Examples:

Source: Cambridge IELTS 11, Test 2 – Reading, Passage 3, Questions 27 – 30

Source: Cambridge IELTS 12, Test 6 – Reading, Passage 1, Questions 10 – 13

Strategies:

1. Read the instruction => check if there is only one correct answer or you can choose 2 or 3 letters
2. Underline key words in each question or unfinished statement
3. Once you have identified key words/ synonyms/ paraphrases in the passage, read the entire sentences, and the ones before and after to have clear understanding.
4. Once you have grasped the meaning of the part in the passage, go to the options and compare that to the meaning of each of the four options. Compare meaning, not just the individual words.
5. Eliminate as many incorrect options as you can:
   • any option which contains information not mentioned in the text
   • any option which contains information contradicting with the text
   • any option which contains information mentioned in the text but doesn’t answer the question
   • any option which is partly correct (correct half of the statement but the remaining information is opposite to the information in the passage or not mentioned)
   • any option which is vague, with little evidence to support it
6. Pay extra attention to extreme words such as MORE, ALL, ONLY, SOMETIMES, TOTALLY, etc which can affect whether an idea is correct or incorrect.
7. Use the information in the passage to decide your answers; don’t make use of your own knowledge that is not in the text.

Tips:

• Only read the options after you have read the relevant part of the passage that contains the key words in the questions. This is because if you spend time underlining key words in the options (A, B, C, D) before you’re able to locate the part of the passage to find the answers, this costs you time. Besides, by the time you underline all the key words in the options and go back to the text to scan, you’ll probably have forgotten what you’ve underlined/ highlighted.
• The questions follow the order of the passage while the options may not.