IELTS Reading Resolutions:

Matching Heading is never easy like

that before
BY SELF STUDY MATERIALS · PUBLISHED APRIL 29, 2017 · UPDATED MAY 5, 2017
In the post How to read quickly but effectively within 60 minutes? I illustrated you
how the keyword technique works with an example of solving matching heading
questions. Today, I would like to show you some tips to tackle matching heading
questions in a more effective way.
The secret of solving matching heading questions falls behind what a
paragraph is about or in the other words, the main idea of that paragraph.
Thus finding the main idea of each paragraph and matching it with suitable
given heading is in the heart of this question type.
Basically, matching heading also applies the keyword technique and strategy to
identify main idea which compares the keywords of each heading with
individual paragraph. The technique to tackle it can be found in How to read
quickly but effectively within 60 minutes?To solve it successfully, what you
should do is following these tips.
Always do “matching heading” question at
last if you struggle with identifying main
idea.
This tip means you should do other types of the question first and finally
matching heading. The reason behind this tips is that when you do other
questions first, you will soon become familiar with the passage and you even
might get some answers from your memory.

Underline keywords in each heading in on

the list
This is a part of keywords technique.
Start reading shortest or easiest paragraph
You should read at normal speed, underline main idea in the paragraph, and
finally compare it with all the heading and choose the best fit.

That’s the end of my blog

Thank you for reading

See you in my next post

IELTS Reading Resolutions: How to

free yourself from traps in
MATCHING FEATURES questions?
BY SELF STUDY MATERIALS · PUBLISHED APRIL 29, 2017 · UPDATED MAY 5, 2017
Matching is always one of the hardest question types in IELTS test because it
requires you the good understanding of what the text is talking about. However, in
terms of matching features questions, I think they are difficult but easy. In fact,
difficulty arises from the fact that the questions do not follow the order of the
text so you may have to look around to find the answer. Fortunately, as this kind of
questions requires you find elements in the text that match a list of people/places, it
will be very simple for you to find the correct parts using these specific names of
people/places. In this blog, I will show you how to deal with this question type step
by step. Besides, I will introduce you what pitfalls are waiting for you in matching
features questions and tactics to tackle them.
What is matching feature questions look
like?
You probably used to respond to questions like these:
Source: IELTS Cambridge Practice Tests 10 – Test 2
You will be given a list of people (or sometimes places) and you have to
match them to items in the text.

Question-solving procedure
To solve this kind of questions, you should concentrate on the
names/dates/places and underline them in the text every time they occur.

So, assuming that you have finished skimming the topic heading, the
questions and the passage along with underlined keywords, what you should
do next are:
1. Solve name by name: The reason to do that is because questions are not
placed in order. Thus you may waste time finding the correct parts for the
questions while it’s very easy to start with a specific name in the text.
2. Scan the text for those names to find the parts with relevant information
3. Read these parts carefully for main idea and look for synonyms in the text
4. Use these synonyms and main idea to check back with the question and
find the commensurate names/places.
 5. If you are not sure about your choice, mark it with a “?” and review it when
you complete all matching or when you find the more appropriate answer.
Before giving you an illustrative example, I will show you traps that you are
likely to fall into.

Traps and ways to avoid them

There are two traps that I intend to highlight here.

1- Word trap
Examiner may sometimes use words in questions that exactly the same with
ones in reading passage, but the meanings is different. If you only focus on
matching word and forget to check whether the meanings of sentences are
equivalent, you probably walk into the trap. For example:

Reading passage: “The first step was the construction of a working model of
a steam locomotive by John Fitch in the United States in 1794”

Question:

A. John Fitch

1. legally protected the design of the working model of the steam locomotive

If you only match word, you may choose 1. However, if (1) is true, it is
accepted that Fitch legally protected the design of a working model of a steam
locomotive while in fact, what he did is constructing it. Hence, (1) is not true.

So what we should do to avoid this trap?

It’s obvious that you should not do word match for this type of questions.
Instead, read the context so that you will not lack the point. Additionally, you
could also overcome this pitfall by reading for synonyms. For example, if the
question is “used animals and not steam to power a form of railway”, it is no
good if you look for the word “animals” in the text. This is because the answer
is given by these words: “The Corinthians did not consider using steam to
power this prototype of the railway but instead used horses and oxen”. In this
case, “horses and oxen” stand for animals.

2- You may use more than one name once

Don’t be trapped into using each name just once. It may be that some names
have two or more correct answers. So make sure that you read the question’s
instruction carefully. If you can use any name/place more than one, you will
see 2 letters NB in the instruction.
Illustrative example
I will take a reading passage from Cambridge IELTS practice Test Vol 10,
Test 2, passage 2 “Gifted children and learning”

Question:

You can see that there are 5 questions with 5 names and no further
requirements so I can infer that one question will be matched with one
character.
The topic heading is “Gifted children and learning”, so none of them will be
keywords.

Now, I will underline keyword in questions:

18: less time, exercise, accurate

19: self-reliance, reach, goals

20: channel, feeling, assist

21: benefits, support, close relatives

22: really successful, considerable, subject

Then, I will skimming through the reading passage to underline names and
keywords.

Now, I will start with the first name – Freeman. Scanning this name in the text
we find it in paragraph A and no other ones contains it. The answer can be
found in this sentence: “For example, a very close positive relationship was
found when children’s IQ scores were compared with their home educational
provision (Freeman, 2010).”
close positive relationship -> benefits
home educational provision -> appropriate support from close relatives
The words in italic is our keywords, so A is the answer of question 21

Continue with the next name Shore and Kanevsky and do the same thing, we
find these name in paragraph C. As we scan paragraph C we find this
sentence following their names: “(Shore and Kanevsky, 1993) put the
instructor’s problem succinctly: ‘If the [the gifted] merely think more quickly,
then we need only teach more quickly. If they merely make fewer errors, then
we can shorten the practice’.”
Compare these keywords with ones in question, we have:

fewer errors ~ accurate

shorten the practice ~less time, excercise

So B is the answer of question 28.

Now, let’s do the remaining questions by yourselves. As you are practicing,

just do it slowly and apply my strategy, don’t worry about time. If you have any
concerns, please leave questions in the comment box.

Summary
In this blog I have shown you the effective way to deal with matching features
questions. Overally, you should solve these questions name by name, use
these names to find the parts containing relevant information. The, read these
parts carefully to recognize main idea and keywords which are synonyms of
the keywords in questions. Finally, compare these keywords in passage and
question to find the answer.

You shouls also remember to avoid word trap and read the question’s
instrument carefully.

That’s the end of my post.

Thank you for visiting my blog

See you in my next post

IELTS Reading Resolutions:

Multiple choice question – From
MANY to ONLY
BY SELF STUDY MATERIALS · PUBLISHED MAY 5, 2017 · UPDATED MAY 12, 2017
The multiple choice questions should be familiar to most candidates because they
have seen them not only in the IELTS test but also other tests such as SAT, GMAT,
GRE, etc. However, this does not make multiple choice questions easy. In many
ways, the skills needed to tackle this type of questions are the same as those for the
True/False/Not Given type. But it may be harder since you get 4 options and not 3.
In this post, I will show you the successful method to handle multiple choice
questions
Basic characteristics of Multiple choice questions
 The questions will go in order so question 2 will come between 1 and 3
 Require very close reading of one or two paragraphs of the text
 At least 3 of the 4 possible answers may look ok until you read them
closely
 Two types of question: one asks you for the writer’s opinion while the
other ask you to find factual information
Strategy to find the correct choice
Step 1: Topic heading skimming (if any)
As said in the previous posts, the purpose of doing this is to help you identify
keywords later in questions and reading passage.

Step 2: Question skimming and keywords underlining

Before skimming the whole passage, what you should do first is looking at the
questions because this will help you see what topics you need to look for.
While you are skimming, remember to underline keywords as you may have
to look for synonyms of them in the reading passage.

Step 3: Passage skimming and keywords underlining and finding the

correct section of the text
While you skimming the text, you should focus on strong words (transition
words), key subjects, verbs, special nouns (names, places, dates, etc.).

To find the correct part of the text that the questions related to, you should use
the keywords in the questions and scan them in the text. Focusing on proper
names and dates is often a good approach

Step 4: Spotting the correct choice

In this step, you should read the correct part of the paragraph carefully and
then re-read the question. Remember to look at each option in turn and
eliminate choices you know to be incorrect. Finally, underline the words in the
text that give you the correct answer.
Useful tips for Multiple choice questions
Tip 1: Don’t stop reading too soon
An answer may seem right but if the next word is something like
“but/however”, the meaning will change completely.

For example:

Reading passage:
[1]Different people read for different reasons. [2]For example, the attraction of
reading detective fiction can be in the intellectual challenge of finding out who did
it, in an autobiography we can eavesdrop on the conversations of the great and
good or we can laugh at folly in the celebrity magazine. [3]For many children, it is a
magic gateway to some other world. [4]Sadly, that is one of the greatest mistakes
they can make.
Question:

According to the author, the attraction of reading for young people is:

A- they find out about other countries

B- different from other generations

C- escaping into another world

D- foolish

It’s easy to eliminate A and B because there is no information regarding them

in the reading passage. Many people may choose C and they may correct if
sentence [4] were not in the passage. So the correct answer is D.

Tip 2: Always go back and re-read the question before you answer
This helps you avoid the trap of the examiner because sometimes they give
you answer choices that can be found in the passage but do not answer the
question stated.
Tip 3: Always make sure you look at all answers, don’t guess too soon. You
may find a better answer later.
Sometimes when you begin reading the very first answer choices and you
think it’s true immediately and stop reading the remaining answer choices. In
fact, that answer choice is probably true but you’re guessing information.

We might be able to guess that this is true, but if it doesn’t say so in the text
the answer is not correct.

Tip 4: Always refocus on the exact wording of the question before giving the
answer. Be suspicious of answers that contain almost the same language as
the text.
Examiner may sometimes use words in answer choices that exactly the same
with ones in reading passage, but the meanings is different. If you only focus
on matching word, you probably walk into the trap. Instead, you should
matching meanings. For example, “almost a third” = “30%” and “18-24 age
group” matches “young people”.

Tip 5: Guessing
If time is up and you cannot find the correct answer for some multiple choice
questions, it’s possible to guess and choose one answes as there is no
penalty for wrong answer.

Post summary
In this post I have shown you:

 Basic characteristics of Multiple choice questions

 4-step approach to solve Multiple choice questions
 5 tips you can apply in doing Multiple choice questions
I hope this post can help you in your IELTS post. If you find it helpful, please
give it a comment, like, or share

IELTS Reading Resolutions: Matching

sentence endings – How to make it right?
BY SELF STUDY MATERIALS · PUBLISHED APRIL 29, 2017 · UPDATED MAY 5, 2017
From my perspective, matching is always the most challenging question type and it
takes considerable time to complete. In matching sentence endings questions, you
will get a series of incomplete sentences and what you should do is matching them
their correct endings using information from the text. Normally, there will be 5 or 6
sentences and 8 to 10 different endings. In this blog, I will show you the features of
this question type and strategy to tackle it. Besides, I will also give you an
illustrative example for clearer understanding.
Features of matching sentence endings
questions
Before giving you the approach to solving these questions, I will show you 5
characteristics of them that you should bear in mind.

 This question type is designed to test your understanding of the main idea
in a text
 The questions are shown following the order of the text.
 The questions may test part of the whole text, not all of it
 The sentence endings look grammatically similar
 You will not use all of the endings
Effective solution for Matching sentence
endings questions
Similar to matching heading questions, this type of question also tests your
understanding of the main idea, so you should basically use the keyword
technique. Moreover, you should remember to focus on the sentence
beginnings, not the sentence endings. This is because not all the endings
appear in the text and you will waste time if you concentrate on them. Hence,
take sentence beginnings as the heart of these questions and start solving
questions with them.

Prerequisite before solving:

 Passage skimming and keywords underlining
 Question skimming and keywords underlining
Now I will show you the strategy to defeat this kind of questions. I call this
strategy within 3 simple words: “Finding – Matching – Checking” which stand
for 3 steps in this approach.

Step 1: Finding the correct section of the text

The first thing you have to do is locating information. In the other words, you
must determine which paragraph of the text and which part of the paragraph
contains relevant information. To find the correct part of the text that the
questions related to, you should use the keywords in the questions (sentence
beginnings) and scan them in the text (reading passage). Focusing on proper
names and dates is often a good approach
Step 2: Matching keywords and find the answer
Now, after finding the correct part, you should continue scanning to match the
keywords in the text with the ones in the sentences endings. The answer will
normally be found by looking for words in the text that have the same meaning
(synonyms) as one of the sentence endings, rather than using exactly the
same words.

Before moving to the last step, I would like to summarize the flow of keywords
by a graphic.

Figure explanation:
We start with the keywords determined in sentence beginnings. I call them main
keywords because they will help us find the part with relevant information by
scanning them in the text. After finding the correct part, we continue by
matching the supporting keywords (words that provide us with key details) in
the text with ones in sentence endings. By doing this, we could find the correct
endings for the sentence beginnings.
Step 3: Checking back with sentence beginnings
Once you found the endings, what you should do next is checking whether
your choice is correct. To do this, you should join the sentence beginnings
and endings together to form a complete sentence. After that you, let’s do a
mental checklist with the following items.

 Meaning: You should check whether the meaning of your complete

sentence matches what you find in the text. If not, you may fall into word
trap of examiner.
 Grammar: Make sure that the sentence you make is grammatically
accurate. It is a mistake if you simply try to match words only.
 Check every ending with every beginning: Examiners will attempt to trap
you by leaving some endings that seem correct.So, be careful and
remember to look at every ending for each question. I know this will take a
little more time, but it will help you avoid mistakes.
Now, I will give you an example.

Illustrative example
 Questions
Complete each sentence with the correct letter A-H

1. The tourism industry in the UK suffered financially

2. There was a ban on burials of animals in quicklime

A. because footpaths were closed due to the foot and mouth outbreak.

B. because it also affected animals that were not affected by the disease.

C. because a similar program had worked well in The Netherlands.

D. because of the adoption of European legislation in the UK.

E. because many abattoirs were closed

 Reading passage
The foot and mouth crisis

First,
after skimming the topic heading, I will exclude all of these words out of my
keyword list.

Secondly, I do question skimming and underline keywords

 Main keywords:
Q1: tourism, suffered, financially

Q2: ban, burials, quicklime

After that, I will skim through the passage and highlight keywords

 Paragraph(I):
Main keywords: effect, tourism, cost, £8 billion
Supporting keywords: due to, closure, way accross land, prevent, spread.
 Paragraph(II):
Main keywords: prohibited, burials, quicklime
Supporting keywords: European Union legislation, in effect
Now, I will do finding using the main keyword of questions (sentence
beginnings) and reading passage. I found the word “tourism” in paragraph (I)
and “cost”, “£8billion” may be equivalent to “suffered financially”. So I find the
part with relevant information is “There was also a profound effect on tourism
industry due to the closure of public rights of way across land so as to prevent the
spread the disease. Estimates vary as to the overall cost of the crisis to the UK
economy, but it is thought that the final figure was in the region of £8 billion”.
Next, I will use supporting keywords in paragraph (I) to scan in sentence
endings and I find only (A) have some synonym matches: due to = because,
closure ~ closed, rights of way accross land ~ footpaths, outbreak ~ spread

Finally, I will check back with sentence beginnings. The complete sentence is
“The tourism industry in the UK suffered financially because footpaths were closed
due to the foot and mouth outbreak.“. I compare this with the sentence in the
text “There was also a profound effect on tourism industry due to the closure of
public rights of way across land so as to prevent the spread the disease.”.Do you
think it makes sense? Yes, the meaning is the same since they all talk about
the negative effect on tourism caused by the methods to prevent the spread of
the disease.I also check grammar and found no error and no other endings.
Now, let’s do question 2 by yourselves following my strategy. I hope you could
find the correct answer

What we have learned so far?

In today post, I have shown you:

 5 characteristics of matching sentence endings questions

 “Finding-Matching-Checking” strategy with 3 prerequisites. Finding means
you use main keywords in questions (sentence beginning) to find the
correct part of the text. After that, you use supporting keywords in text and
match them with ones in sentence endings. Remember that the words you
find may not be exactly the same. Actually, they are synonyms. Finally,
remember to check your choice with the mental checklist of meaning,
grammar, and make sure all endings are looked at.
Thank you for reading my blog

IELTS Reading Resolutions: SUMMARY

COMPLETION – How to make it done as
quick as a wink?
BY SELF STUDY MATERIALS · PUBLISHED MAY 6, 2017 · UPDATED MAY 8, 2017
SUMMARY COMPLETION question is typical and it appears quite frequently in real
IELTS Reading tests. To succeed in this question, you should acquire the ability
to understand the general meaning of the summary, the ability to scan for
the correct information in the text as well as to identify synonyms and
paraphrases. This article will provide you with a simple but successful strategy
and some useful tips to tackle this type of question.
What do summary completion questions
look like?
In general, this question type will ask you to complete a summary of the
reading passage by selecting words from (1) a box or (2) the reading passage.
For example:
 <Complete summary by selecting words from passage>

Features of summary completion questions

This question type has the following characteristics:

 the summary may relate to the whole passage or only a part of it

 there are more words in the box than questions (if you are given a box)
 the text of the summary will follow the order of the text of the passage
 the words on the box are not usually the same as in the reading passage
What skills need to succeed in this question
type?
To be successful in summary completion question, you need to:

 Reading skill: You should read a text quickly and understand its general
meaning
 Vocabulary skill: You need this skill to recognize “synonyms” or
“paraphrasing”.
 Grammar: Each word you place in the summary must fit in grammatically,
so it’s vital to know whether you need a noun, adjective, verb or adverb.

Question-solving procedure
I still use the keyword technique to find the correct words. To use this
technique, you should ensure you have read the topic heading (if any) and
skim through all questions and highlight keywords in these questions before
look through the passage.
Step 1: Read the instructions to the questions and the summary title very
carefully
Note how many words you can write (normally one, two or three) and if you
should get the words from the reading text or a list. The title of the summary
can help you understand what the summary talks about and enhance the
probability that you may find the relevant parts while reading the passage.

Step 2: Skim through the summary (questions) ignoring the blanks and
underlining keywords
You should do this to understand its general idea of the summary and it may
assist you when you find the part including relevant information. Don’t forget
underlining keywords which will help us find the correct words later. You
should note to underline keywords in the sentence containing the gaps.

<Before come to step 3, make sure you have finished skimming through the passage
already>
Step 3: Identify which part of the passage the summary relates to.
You don’t want to waste time looking at parts of the passage that are not
included in the summary. To do this, you should look at the first and last
questions in the summary.
Step 4: Look at each gap in turn
When looking at each gap, try to predict which word is missing from your
understanding of the text. Then see if any of the options match your
prediction. Remember to look through all the words.

Step 5: Check with the passage

You should use keyword technique to identify the correct part of the passage
but remember you are looking for synonyms. Read carefully the part you
identified and find correct words to fill in the blanks.
Step 6: Check grammatical accuracy
You should check whether the words you found meet grammatical
requirement. Think about nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs.

Tips for summary completion questions

Tip 1
Try to predict the answers before you look at the options or the text. This will
help you spot the correct answer.

Tip 2
Use your grammatical knowledge to checking whether the missing word is
noun, verb, adjective or adverb. Doing this will help you eliminate a number of
words that fail to meet grammatical requirement.
Tip 3
Look for synonyms and paraphrases in the text rather than only do word
matching. If you only match word by word, you are easy to fall in word trap of
examiner.

Tip 4
Don’t get stuck on any one question. If you can’t find the answer, move on
and come back to it later. You should remember that focusing on the easier
answers is a better use of your time

Tip 5
The answers normally come in the same order as the questions. For example,
if the answer of question 2 is found in the third sentence of a paragraph, the
answer for question 1 cannot appear in sentences behind this third sentence.

Now I will give you an example.

Illustrative example
As this is the first example, I will make it simple by taking a passage from
Cambridge IELTS test Vol 9 test 4 passage 2. If you do not have it on your
hand, please download the ebook here.
Question
Now, when we read the topic heading “Young children’s sense of identity” we
could say certainly that none of these words will be keywords in both
questions and the reading passage.

Next, we move to the question and come into Step 1

Step 1: Read the instructions to the questions and the summary title very
carefully
As stated in the question, we find that we can only use ONE word from
the PASSAGE to fill out each gap. When we read the summary’s title, we would
know that this will be the summary of the process of acquiring sense of
indenity.
Step 2: Skim through the summary (questions) and ignore the blanks
Now I will skim through the summary and underline some keywords.

Keywords:

 effect, the world, image, move, face, difficult, research directly, because
 Western society, linked to, disputes.
Before moving to step 3, I hope you have finished skimming through the
passage for main idea and underlining keywords.

Step 3: Identify which part of the passage the summary relates to

It’s time to apply keyword technique.

Assuming that you identified keywords for all paragraphs, what you should do
next is searching keywords of questions on the passage.

When you search for words: “effect”, “the world”, “image”, you can firstly see
them in paragraph C. Then, you go with the last sentence in the summary with
a gap of question 26 with the keyword “Western society”. Scanning through
the passage you will see this word in paragraph H. So you can conclude that
the answers can be found from Paragrah C to H.

Now continued to find the remaining keywords like “difficult”, “research

directly”, you will not find them in C. So you should go further to paragraph D.
In this paragraph

Step 4 & 5: Look at each gap in turn & Check with the passage
We will start at question 25. As stated in step 3, the answer for this question
stay in paragraph C. The general meaning of this question is when young
children face something, they cause the image to move. Now let’s find what
they face in the passage. By focusing on the word “image” and strong word
“However”, we could find the correct answer is “mirror”. Why do I know?

It’s very simple, I do some word comparison.

image = image (main keyword)

move ~ movement (supporting keyword)

face ~ see

so, what children face/see is mirror

Do the same step for question 26 you find the correct word is “communication”
in paragraph D

Empirical investigations ~ research

because of ~ because

difficulties ~ difficult

For question 27, we use the main keyword “Western society” and strong word
“Although”, we can find the correct answer is “Ownership” because:

“Western society” = “Western society”

disputing ~ disputes

link ~ linked to

Step 6: Check grammatical accuracy

We can see that all answers are nouns and meet grammatical requirement

That’s the end of my post.

Thank you for visiting my blog

See you in my next post

IELTS Reading Resolutions: Is it TRUE/FALSE or NOT GIVEN?

A successful strategy to defeat these tricky questions
BY SELF STUDY MATERIALS · PUBLISHED APRIL 29, 2017 · UPDATED MAY 5, 2017
Many people have highlighted that it’s hard for them to determine whether a
statement is True, False or Not given. In fact, the way words are used in these types
of questions are tricky and people always confuse between False and Not given (or
No and Not given). I have to admit that I used to fall into the traps that these
question had made many times. So, after doing some research about the way to
solve these tricky questions, I find a simple strategy but effective which could help
you answer these questions correctly.
In this blog, I will show you the difference between TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN
and YES/NO/NOT GIVEN as well as the strategy to tackle them.

What is the difference between TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN and YES/NO/NOT

GIVEN?
Basically, True, False or Not given is about identifying information when the
passage is about facts. This means you have to evaluate whether a statement
is true according to the infirmation in the passage. In contrast, Yes/No/Not
given requires you to identify writer’s views/claims when the passage is
about writer’s views/claims. In the other words, you have to assess whether a
statement AGREE with the views expressed by the writer. However, you
should remember that the difference between them is not important andthe
technique to solve them is the same. Remember that the only thing you should
do is just determining whether a statement is correct, incorrect or not given.
A simple but useful approach to succeed in T/F/NG (or Y/N/NG)
In the previous blog, I introduced you the “keywords technique” which is
fundamental to address all question types in IELTS reading test. As a result, I
will adopt this approach to this type of questions step by step. Additional, you
should be confident that answers always come in the correct order in the
passage. Now let’s start.

Step 1: Question skimming and keyword underlining

Assuming that you have read the topic heading (if any), the next step is
skimming over the questions and underlining keywords in the questions. You
should note that this type of question requires absolute precision to be
answered TRUE, otherwise, it will be FALSE or Not Given. Therefore, to
determine whether a statement is correct, you have to focus on every small
word in that statement. It is also vital to be specific in underlining keywords as
the more specific the keywords you define, the more correct the answer you
may find. Therefore, I will classify keywords into 2 categories: Main and
supporting keywords.
For example:

“It is possible, but not normal, to say “powerful tea”.

Main keyword: “powerful tea” – this is used to locate keywords into reading
passage

Supporting keywords: “possible”, “not normal” – they help you to determine

whether the statement correct.

Step 2: Locating these keywords into reading passage and comparing these
keywords to find the correct answer.
Before moving to this step, I expect that you have finished skimming through
the reading passage and underlining keywords. Now, what you should do next
is integrating keywords in questions and in reading passage to find the
relevant paragraphs and sentences (I called this as “locating keywords”). After
that, use your scanning skill (names, dates, etc.) or read in detail to find the
answer.

One thing you should know is the fact that the keywords in reading passage
may not be exactly the same with the keywords in questions, but equivalent in
meaning. In the other words, they are synonyms or something but results in
the same idea. For instance, looking at the above example, the writer may use
“could be” in replacement for “possible”.

Alright, I have shown you 2-step approach to solve a T/F/NG or Y/N/NG

question. Now, I will guide you how to decide a statement is True, False, or
Not Given (or Yes, No, Not Given).

Identifying TRUE/YES statement

A statement is true if the passage tells us this is correct. Similarly, you give a
statement a YES if it agrees with writer’s view/claim.

To be correct, a statement has to meet two requirements at the same time

which are Existence (E) and Accuracy (A). In particular, existence means the
information mentioned in the question must appear in reading passage and
Accuracy means this information is true according to the reading passage or it
agrees with writer’s views/claims.

For example:
 1. True statement
Question (Q): It is possible, but not normal, to say “powerful tea”.
Reading passage (RP): While the same meaning could be conveyed through
the roughly equivalent powerful tea, the fact is that English prefers to speak of
teas in terms of being strong rather than in terms of being powerful.
Now let’s do some keywords matching

(1) possible = could be (supporting keyword)

(2) powerful tea = powerful tea (main keyword)

(3) prefers, strong => not normal

(2) => Existence

(1) & (3) => Accuracy

Now when you do some matching like this, you can decide the statement in
the question is TRUE.

2. Yes statement

Q: The information age is characterised by our exposure to an abundance of

data.
RP: The information age now buries us in data coming at us from every which
way.
Keywords matching:

Information age = information age (main keyword) => Existence

our exposure, abundance of data = buries us in data (supporting keywords)

=> Accuracy

All information is matched so the answer is YES

Identifying FALSE/NO statement

A statement is false if the passage tells us this is incorrect. In the same way,
you give a statement a NO if it disagrees with writer’s view/claim. Like True
statement, you can only determine a statement false when it meets Existence
(E) and Fallacy (F) requirements. Specifically, the information mentioned in
the question must appear in reading passage (E) and this information is
contradicting according to the reading passage (F).

Tips: If the sentence in a question contains one of the following

words: usually, often, many, some, all, almost, most of, always, never, hardly,
unique, only or can, could, likely, probably, possibly, may, must, should, the
answer is normally False or No. However, beware of exception so please read
carefully.
Example:

1. FALSE statement
Q: He dedicated the whole day to his work.
RP: At noon, he ceased work for the day and spent half an hour practicing
flute, on which he became quite a skill performer.
Keywords matching:

work = work (main keyword) => Existence

dedicated, whole day >< at noon, cease work for the day => Fallacy

So the answer is FALSE

2. NO statement

Q: The majority of choices we make on a daily basis are conscious decisions.

RP: Most of the choices we make each day may feel like the product of well-
considereddecision making, but they’re not. They’re habit.
Keywords matching:

(1) Majority of choices = most of the choices (main keyword)

(2) daily = each day (main keyword)

(3) conscious >< they’re not, well-considered (supporting keywords) (1)&(2)

=> Existence
(3) => Fallacy

So the answer is NO

Identifying NOT GIVEN statement

As said before, to determine whether a statement is False or Not given is
tricky because sometimes, which seems not given but actually false and vice
versa. In general, you may mark a statement Not Given if you cannot say for
sure that it’s true or false with only the given information in the passage (lack
of information).

A not given statement may have the following characteristics:

– No information regarding it can be found in reading passage.

or

– The subject matter of the statement is mentioned in the passage, but the
information agreeing or contradicting the statement cannot be found. It means
the information in the reading passage can not be used to determine whether
the statement in a question is true or false.

For example:

Q; Houdini was more successful in Europe than in America.

RP: He first attracted attention as “Harry Handcuff Houdini” on a tour
of Europe, where he challenged police forces to keep him locked up.
Keywords matching:

Houdini = Houdini (Main keyword) => Existence

Europe = Europe (Main keyword) => Existence

more successful -> cannot found comparable words

America -> cannot found comparable words

So the answer is not given.

What we have learned fo far…
Now, let’s summary which we have learned in this post.

1. Dont’ worry about the difference between T/F/NG and Y/N/NG question
types because you can use the same technique to solve them
2. Adopting the 2-step approach to solve these types of questions. Start by
(1) skimming and underlining keywords (main and supporting) in the
questions then continue by (2) locating them in the reading passage to
find the answers.
3. Checking whether a statement meets 2 requirements to be marked as
T/F/Y/N. A statement is True(Yes) if it is E and A while it will be False(No)
if it is E and F. E can be checked by main keyword and A or F could be
verified by supporting keywords.
4. A statement is not given if no information regarding it can be found in
reading passage OR the subject matter of the statement is mentioned in the
passage, but the information agreeing or contradicting the statement cannot
be found. If it is not E, it’s Not given. But if it’s E but we do not have
information to determine whether it’s A or F, so it’s also not given

IELTS Reading: A smart and the best strategy to handle YES/NO/NOT

GIVEN
In IELTS Reading exam, students often face the problem of dealing with
different types of questions. One of these questions is YES, NO, NOT
GIVEN which is also known as TRUE, FALSE, NO INFORMATION. This is a
question where many students, who have weakness in English reading,
become utterly confused. Especially it becomes difficult to decide on whether
the answer should be NO or NOT GIVEN. In this post, I’ll provide a simple yet
the best powerful trick to solve this problem. This may be helpful for everyone
if you think about this question in a different way.

I’ve named this technique as method 3210. The name suggests that the
answer has some sort of relation to numbers. Actually, there is a tiny trick
which we can apply here. If you look at any YES/ NO/ NOT GIVEN question,
you may find some individual parts. We shall try to break the question into 3
individual parts and then try to find them in the passage. If we can match all
the 3, the answer will be YES. If we can match 2 parts, it will be NO. In the
same way, if we find only 1 or no match, the answer will be NOT GIVEN.

TRUE: if all 3 parts are found.

FALSE: if any 2 of the 3 parts are found.

NOT GIVEN: if any 1 of the 3 or no parts is found. Also, if the most important
information of the question is not discussed in the passage, the answer will
be NOT GIVEN.

Let’s have a look at it in details and apply it in some real IELTS Reading
questions.

Find a copy of CAMBRIDGE 10 and open at page 19. Here, you will find the
first set of questions of READING TEST 1 PASSAGE 1 (Stepwells), which are
TRUE/FALSE/NOTGIVEN. I know many of you know about finding answers
from a keyword. But, this might not work for many students, who just know
how to read, nothing more. So, how can we find the answer more easily?

The first question says,

“Examples of ancient stepwells can be found all over the world.”

Let’s break the question.

We can break it like the following pattern:

Examples of ancient stepwells can be found all over

the world.

Now, let’s read the passage. As this is the first set of questions, we shall look
at the first paragraph of the passage.
Phrases like “During the sixth and seventh centuries” indicate that the
stepwells are ancient.So, we can give a tick (√) for the first part of the
question.

Line 7 of the second paragraph says, “Most stepwells are found…. …. … ..

”. This confirms that the setpwells can be found. So, we can give a tick (√)
for the second part of the question.

But, interestingly, Line 1 of the second paragraph says, “Unique to this

region”. Then, from line 7 to 14 indicates that the stespwells are clustered
around Gujrat, Rajasthan and Delhi, all of which are located in India. So, this
information contradicts or doesn’t match with the third part of the question.
So, we can give a cross (X) for the third part of the question.

Now, we have two ticks(√) and one cross(X) for this question. So, the answer
is FALSE.

Let’s see if it works for the other questions.

2. Stepwells had a range of functions, in addition to those

related to water collection.

Clues: Line 5-10 of Para 1 matches with part 1 and 3 in the question. “method
of gaining access to clean, fresh groundwater during the dry season for
drinking, bathing, watering animals and irrigation. However, the significance of
this invention – the stepwell – goes beyond its utilitarian application.” It
proves that Stepwells had the main function related to water collection. So, we
can give two ticks(√).

Line 12-14 of Para 2 says, “Some were located in or near villages as public
spaces for the community; others were positioned beside roads as resting
places for travellers.” So, this is a clear match to the part 2 in the question.
So, we can give one tick(√).

Three ticks (√) = TRUE.

3. The few existing stepwells in Delhi are more attractive than

those found elsewhere.
Clues: Part 1 and part 3 of the question can be found in the second
paragraph of the passage. But, remember that the 3rd part has a
word “than” which means there is a comparison. If you search the 2nd
paragraph, you won’t find any comparison regarding the attractiveness of
the stepwells. So, technically, we can find a single match in the passage with
the 1st part of the question only. So, we can give only one tick(√).

One tick (√) = NOT GIVEN.

4. It took workers many years to build the stone steps characteristic

of stepwells.

Clues: Scanning the third and fourth paragraph, we find a match with the 3rd
part, “As their name suggests, stepwells comprise a series of stone
steps descending from the ground level … . .. . . ..”. But there is no mention
of the 1st and 2nd part in the paragraphs. So, again, we can give only one
tick(√).

One tick (√) = NOT GIVEN.

5. The number of steps above the water level in a

stepwell altered during the course of a year.

Clues: Lines 6-9 in Paragraph 3 clearly says, “When the water level was
high, the user needed only to descend a few steps to reach it; when it was
low, several levels would have to be negotiated.”

Here, the high and low levels of water indicating the changes happening
during the course of a year. “To descend” and “negotiated” means that the
changes of position of the steps. Thus, all the parts match with the passage.
So, we can give three ticks (√).

Three ticks (√) = TRUE.

Thus, you can easily match all the key information with the question to match
the three parts. It may be difficult for you at first. Just keep practicing; after
doing it a couple of times, you will become used to with it. It really worked for
me and I made it easier by practicing from most of the Reading Passages 1
from different Cambridge IELTS books. Reading Passage 1 generally focuses
easier passages. So, you can start from here.

Hope, this trick helps you.

Strategies for heading match questions

Published on November 20, 2017
One type of question that is known for being difficult on the IELTS test is Heading Match questions in
the reading section. It has this reputation because:

 It takes more time than other questions to complete.

 Often, there are more headings than paragraphs.
 There are some similarities between headings.
 Headings that only include specific details rather than the main idea mislead candidates.

Heading Match Questions can be approached in these two ways.

Strategy #1: Question First - Reading Second

1. First, read each heading.
Try to completely understand the meaning of each heading by reading all of them thoroughly.
Understanding the main idea of the heading can be made easier by paraphrasing.

2. Circle key words within the headings.

Underline or circle any key words in each heading such as names, places, dates, and nouns, once
you have read them fully. Connecting the correct heading to the appropriate paragraph may become
easier with this step.

3. Any similarities or differences between the headings

should be noted.
In this type of question, headings are often very similar or completely opposite. Similarities and
differences will become clearer among the headings, once you have picked out key words. This will
make choosing an option clearer.

4. Read the first and last sentence of the paragraph.

The first and/or last sentence of a paragraph often contains the main idea. It is good practice to read
these sentences carefully as it will save time. It is also important to skim the other sentences quickly
within the paragraph because the main idea might not be apparent until the second or third
sentence.

5. The heading that is most suitable for the paragraph

should be chosen.
Choose the heading that most closely matches the paragraph once you have read through them
again. Make a note if you are unsure of the difference between multiple headings, and move on. You
may be able to cross some heading options out and answers may become clearer once you’ve read
all of the paragraphs.

Remember, a heading is the main idea of the paragraph, NOT a specific detail. The same detail in
the paragraph such as a matching word may be in the heading, but it may not be the main idea. This
can be confusing to candidates.

Strategy #2: Reading First - Question Second

1. Read one paragraph at a time.
Again, spend more time on the first and last sentences of a paragraph, trying to identify the main
idea.

2. Create your own heading.

Come up with your own heading once you have read the paragraph. Your heading should
encompass the main idea, and not just specific details.

3. Read each individual heading.

For a complete understanding of the meaning, read the headings thoroughly. This time, try to
choose a heading that is closely related to the heading that you gave the same paragraph. Again,
make note of multiple options that may fit the paragraph, and move on. As you read more
paragraphs, you may be able to eliminate options.

Mark key words that note similarities and differences as this will aid in eliminating headings with
similar meanings.
General Tips
Be as efficient with your time as possible when choosing the correct heading for both strategies as
this can be very time consuming. Make a note of all answers and move on to the next paragraph if
you are unsure of the difference between two or more headings. Eliminating possible answers as
you read further into the passage may be an option.

Crossing out the heading on the test booklet once you are sure you have the correct heading for the
paragraph or have eliminated an option, is good practice. This results in less time spent on
repeatedly reading the same heading.

Finally, skimming is an essential skill for time consuming question types such as heading match
questions. This skill will also provide you more time to do the other questions within the section.

What you are most comfortable with as well as how much time you have to spend on the question
will help you find the best strategy when tackling heading match questions. This will also become
more apparent through practice.

IELTS Reading Exam Tips & Strategies: How to Answer

Match Heading Questions

The most essential skill to answer Match Heading questions is skimming, which
is being able to read a text quickly to get a general idea of meaning. The
following answer strategy explains how you can utilize skimming skills to tackle
this question type.

1. Skim the first paragraph. When you skim it, read the first one or two
sentences and the last sentence to understand the general meaning.
2. Once you have a general idea of the first paragraph, you should be able to
identify some keywords that are important Usually keywords are found in the
first and the second sentences. For example, in the above sample question,
the keywords in the paragraph A is government and environmental
management
3. Browse through all headings and match any headings that are very obvious
and you are sure about. Usually by this step, you can already find the
answer. However, if there is more than one heading, and you are not sure
which one is correct, continue to the next step
4. Write all potential headings beside the paragraph. Identify the difference
between each of them. Pay attention to any synonyms in the paragraph to
keywords in the headings. If you still can’t pick one, move one. The answer
will often reveal itself later.
Follow this step by step process for each paragraph.