Chapter 5

26 Tips and Strategies to Destroy Reading Comprehension on the GRE

The most extensive list of strategies you will ever find, that will help you on your conquest of the most dreaded section on the GRE.

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Now, for those of you who have the time, and the patience required, let us begin this fascinating journey. We will now discuss some extremely powerful tips and strategies that will help you master the reading comprehension section. These proven strategies have helped hundreds of students score high on the reading comprehension section of the GRE. While this is the most exhaustive, detailed guide there ever is, it isn’t complete yet. Rest assured, we will be adding new strategies every now and then, so don’t forget to keep checking this space often.

1. Start Reading Today

This might sound pretty straightforward, but it is very true. It is also something that gets neglected very often. If you are planning to take the GRE sometime next year, you should start reading a lot, right from today. Even though tricks and tips will help you improve you performance on the Reading Comprehension as a topic, making reading a habit will make you a better reader, and a better judge of different styles of writing. This will not only make you better as an individual, but will also help you score higher on the test. There are tons of books, newspapers, and magazines at your disposal, but only a handful of them will actually help you with your GRE prep. Don’t worry, we have a list.

Some of the best and the most resourceful newspapers and magazines you can subscribe to are:

If you make an honest effort to read these every single day, you will not only improve your reading comprehension skills by leaps and bounds, but you will also come across hundreds if not thousands, of new vocabulary. Which is exactly what you need, to ace the Verbal section on the GRE.

And if possible, get into a habit of reading from a screen rather than a conventional book. All of the aforementioned newspapers and magazines have their own electronic versions and websites for you to read from, and it helps if you read them online rather than on paper, because that is what you do on the GRE. Yes, it is rather difficult and probably uncomfortable to read from a screen, and reading a conventional book seems rather nice, but the more you get used to reading from a computer screen, the more comfortable you will be on test day. Plus, you’ll be saving a few trees too!

2. Read Before You Sleep

Make it a habit to read before you go to bed. No, not Facebook news feeds, funny cat memes, or random tweets, but useful stuff. Stuff that will improve your thinking capacity, and your comprehension. If you can, try and read a few pages of a novel or a news item on the internet. Try to read on your laptop or a tablet, at least for 30 minutes before you go to bed, and if that isn’t possible, try reading at least a few pages of a book before going to bed.

This will help you a lot in the long run, because the more you get your mind used to reading, the sharper it will be on the day of your test. Plus, if you can understand complex things when you are sleepy, imagine what you can do when you’re awake.

3. Paraphrase Extensively

More often than not, you will see a lot of technical jargon in the passages. Don’t get intimidated by the terminology that you are not familiar with. The GRE doesn’t test your ability to remember or have the knowledge of technical terms and jargon. Even native speakers would not know much about a lot of terms and vocabulary used in the passages. So, all you need to do is, replace that one particular term with some familiar or easy word that you can understand, and continue reading the passage. This situation is particularly common when it comes to passages on science and technology. So, if you don’t understand a word, substitute that with a commonly known word.

For example, the passage says: “Stomatopods are marine crustaceans”. Now, all you know is that marine means something related to water. So, you can easily replace that sentence with something like: ”Tomatoes are weird animals in water.” See how easy it becomes? Of course, it does not make any sense, but you would agree that the latter sentence is a lot easier to recollect, even after five to ten minutes of reading.

First of all, Tomatoes is something you can easily remember, and you can still link it to the original word Stomatopods. Second, the GRE is never going to ask you what exactly a crustacean means. It might, however, ask you relevant questions, which you can easily answer if you have read the passage well enough. Even, in an improbable event where there comes a question asking you the meaning of the word crustacean, you can still answer it with ease, because you already have a solid idea of the topic, and you can make an educated guess as to what it means.

4. Practice In a Timed Setting

There is only one mantra to succeed: Practice, practice and practice even more. A lot of students do follow this mantra, but they leave out one little aspect: Time. It is important to practice all your tests in a timed setting. It is easy to solve a question in ten minutes, and almost anyone can do it. But doing it in under 100 seconds is way too hard, and only those who have practiced for a long time can do that repeatedly. Ergo, those are the ones with high scores on the GRE. You will also have to learn when you should stop trying and move on, and this only happens when you are used to practicing in a test-like environment.

There is only one mantra to succeed: Practice, practice and practice even more.

A lot of students fail to practice in a timed setting, and hence end up with time management issues during the test. Don’t be one of those guys. Even if you are not writing a test, and even if it is just a few practice questions you are doing for fun, have a timer with you, and set it for 100 seconds. Practice like athletes. Athletes don’t just jog during practice. They work as hard as they do when they are in a competition. That’s how you should practice. Remember, the harder you practice, the easier the game will be.

5. Ace Sentence Equivalence

Scoring more points on the Reading Comprehension section depends on how well you can solve Sentence Equivalence questions. What? How?

If you are one of those advanced students, you will find out that Sentence Equivalence questions are real time-savers. If you are very good at vocabulary, and if you have practiced well enough, you will find out that Sentence Equivalence questions can be solved in under a minute. Yes, we know of a lot of students who can solve Sentence Equivalence questions in 40-50 seconds. And you can easily do it under 60 seconds, if you practice hard enough.

Now, this means, you are saving yourselves 30 seconds of precious time per question. That equals to about 4-5 extra minutes on your watch, which you can use to solve around 2-3 questions on Reading Comprehension. It might sound crazy if you are a beginner, but it’s true. All you need to do is become a master of Sentence Equivalence, and Bam! You have lots of extra time to solve Reading Comprehension questions.

6. Use Error Logs

Create an error log. If you are new to this, an error log is basically a log where you note down all the errors that you make, during your prep. It can be a practice question, or an entire test; doesn’t matter. The more effectively you use the error log, the more clarity you will have on where exactly are you, in terms of readiness to take the test. The error log also validates your strengths and weaknesses, so you will have solid data in order to make changes to your study plan.

If you try and use the error log effectively for a while, you will be able to see a distinctive pattern of the mistakes you make and the areas you make them in. Believe it or not, the error log will be your best teacher! You can only get a higher score when you know if you are improving constantly or not. It is quite easy to create an error log; it can be anything, but an excel file would be the most preferred option, since it is easier to not only use, but also make changes in the future. Make an excel sheet with the entire list of topics you are going to study in the next few months: Algebra, Geometry, Text Completion, etc. And write down your confidence levels in the next column, on a scale of 1 to 5 with 5 being ‘very confident’ and 1 being ‘clueless’.

7. Join GRE Forums and Groups

If there is one place where you can learn for the GRE for free, it is forums. Most students don’t prefer forums as a means of learning because they mainly consist of fellow students, and most students don’t like to learn from fellow students. They think they are all at the same level. But you couldn’t be more wrong if you are thinking the same. First of all, not everyone is at the same level, and second of all, forums don’t have just the current students. There are tons of students who have already written the GRE and scored high; and there are lots of trainers who help out students with free suggestions and strategies.

So, if you can participate in forum discussions and Facebook groups that are dedicated to GRE, you will not only learn so much, but you will also actually meet a lot of smart people and learn from them. If you are one of those smart students, you can also try and help out other students with their doubts and problems. Forums are a great way of networking with other people who have the same interests as you.

8. How to Skim the Right Way?

Here is a great tip for you to read the entire passage quickly: Read the first and last paragraphs of the passage slowly and very carefully, rephrasing each sentence in your head. If possible, write down notes on the scratch paper, paraphrasing the given complex sentences into something that you can easily understand. Make sure you clearly understand what it is that the author is trying to convey, because ideally, you shouldn’t come back to read this part once you read the questions. As soon as you see the questions, you should be able to answer them.

Now, once you are done with the first and the last paragraphs, move to the others. Read the first one or two sentences in the other paragraphs in order to visualize the structure of the paragraph. Reading this much will be enough, and will give you a bird’s eye view of what is going to happen next, in that paragraph. Repeat the steps for the rest of the paragraphs, and you will be left with an overview of the entire passage in a few sentences.

For example, these must be the thoughts in your mind as you read the entire passage: “Alright. So, the 1st paragraph claims that X happens very often, the 2nd paragraph says it’s not necessarily so and that there are quite a few exceptions [with examples], but the 3rd paragraph says that X still holds true in the majority of cases, and the 4th and the final paragraph concludes that although X happens 90% of the time, it is rather foolish to think that X is always bound to happen.”

See how things can be condensed into just a few lines. Having a clear idea of the entire structure of the passage allows you to answer general questions such as “What is the tone of the author?” and “What according to the author is the main idea of the passage?” etc. These sort of questions are very easy and can be answered within 10 seconds, if you have a crystal clear idea of the entire passage, which can be explained within a few lines like we showed above. So, basically, if you use this strategy, you will be capable of answering about 50% of Reading Comprehension questions easily, within a few seconds.

9. Tweet To a Friend

Now that we have discussed the above technique, there is a similar technique that we have found to be extremely resourceful while solving Reading Comprehension questions. It is called “Text to a friend” or “Tweet to a friend” format. This format is fairly simple. What if, as soon as you finish reading a particular paragraph from the passage, you are asked to send a summary of it as a text message or a single tweet to your friend? Now, you know that you cannot write more than 140 characters in a tweet. Which means roughly around 20 words.

So, if you can condense a 100 word paragraph into 20 words, or a tweet sized paragraph, it means that you not only have completely understood the points made by the author in that paragraph, but also have reduced the time required to answer each question. If there are 5 paragraphs in the passage, you now have only about 80-100 words, which is far easier and far more time saving to skim through, when you read questions.

This technique has been tried and tested by us and our students, and it has proved to be extremely effective in saving time. On an average, students saved at least 5 minutes per passage (on 4-5 questions) on their practice tests. So, we urge you to give it a try in your next practice session, and see how well it works for you.

10. Look For Keywords

While reading the first 1-2 sentences in the beginning of each paragraph, you should also scan the rest of the text in the paragraph, especially looking out for keywords such as important names, dates, and other stand-out terminology used by the author. These are very important, as they more often than not asked in the questions that follow the passage. Plus, when you encounter an inference or a detailed question, you will know exactly where to go in the paragraph.

You might ask why this technique is a time-saver when you still have to go back and read the text all over again. But the truth is, even if you are ever so careful about reading the entire passage the first time around, some of the inference/support questions on the GRE are so detailed, that most of the time you will have to go back to read the lines anyway. So, if you have already figured out the details like names and dates and other keywords, you don’t have to waste additional time on finding them all over again. You know where exactly to go back. This saves quite a few seconds, believe it or not.

11. Read Aggressively

Writing quick notes as you read the passage will keep your brain naturally engaged and help you move through the passage deliberately. More about note taking later, but this process is what we call Aggressive Reading. Aggressive Reading is when you are reading quickly but still understand the stuff that’s in there. You are not simply reading fast, you are reading fast and effectively.

As you read, jot down a quick summary for each paragraph on the scratch paper, and note the main ideas names, theories, and other important details mentioned in the passage. Students often skip this note-taking step because they think it takes too much time. But think about it: It is much better to take a few extra seconds to jot down helpful notes than to waste potential minutes staring blankly at the screen looking for that sentence that keeps hiding from you. Also, your notes will provide useful shortcuts and shortened phrases for some of the broader reading comprehension questions, which can actually help you save time in the end.

12. The Rotten Tomato Technique

Some answer choices look like the perfect answers to the given question, but in reality, they are only 90% correct. Students often tend to read only the 90% and their futuristic brains tell them that the remaining 10% is going to be the same. So, they think that it is the answer to the given question, and since it is 90% right, it must be correct. But sadly, the GRE test makers are far ahead of you when it comes to setting up traps within answer choices.

It very so often happens that there is some sort of mistake or an assumption in the other 10% of the answer choice that you thought was perfect. But out of excitement and anxiety, and not to mention the clock that is always sprinting, you overlook that one part of the answer, and select it as right. Little do you know that the remaining 10% contains something that is blatantly wrong, and thus it invalidates the entire answer option.

This is why we at CrunchPrep use the Rotten Tomato Technique. Picture this: When you are buying tomatoes from the market, what do you do? You inspect each tomato 100%, and only if you are sure that the entire tomato is healthy, you purchase it. If you find any dark spot, or a rotten part, then no matter how small it is, you put it back. This is the same strategy you should use to check if an answer option is suitable or not. If ever there is one thing – even if it is a single word – that doesn’t seem right, or dilutes the entire sentence, then you should treat the answer option as invalid, and move on to the next choice.

So, the next time you are solving questions on Reading Comprehension, remember that the Rotten Tomato technique gives you healthy results.

13. Pause and Play

Sometimes when you are reading a long Reading Comprehension passage, your eyes feel glazed and watery. If you feel glazed eyes starting to set in, look away from the passage. By just turning your eyes in a different direction, you will be, in a way, hitting a reset button on your brain. When you look away from the screen, or close your eyes for a few seconds, you should also take a few deep breaths, and get some oxygen up to the brain. Just a few seconds of rest will make a huge difference to your performance, and you can then return to the passage.

Don’t start thinking about wasting seconds here. Your state of mind is far more important than time, and if you really think your mind deserves a few seconds of rest, then maybe should give it some rest.

14. Don’t Read Too Fast

Don’t read too much too fast. Your brain has a natural tendency to block off too much information at a time, and when you read too fast when you are under pressure, your brain simply blocks things off. This is a bit similar to how when you forget someone’s name, you cannot recollect it no matter how hard you try, but you get it at a later point when you are doing something else. Whenever too much information is being thrown at your brain, it cannot take it all at once. And this is why it shuts off for a few seconds, or even minutes, and you can’t get anything into your head for a while.

This will only waste your time during the test, and will increase pressure on your brain even further. So it is best for you if you can read at a steady pace. If you would like to read faster, you should understand that speed reading cannot be achieved overnight. It comes with a lot of practice, and you should start doing it right now. We have discussed about Speed Reading techniques in great detail. Take a look at the final chapter if you would like to know more.

15. Identify Signaling Words

Every Reading Comprehension passage has a few to many key words and phrases. These are also known as signaling words. Words like “First, second, third, furthermore, on the other hand, for example, namely, for one thing, in addition, nevertheless, for these reasons, proponents believe, critics believe, but, however, whether/if, according to, therefore, consequently, In contrast, claims, goes so far as to claim, others argue”, etc.

This list is far from comprehensive, but you get the idea. As you work through more and more Reading Comprehension passages during practice, you will start to think like the test makers, and develop a sense for where the test makers are likely to draw questions from. This will be of great advantage to you, because if you can anticipate the oncoming question, you will be mentally ready with the answer, as you read through the passage.

16. Focus is Key

The passages on Reading Comprehension are more often than not dull, boring, and concern subjects you either find uninteresting or are completely alien to. But that is not something you should worry about, because you are not alone. The test makers select passages as to make everyone feel uncomfortable; not just you. So, if you find a passage unfair or super hard, remember that it is the same for everyone else. Every test taker is in the same boat as you are.

Don’t beat yourself up over not having read up on the Nazi culture or quantum theory or the lifecycle of dolphins. The test givers don’t expect you to have any expertise on such abstruse subjects. They are only testing your ability to read quickly, to extract and process information efficiently and to draw inferences and make logical connections even when you know nothing about the material. So, all you need to do is settle down, take a deep breath, accept the challenge, and start reading. Maintaining focus is key. Which is why we ask students to take down notes as they read the passage. You are writing notes primarily to help you to focus on the text.

17. Practice Active Reading

It is very important to read actively, not passively. Passive reading is for knowledge, or for pleasure, but not to score high on a competitive test like the GRE. You need to actively extract information, instead of passively absorbing it. Focus on the main points. Be strategic. Get used to reading only certain parts of a passage carefully.

These include: the opening paragraph, the conclusion and the opening and closing sentences of each paragraph. They help you answer straightforward questions like: What is the author’s main point? Why is the author writing this? What is the author’s writing style?, What is the author’s attitude towards the topic?, etc.

18. Unhear That Song Already

It is extremely common that you always have that one song in your head during the entire time you take the test. You are not alone; research shows that close to 90% of us have this phenomenon, popularly called as an earworm. While this is completely natural, and there is nothing wrong in it, it may be one of the reasons your brain cannot give its 100% during the test. The more activities your brain does, the lesser it spends its focus on the test.

So, before you go into the test center, you will have to cleanse your brain off the song that’s stuck inside. Use Unhear It or similar websites, and get that song out of your head before you leave for the test center, or even better, before you enter the testing area. We have tested this, and it seems to work fine most of the time.

19.Rephrase the Original Question

If you thought that you will be safe once you finish reading the dreadful passage, you should probably hold that thought for a while. The questions that follow the passage are equally deceitful, and they will never be straightforward. You should always be on the lookout for troubling questions which include double and triple conceptual questions. This means, if the author has included more than one concept or scenario, there might be questions that are complex and lengthy in nature. These questions may also include double negatives, or double trigger words just to confuse you further.

One way to solve these questions, is to break down the question part by part, and analyze it. This is a really effective strategy, but it takes time for you to break down questions, and then find answers to each part separately from the passage. Instead, you can simply read the questions thoroughly and carefully, and then based on what you understood, you can rephrase the question in your own words. This is make the question sound simpler, and it will be easy for you to go back to the passage in search of the answer if the question is easier to understand.

20. Check the Number of Questions First

Before you decide how much time you should be vesting on a Reading Comprehension passage, you should see how many questions there are in total. Before you even begin reading the passage, check to see how many question are given, and then decide on the time you would like to spend on the passage. If there are too many questions and you think it would take a lot of time, then it is better to mark it and skip to the rest of the section. If you don’t do this, you’ll risk reading the entire passage and then find out that you want to skip it altogether. This means, you will have wasted around 4-5 minutes without any outcome. So, make sure you check the number of questions before you start reading.

21. Be Careful With Multiple Select Questions

When you are answering Multiple Select questions, you should remember to treat each answer option separately. Sometimes, it is easy to get lost in the details, and students assume that if they are asked to select multiple answers, then it must mean that both option A and B, for example, must be true in order for the answer to be correct.

No, that is not how it works. You should be treating every answer choice separately, on its own. If you are reading option A, don’t bother about the other options. See if A fits as the answer, and if does, select it. Only then should you be moving to option B. When reading option B, forget about the other choices, including A. Two answer choices cannot be combined to form one answer, and hence you should treat them separately.

22. Embrace the Passage

As much as you wish it were true, you know that there won’t be any Reading Comprehension passages on your favorite TV shows. All Reading Comprehension passages are designed to trouble you with new concepts, new information, and new questions. But, if you are a smart reader, you would not get bogged down by the sheer length or depth of questions and paragraphs. Instead, what you should do is, embrace the passage completely.

Yes, you read it right. Embrace the passage as if it were your friend. Appreciate it for its uniqueness, greatness, and its wealth of information, but also embrace it for its stupidity, stubbornness, and its strangeness. Just as with your best friend, you should understand that a Reading Comprehension passage has its own flaws, and keep in mind that it is always looking to trouble you, and waste your time.

Embrace the passage as if it were your friend.

While embracing the passage and its pluses and minuses, you should also learn to love it despite what it is. Sometimes, it is really difficult to keep your focus on the passage, because no matter how much you try, you hate to learn about orangutans or about the science behind natural reflexes. What you can do, however, is try and fall in love with the subject. Tell yourself that today you really want to know why stars die, or why Rasputin led to his own downfall. You should learn to fake your love for the passage, deceive it with your fake enthusiasm, and then destroy it when it finally surrenders to your relentless pursuit. That is how you master boring passages. It sounds evil, but you can’t help it.

23. The Tone of the Author Is Never Negative on the GRE

This is a very important point you should remember. The GRE being an internationally acclaimed test, doesn’t ever include essays or paragraphs that are negative in nature. The test makers select the passages and design the questions so carefully that there won’t be much room for negativity.

Hence, you can say that the tone of the author is either neutral (which is mostly the case), or positive or praising in nature. Now this doesn’t mean the author does not criticize anything in the passage. Yes, there will be a lot of criticism, but most of it is constructive. Meaning, the author says that something is wrong, but he/she also gives the necessary reasons behind their stance. So, this qualifies the tone as neutral.

Sometimes, the author advocates for a particular reason or a cause, in which case, he/she is being positive about the topic. But there will not be many essays where the author severely criticizes and demeans someone or something in the passage. Hence, while answering questions related to the tone of the author or the writing style, you should remember to automatically eliminate answer choices that hint that the author is being completely negative. If an answer choice implies that the author has used drastic or extreme language to criticize the topic he/she writes on, then you should automatically disqualify that answer choice, and move on.

24. Pay Utmost Attention to Tough Reading Comprehension Passages

These are very difficult to understand, especially because the author uses several traps to confuse you. You will find satiric comments which look like praises but are in fact criticisms, you will see multiple comparisons where the main idea is compared to other similar scenarios so as to confuse you about which of them is the main idea.

Often times, the author camouflages his/her opinion in the form of others’ opinions. The passage has opinions of other people, but not the authors. You should be really careful here, and see whether the author is supporting or disapproving their opinions. When you think things are going beyond your control, stop reading. Mark it for review, and come back later with a fresher mindset. Maybe you will crack the code later. Why waste time now?

Be very careful when you see twisted questions. Sometimes you will be asked to provide analogies, or situations that are similar to the ones mentioned in the passage. These are some of the dangerous questions you will see, because every situation seems like an analogy to a beginner. So, you should practice such questions rigorously, and be ahead of the curve.

25. Make Notes Intelligently

You can use several techniques to take down notes in an intelligent manner. Most students, when asked to make notes, write down a few sentences altogether. But think about it. Why do you take notes? So you can save time. But if you are writing down a few sentences every time you read a paragraph, are you really saving time, or wasting it even further?

If you really want to save more time, you should not keep writing sentences. Instead, you should try and keep the notes as small as possible. Now you may ask, how do you store lots of information with only a few words?

By being smart, is the answer. Identify the most relevant information. Write down the key words or phrases that are most relevant to the topic at hand — things like dates, names, theories, definitions — only the most important details should make the cut. Eliminate all the filler words and secondary details. Replace all the tough-to-remember language with easy, and simple words. Paraphrase with exaggeration. Write whatever you want, as long as it fits the main theme, and you understand it.

Also, use shorthand, or texting lingo. Replace should with ‘shd’, question with ‘ques’, communicate with ‘comm’, etc. This is really helpful because, if you’ve ever noticed, writing is a lot slower process than typing. So, use shortened versions of words, and try writing what you have understood, instead of repeating sentences from the passage.

And, who said you have to use only words? You can use illustrations, symbols, tree diagrams, relationships, arrows, etc. This will significantly shorten the information you need to write, and will maximize efficiency.

26. The Best Time Saving Strategy

Students often use answer grids in order to save time. But did you know that there is an even better time saving strategy?

Using an answer grid while solving a Reading Comprehension question means you should keep shifting your focus while reading answer options on the screen, and while striking off options on the scratch paper. So moving your eyes off the screen and off the scratch paper repeatedly leads to lack of focus. It takes time to read, and then strike off options on the paper. Why waste time when there is a better alternative?

We usually recommend our students to use their left hand (or right, if you are a southpaw) and fold fingers as they eliminate each answer option. Confused? Don’t be.

It is pretty simple. Assign options to each of your fingers, (A = thumb, B = index, C = middle, etc.) and fold fingers as you eliminated each of the options. This method is not only much simpler to apply, but it is much, much faster than any other method. Since you don’t need to write anything on the paper, you don’t need to look down, and you can keep your eyes on the screen!

We have asked our students to test this method during their practice tests, and on an average, they have saved 5-6 seconds per question! Now, 6 seconds might not seem like a lot to you, but they are invaluable. Don’t believe me? You do the math: there are about 20 Reading Comprehension on the GRE. That’s 20 questions multiplied by 6 seconds = 120 seconds, or two minutes. Which means, you will have enough time to solve another two questions! And that should give you a chance to increase a couple of points on your final score.

So, those are the various tips and strategies that you can use effectively, to completely annihilate the Reading Comprehension section. Other guides usually end here. But we at CrunchPrep want you to get yourself acquainted with some of the most advanced techniques that you can use on the GRE. These advanced speed techniques will help you solve Reading Comprehension questions at the blink of any eye, and you can brag about your newly acquired skills with your friends.