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Do you get worried when you hear the dreaded phrase: “comprehension section?” Don’t worry, Matrix is here to help! Over the last 19 years, we’ve mastered the art of answering comprehension questions and, in this article, we’re sharing our best strategies with you.
Just like any other aspect of studying English, there’s a process for approaching and answering comprehension questions. This process is the same for year 7 & 8 students as it is for Year 12 students sitting HSC English Paper 1.
By learning this process now, you’ll be calm and confident when it really counts!
We’re going to show you how to ace your next comprehension assessment. We’ll look at the following:
Firstly, let’s look at what a comprehension section looks like.
In a comprehensive section, you’re given a feature article, an extract from a novel or short story, or a poem that you haven’t seen before. You need to read the text and then answer a series of questions about it.
Some questions will be multiple choice, others will be written. The questions will be worth different marks and will require different lengths of answers.
Remember how in Part 3 of this Guide we discussed how comprehension measures how well you interpret information from a text?
Well, a comprehension section tests exactly that. The questions are designed to see how well you have read and understood (also known as parsing) the information and ideas in the text.
While comprehension questions assess how well you have comprehended a text, they also assess how well you can turn your findings into responses and arguments.
Throughout your study of English in high school, you’ll need to demonstrate your ability to read texts and produce critical responses to them. The comprehension questions you answer in Years 7 & 8 introduce you to that.
As you may know, in Years 7 and 9, you’ll have to answer comprehension questions for NAPLAN.
It’s clear that comprehension skills are really important. So, let’s show you how to attack comprehension sections.
To teach you how to answer comprehension questions, we will first walk you through the process and then we’ll work through an example with you.
Here’s how to answer comprehension questions:
It may seem backwards to read the questions first, but it actually helps a lot.
Reading the questions first tells you what you need to look for in the unseen text you’ve been given.
Make sure you read the questions a few times so that you know what to look for.
Questions will come in several forms:
You should learn to identify these different types of questions and understand the key verbs used in these questions.
Once you’ve memorised the question, make a mental note of the information you need to find.
Now that you know what you need to answer, you’re ready to read the text.
As you read, you need to read to:
When you read the text, you need to be mindful of the time. You don’t want to rush it, but you also don’t want to skim read.
Be aware of the amount of time you have to read the text. If you have more than enough reading time, you should read the text twice.
The first time you read it, try to understand it.
The second time you read it, to find what the question is asking for.
While reading, focus on finding the information the questions are asking for.
Since you already know what you need to answer, this makes your task easier.
Pay attention to the following as you read, based on the questions you’re given:
If you can’t take notes during the reading time, try to remember the parts of the text that contain useful information.
If you’re allowed to make notes, jot down key points with relevant information.
Now, let’s look at how you should answer different types of comprehension questions: multiple-choice or short-answer responses.
Let’s start with multiple choice.
For multiple-choice questions, you need to choose the most appropriate answer from the options they give you.
Make sure that you read the question carefully and look for:
Don’t rush the question, take the time to make sure that you are answering correctly.
Make sure to reread the relevant part of the passage before you respond.
When you’re answering written responses, follow these steps.
Let’s break these down in more detail.
1. Identify and restate the keywords in the questions
Each question contains important verbs and nouns that tell you what to do and what to focus on.
Start your response by restating or, ideally, paraphrasing these questions.
2. Restate the keywords and present your answer
Next, present your answer to the question. In the step above, you incorporated the language of the question to frame (or introduce) your response.
Now you need to present your response clearly. To do this use the T.E.E. structure:
If you’re unsure of what a T.E.E. statement is, read this post.
3. Incorporate your evidence
Some questions will require you to provide evidence from the text.
When giving evidence, make sure it fits naturally within the grammar of your sentence.
For example, let’s use a quote from To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.
“I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand.”
In this case, Atticus uses a metaphor – “courage is a man with a gun in his hand” – to explain to his son that true courage isn’t and doesn’t involve weapons. He contrasts “real courage” with the image of “a man with a gun in his hand.”
If we need to discuss Harper Lee’s use of metaphor, we’d state:
To describe courage to Jem, Atticus uses the metaphor of courage as “a man with a gun in his hand” to personify what courage is not.
This answer uses the technique and example from the T.E.E statement.
Now we need to explain the example.
4. Explain your example
When you explain your example, you need to explain how you think the example, and its technique, support your response to the question you’ve been asked.
The length of your explanation will depend on how many marks the question is worth.
A good rule of thumb is to aim for 1-2 sentences per mark. Obviously, if you need to write an extended response, you’ll be writing something much longer that requires more examples.
Let’s look at a sample question and response.
Question:
How does Atticus try and explain courage to his son, Jem? (2 Marks)
Answer:
When Atticus explains courage to Jem, he states that he “wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand.” In this statement, Atticus uses contrast and metaphor to show Jem that “real courage” is not “a man with a gun in his hand.”
5. Conclude your response
If you have a comprehension question worth 3 or more marks, you may want to include a statement that sums up and concludes your argument.
When writing a concluding statement make sure that you address the key points of the question by including the keywords or synonyms in your response.
If you want to test your comprehension skills and see how your new skills work, try our practice comprehension test at the top of the page!
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Now you know how to answer comprehension questions, let’s practise with a sample text and questions.
Now you know how to answer comprehension questions, let’s practise with a sample text and questions.
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.
1. According to the poem, if you don’t hold onto your dreams ________ (1 mark)
2. How does Langston Hughes use metaphor to convey the importance of dreams? (3 marks)
Take a few minutes to read the questions two or three times.
Let’s see what the questions are asking you to discuss:
Read the poem once to get a sense of what it is about.
We can see that the narrator (known as the persona) is telling the reader that we need to have dreams or our lives will lose meaning.
Now reread the poem with the questions in mind and look for the information we need to answer them.
Here’s the key information you need for each question:
You need to relate this to the poem’s overall meaning: that is, if we don’t hold onto our dreams then life loses meaning.
Now you have all the information, you’re ready to answer the questions. Let’s start with the multiple-choice question.
Question 1: According to the poem, if you don’t hold onto your dreams ________ (1 mark)
A good approach is to work through a process of elimination:
Now let’s look at question 2, the short response comprehension question.
Question 2: How does Langston Hughes use simile to convey the importance of dreams? (3 marks)
We have already identified the metaphors in Hughes’ poem and what they are conveying.
Now we need to write a response. Remember that the process for writing a T.E.E comprehension response is:
Let’s put this into action:
1. The keywords are – how, use, simile, convey, “the importance of dreams”
2. To restate this in our response we would write that:
Hughes uses a pair of metaphors to represent the importance of dreams.
This is the Technique of our T.E.E. response.
3. Now expand on this and develop your answer by incorporating the evidence.
Remember this is worth three marks, so you should probably use a couple of pieces of evidence to back up your answer.
Don’t forget to try and incorporate the quotation, or quotations, into your full sentences.
Hughes relates to us that if we forget or fail to nourish our dreams, life becomes “a broken-winged bird / That cannot fly” and “a barren field / Frozen with snow.”
This is the Example part of our T.E.E. structure.
4. You’re ready to present our explanation and explain what you think Hughes means.
These metaphors capture the importance of dreams to the meaning we find in our lives.
This is the Effect part of our T.E.E. structure.
5. Finally, add a concluding statement to hammer our analysis home.
In his poem, Hughes is saying that without dreams to drive us, life becomes empty and devoid of purpose.
Now, put it all together.
Hughes uses a pair of metaphors to represent the importance of dreams. Hughes relates to us that if we forget or fail to nourish our dreams, life becomes “a broken-winged bird / That cannot fly” and “a barren field / Frozen with snow.” These metaphors capture the importance of dreams to the meaning we find in our lives. In his poem, Hughes is saying that without dreams to drive us, life becomes empty and devoid of purpose.
Now, while this is a good response that would get full marks, it is a little long-winded.
As you practise your writing you want to learn to be a bit more concise. We could make this response more concise by rewriting it as:
Hughes uses a pair of metaphors to relate to us that if we forget or fail to nourish our dreams, life becomes “a broken-winged bird / That cannot fly” and “a barren field / Frozen with snow.” These metaphors represent Hughes’ belief that without dreams to drive us life becomes empty and devoid of purpose, capturing the importance of dreams to the meaning we find in our lives.
Comprehension sections pit you against the clock. This means that to do well, you need to be as efficient as possible.
So, what can you do to beat the clock?
Let’s have a look.
You’ll always be given more reading time than you need. Use it properly by reading the questions first, and then reading the texts.
If you have time remaining, read the questions again and then look specifically for the answers.
When your writing time begins, take a few minutes to plan your written responses. This isn’t the waste of time it sounds like.
If you plan what evidence you’ll use in your answers and how you will use it, you won’t encounter writer’s block when responding.
This also gives you the opportunity to reevaluate your initial ideas as you write your responses.
Students often ask, “How long should my response be?” But, you should be asking:
“How much time should I spend on each question?”
The best way to figure this out is to divide the total number of marks on offer by the total writing time of your exam.
For example, if you have a test worth 15 marks and you’re given forty-minutes of test time with 10 minutes of reading time, then you should spend 2 minutes per mark.
Why? You only have thirty minutes to write. 15 marks for a 30-minute exam means that you should spend 2 minutes per mark. (\(30 \over 2 = 15\))
If you’re worried about running out of time, be strategic.
What does this mean? If you have a question worth 5 marks and three questions worth 1 mark, you really need to get that 5-mark question answered. If you run out of time on a 1-mark question, you only lose a mark. But if you don’t start the 5-mark questions or only partly answer them, you will lose more marks.
Finally, you need to be concise. When answering comprehension short answer questions, don’t waffle. Get to the point as quickly as you can.
If you have a question worth 2 marks, don’t use three examples and write a paragraph. Write a couple of sentences using 1 or 2 sentences.
Don’t say something in 5 words if you can say it in 2.
Don’t write: The composer, Hughes, tries to show the audience why we need to look after and nourish our dreams.
Do write: Hughes explores why we should nourish and follow our dreams.
There is no cheat code for improving your responses to comprehension questions. You have to practise the skills involved:
The best way to do this is to take as many practice comprehension papers as you can get your hands on.
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