By understanding your question type, you understand what exactly is being asked of you and what you need to do to get the right answer.\u00a0 The SAT reading section measures your ability to comprehend complex and differentiated texts under time pressure.\u00a0 Interestingly, doing well on the reading section, more often than not, comes down to who is more familiar with the types of passages and questions, not who is a faster reader.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Think about it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Student A can read a social studies passage in four minutes, leaving her roughly eight minutes to answer ten questions.\u00a0 But, she\u2019s never seen an Inference or Function question before.\u00a0 Very likely, this student will spend those eight minutes puzzling over phrasing, details, guesswork, and possible answers.\u00a0 In total, a twelve-minute reading section ends up dragging on well over the fifteen-minute mark.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Student B can read that same passage in about six minutes- half the allotted time.\u00a0 Even though this student has less time to answer the ten questions, he has a trick up his sleeve.\u00a0 Student B has done multiple practice exams and has done tutoring with Test Geek (shameless plug).\u00a0 Student B\u2019s familiarity with the eight Question Types lets him look over the overwhelming passage questions and instead see: 3 Big Picture, 2 Detail, 2 Supporting Evidence, 1 Inference, and 2 Vocab-In-Context questions.\u00a0 With that knowledge and the tools to decipher the questions, Student B will stay on track.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Student B knows what we want all of our students to know: the SAT reading section, and the corresponding questions, are not that bad.\u00a0 Not bad at all once you know how to approach it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Alright, into the thick of it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n First up: the most common reading section question out there, the Big Picture question.\u00a0 Big picture questions gauge multiple test-taking skills including reading comprehension, critical thinking, and text synthesis.\u00a0 Sounds dense, right? Luckily, there are some clear signs that you\u2019ve stumbled upon a big picture question.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n If the question starts with one of these prompts (or one like it):<\/p>\r\n You\u2019ve hit a Big Picture.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Now that you know what you\u2019re looking at, here comes the tricky part.\u00a0 Let\u2019s break down the \u2018how\u2019 of answering Big Picture questions correctly.\u00a0 We already know that our question is asking something comprehensive, something that we can\u2019t just find on line 37.\u00a0 What we need to figure out is how to piece together that \u2018big picture\u2019 out of the text.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Start by taking a small breather at the end of each passage.\u00a0 Once you\u2019ve read it all the way through, take the next thirty seconds to summarize the passage to yourself.\u00a0 Pretend you\u2019re giving an elevator pitch to a publisher about this passage.\u00a0 What are the main themes? Arguments? Transitions? Is there a shift in tone?\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Think about it like this: If I wanted someone to understand what this passage was about in 6 sentences or less, what would I say?<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Would I include the color of the seamstress\u2019 shirt? No, that\u2019s a detail. Would I have synonyms for some word the author used? Nope. Save that for the vocab questions.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n I would say: This story was a suspense-filled tale about a young girl who moves to a new town.\u00a0 There\u2019s a creepy tone the whole time, especially when talking about this boy in her algebra class.\u00a0 The boy follows her out of class one day, and that\u2019s where there\u2019s a big shift.\u00a0 The boy and girl get to know each other and he reveals his troubled childhood.\u00a0 The story ends with a light-hearted, maybe even coupley, tone and the boy and girl are good friends.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Next, armed with your own ‘big picture’ of the text, go on to the answer choices.\u00a0 Make sure the answer choice you select not only mirrors your own big picture but also includes a wide enough scope.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Up next are our Detail questions.\u00a0 Think of these as the polar opposite of Big Picture questions.\u00a0 With Big Picture we thought of the passage as a whole, now with Detail, we want to bring out our reading microscopes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Detail questions measure how closely you read the text, but they also test how willing you are to go back into the text and find proof for your potential \u2018yes\u2019 answer choice.\u00a0 The secret to ace-ing every single Detail question is in the question itself: if you can\u2019t find evidence of it in the text, it isn\u2019t the right answer.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n To know when you need to look back into the text for proof, look for these sure signs of a Detail question:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n If the question starts by saying:<\/p>\r\n It\u2019s a Detail question.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n You might be wondering, what if I don\u2019t remember reading that detail in the passage? What if I had to skim the passage because I take a little longer when I close read? Well, breathe easy because you have nothing to worry about.\u00a0 All you need to remember from reading the passage is generally where that information might be located.\u00a0 This is just to save you from re-reading everything another time to find it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Once you\u2019ve gotten to the right paragraph in the text, now is when you pull out your microscope.\u00a0 You may have heard growing up that being too picky can be a bad thing.\u00a0 While that might be true day-to-day, there is no such thing as being too <\/em>picky when it comes to the SAT.\u00a0 Be as picky as possible; we encourage it!<\/p>\r\n First, take a quick look over your answer choices for the Detail question.\u00a0 Then, go through the part of the passage you\u2019re looking at with a fine-tooth comb.\u00a0 If you can\u2019t prove an answer choice with text evidence – or even worse, if the text disproves an answer choice – I can promise <\/em>you: that it is not the right answer.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Something to take with you into the test: With Detail questions, you can rest assured you will always find proof for the correct answer.\u00a0 Remember, if it\u2019s not right there in the text, it\u2019s not right.\u00a0 Period.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Try to think of the Detail questions and the Supporting Evidence questions as best friends.\u00a0 Where you see one, you\u2019ll most likely see the other.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Generally, the Detail and Supporting Evidence questions follow in the same order as they\u2019ve been listed here.\u00a0 First, you find the correct Detail answer by proving it to yourself in the text.\u00a0 Now comes the really easy part (if you\u2019ve done the first part correctly).\u00a0 Supporting Evidence questions ask you to, unsurprisingly, support the previous question and answer with textual evidence.\u00a0 The structure of the answer choices, if you\u2019re unfamiliar, is a series of text selections from the passage that you have to read through and determine which best supports your answer to the Detail question preceding it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Unfortunately, I can\u2019t tell you that every single time the text selection you find on your own and the text selection in the Supporting Evidence answer choice will line up perfectly (how nice would that be??)\u2026 but if you\u2019re looking in the right area to begin with, they will almost always be right after one another.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n You\u2019ll know that you\u2019re on the right track in answering the Supporting Evidence question if:\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Vocab in Context questions deal less with how difficult <\/em>a word is and more with the context <\/em>surrounding a certain word.\u00a0 The words included in these question types are typically ones we use every day: stack, concentration, focus, raise, train, etc.\u00a0 Where the trouble comes in is sifting through the sentence to find the exact context surrounding the vocab word.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n If I say the word \u201cstacks\u201d without context, can you tell me what exactly <\/em>the definition is? What if I\u2019m using the word in a slang context, and I\u2019m referring to money? What if I\u2019m saying there are \u201cstacks\u201d of paperwork on my desk? What if it\u2019s being used as a verb instead of a noun?\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n What I\u2019m trying to get at is this: these questions will be nearly impossible to answer correctly if you don\u2019t look back at the text and re-read the sentence that the vocab word is included in.\u00a0 The good news is, if you do <\/em>go back into the text, these questions actually become fairly simple to answer correctly.\u00a0 Here\u2019s the process that we recommend:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n First, identify the line(s) that the vocab word appears in.\u00a0 Don\u2019t read through the answer choices before! <\/em>Trust me. Don\u2019t.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Then, go back to the text and read the selected sentence all the way through, paying special attention to the words\/settings\/theme surrounding the vocab word.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Next, pretend there\u2019s a blank where the vocab word is.\u00a0 Based on the parts of the sentence that remain, what word would you fill in the blank? How close can you get to the vocab word without just re-stating it?<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Finally, and only once you\u2019ve done everything above, go to the answer choices.\u00a0 Sometimes, the very word you chose as your replacement will be one of the answer choices.\u00a0 It\u2019s awesome when that happens, right? I feel like a genius whenever I guess the same word as the SAT, but that\u2019s just me.\u00a0 I guess there\u2019s a reason why I work for Test Geek.\u00a0 <\/em>But, more often than not, it\u2019ll just be a word really close to your guess that has the same context.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n For example:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n If our sentence was this: \u201cThe difficulties to be overcome in getting from the latter to the former are by no means slight<\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n And our vocab word was slight, what would you replace it with for that sentence? What\u2019s the context? Me, personally, I\u2019d say \u201csmall\u201d or \u201cinconsequential\u201d.\u00a0 Something that conveys that the difficulties aren\u2019t to be taken lightly.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n If our answer choices are \u201cminor\u201d, \u201cshort\u201d, \u201cmarginal\u201d, and \u201ctricky\u201d, which one are we going with? If you said marginal, nice! Marginal correctly conveys the context of how the difficulties are not something tiny that can be ignored.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Inference questions are typically viewed, by my students anyway, as some of the most difficult on the SAT reading section.\u00a0 I think the nerves surrounding Inference questions come from the fact that the questions can be so vague<\/em>.\u00a0 Unlike Detail questions, Inference questions have no textual evidence.\u00a0 What Inference questions test is not how closely you read the text but how well you understood it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Inference questions usually look something like this:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.testgeek.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/reading-question-types-1.jpg\")
\r\n1. Big Picture<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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2. Detail<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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3. Supporting Evidence<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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4. Vocab in Context<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.testgeek.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/reading-questions-2.jpeg\")
<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n5. Inferences<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.testgeek.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/200-Points-SAT-Banner-10.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n