lead to careless mistakes or answers that are not specific to the question.
Your memory is NOT reliable!
As you refer to the passage, make sure to highlight and annotate the answer and clues as well. You can also number them according to the question number to speed things up when you are checking your work. In Example 3, the answer and clue are highlighted.
The last line in the passage (highlighted) tells us that the narrator did believe he was being offered a job. Now you have to find the evidence to why he believed that.
This is the clue: “If all they wanted to do was to buy my comic strip, they would have sent me a cheque. So, there must be something else.” (highlighted)
Now craft your answer: Yes, the narrator believed he was being offered a job. If Boy Magazine just wanted the narrator’s comic strip, they would have sent him a cheque. Instead, they wanted to meet him and that led him believe that they were going to offer him a job.
The answer is quite detailed. If you had only relied on your memory and not refer to the passage, you might miss out some details and lose marks. So always refer to the passage and highlight relevant clues when answering questions.
WARNING: Take note that even if you answered the first part of the question correctly, (“Yes, the narrator believed…”) you could still get 0 marks if you gave the wrong or insufficient evidence.
4. Determine the Type of Comprehension Question
As you read each question carefully, it is important to know what the comprehension question type is and how best to answer it. The following list contains the most common English comprehension questions and how to tackle them.
a. Factual or Literal Questions
Such questions are straightforward and contain information that the student can easily find in the passage. The key is to extract all the relevant details and let the superfluous stuff slide! Questions beginning with ‘What’, ‘Who’ and ‘Where’ are usually indicators of a factual question.
b. Sequencing Questions
These questions require students to list down the sequence of events that occurred in the passage. Importantly, the order of events presented in the text may not follow the actual sequence of events.
c. Vocabulary Questions
There are two types of vocabulary questions:
- Vocabulary in Context
- Use Your Own Words
If the question asks to pick out a word or a phrase in the passage with a certain meaning, it is a Vocabulary in Context question. Do note that for such questions, knowledge of figurative language such as idioms and metaphors is crucial.
Questions that ask you to use your own words to describe a person or a situation require the use of precise vocabulary and the ability to paraphrase without lifting.
d. Referencing Questions
These questions usually present the student with pronouns such as ‘it’ and ‘them’ that are found in the passage. The key to nailing these question types is to read the sentences prior to the given pronoun to determine what is being referred to.
e. Cause and Effect
As the name suggests, this question type is asking for the reason that something happened (the cause) and what happened as a result (the effect). This inference question may require students to combine information from different parts of the passage to form their answer.
f. True or False Questions
There are two steps to this question. Firstly, students must identify whether a given statement is true or false. Secondly, they are required to state the correct evidence to support their answer. For true statements, students must find the matching phrase or sentence from the passage while for false statements, the contradictory details in the passage.
And now for the…
g. “Dreaded Final Question”
Although not a question type per se, the last question strikes fear in the hearts of even the most seasoned comprehension OE warriors. Here, we analyse two possible final questions and how to navigate them like a pro.
- Impressions and Reason
If students are asked to give their impression of a character from the passage, they must not only be equipped with precise vocabulary to describe the character but also give the supporting reasons for their impression.
- Make a Stand
For such questions, students need to state whether they agree or disagree with the given statement. Sitting on the fence is not an option! Their reasoning must be explained by finding supporting evidence in the passage. Analysing the text carefully is the key to acing this.
Once you are able to determine the question type, you will be able to write more specific answers for the English Comprehension questions.
5. Give Specific Answers
This is very important. You must give the question exactly what it is looking for. Once again, Comprehension Open-Ended is testing a student’s ability to understand the passage and the questions. Giving specific answers shows that the student is able to both understand the passage and answer confidently. One the other hand, giving vague answers is problematic as the required information is sorely lacking. This also shows that the student does not have a clear understanding of the passage or what the question is asking for.
To make sure your answer is specific, make sure you give sufficient points according to the marks allocated to the question.
First, find the two actions/points required for the answer: The two actions by Daniel and his teammates that saved John’s life were…
Complete your sentence: … tying John to the axe that they drove into the snow to keep him from falling off the mountain and contacting the base camp for assistance.
Remember the key here is to be specific. If your answer is only “… tying John to the axe.”, it is not specific enough. Always make sure that you have earned the 2 marks allocated to the question with 2 points in your answer!
True or False questions in a table form are actually similar to questions asking for supporting evidence (the ‘why’ questions). Here’s an example of a True or False question.
Example 5
Answering just true/false correctly will not give you any marks, you will need to give the correct reason to earn the full mark. Therefore, each reason is worth 1 mark, and 1 point needs to be made in each reason.
You may be penalised for incomplete sentences, so do answer in full sentences even for questions in table form.
Sometimes, it’s difficult to know whether your answer is specific enough or not. This leads to students becoming unsure and giving more information than what is needed.
Read your answer when you are done and if there is no room for asking “… and so what?” then it is specific enough. Check if every word in your answer is essential. If you find a sentence or phrase that does not answer the question, it is not essential and should be removed.
Example 6
1st part of the answer: Jimmy playing his songs on a CD player very loudly caused the writer to first think that Jimmy was inconsiderate.
2nd part:
This was inconsiderate because it was the day before an examination.
This was inconsiderate because it was the day before an examination and that morning, Jimmy was at home relaxing.
It is still not specific enough and now there is information the question is not looking for. It was the day before an examination… and so what? The answer requires inference.
This was inconsiderate because it was the day before an examination, and the writer could not study with Jimmy’s loud music.
(By the way, you might want to check out this in-depth course we have on Comprehension Mastery, that teaches your child how to tackle all the different Comprehension questions types.)
6. Practise Paraphrasing
To lift is to copy a whole sentence from the first word to the full-stop. Do not lift unless you are required to quote. Those questions would be “Which sentence/phrase tells you…” Unless you are tackling those, never lift directly from the passage.
When you are telling a story that someone shared with you, you are unlikely to repeat what they said word-for-word. Instead, you use some of your own words and change the sentences. That is paraphrasing!
Paraphrasing shows that a student has understood the passage and questions clearly enough to answer in their own words. Not everyone is confident enough to do that, and luckily there are other ways to avoid lifting.
Taking part of the sentence from the passage and writing it in your answer is not considered lifting. You can also use pronouns to replace nouns (or nouns to replace pronouns) and leave out unnecessary adjectives or descriptions.
Example 7
Reason (paraphrased): The writer came to study in Singapore in 1984.
Another acceptable answer: The writer left Malaysia the year before 1985 to study in Singapore.
The pronoun “I” was changed to “the writer” and “at a junior college” was removed to avoid lifting.
7. Check the Spelling, Punctuation, Subject-Verb agreement and Tenses
The most vital tip. Check your work after you are done! Fix your errors in spelling, punctuation and tenses.
Don’t let your precious 2-3 marks be lost just because you forgot to add a full-stop at the end of your sentence.
For words that you had to copy from the passage because you did not know how they were spelled, check again to make sure you have copied that difficult word correctly.
Check that the tenses in your answer match the tenses in the question. Normally, your answer will have to be in past tense but there are some exceptions (like the one pointed out in Example 2) so be careful!
Lastly, make sure you have answered in full sentences. Complete sentences begin with a capital letter, contains a subject and verb, and ends with a punctuation, in the case of Comprehension Open-Ended answers, a full-stop.
would be caught in the storm if they did not get to the base in time and freeze to death
They would be caught in the impending storm if they did not get to the base in time and freeze to death.
Final Words
The definition of ‘comprehension’ is ‘the ability to understand something’. The ability to read long passages, understand deeply, and express our ideas accurately in written words are skills that are essential in order to progress to a higher level of intelligence.
With good comprehension skills, you can also better appreciate books and the hidden meanings of certain words and phrases. After all, books are no fun if you can’t understand what you are reading.
So remember these 7 tips when you are practising Comprehension Open-Ended questions and you will soon find your comprehension skills improving!
See more related articles on Writing Samurai:
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- How to read the passage
- How to annotate properly
- How to answer questions accurately
- Referencing for answers
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