Grasping What’s on the Grammar and Writing Component

Although the GED test doesn’t label question sets with the words writing or grammar, the concepts are worked into almost everything on the test. To pass this component of the RLA test, you need to demonstrate that you have a command of the conventions of Standard English. You need to know the appropriate vocabulary to use and avoid slang. Texting shortcuts may save you time while communicating with your friends, but they’re not acceptable in formal writing. You need to be able to spell, identify incorrect grammar, and eliminate basic errors, including such common errors as run-on sentences or sentence fragments.

To help you succeed, we provide insightful information in the following sections about what skills this part of the test covers, what you can do to brush up on those skills, and how the questions are presented. With this information in hand, you can be confident in your ability to tackle any type of grammar or writing question on test day.

Looking at the skills the grammar and writing component covers

The grammar and writing component of the RLA test evaluates you on the following types of skills related to grammar. Note that unlike the other GED test sections, this component of the RLA test expects that you know or at least are familiar with the rules of grammar. Just looking at the passages provided won’t do you much good if you don’t understand the basics of these rules already.

Mechanics: You don’t have to become a professional grammarian to pass this test, but you need to know or review basic grammar. Check out Chapter 7 to review what you should know or may have forgotten. The mechanics of writing include the following:
- Capitalization: You have to recognize which words should start with a capital letter and which words shouldn’t. All sentences start with a capital letter, but so do titles, like Miss, President, and Senator, when they’re followed by a person’s name. Names of cities, states, and countries are also capitalized.
- Punctuation: This area of writing mechanics includes everyone’s personal favorite: commas. (Actually, most people hate commas because they aren’t sure how to use them, but the basic rules are simple.) The more you read, the better you get at punctuation. If you’re reading and don’t understand why punctuation is or isn’t used, check with your grammar guidebook or the Internet.
  
  A general rule: Don’t use a comma unless the next group of words is a complete sentence. For example: “As agonizing as it was to leave her friends, college was what she wanted.” College was what she wanted is a complete sentence and can stand alone, so using a comma here is correct.
- Spelling: You don’t have to spot a lot of misspelled words, but you do have to know how to spell contractions and possessives and understand the different spellings of homonyms — words that sound the same but have different spellings and meanings, like their and there.
- Contractions: This area of writing mechanics has nothing to do with those painful moments before childbirth! Instead, contractions are formed when the English language shortens a word by leaving out a letter or a sound. For example, when you say or write can’t, you’re using a shortened form of cannot. In this example, can’t is the contraction.
  
  The important thing to remember about contractions is that the apostrophe (that’s a single quotation mark) takes the place of the letter or letters that are left out.
- Possessives: Do you know people who are possessive? They’re all about ownership, right? So is the grammar form of possessives. Possessives are words that show ownership or possession, usually by adding an apostrophe to a person’s or object’s name. If Marcia owns a car, that car is Marcia’s car. The word Marcia’s is a possessive. Make sure you know the difference between singular and plural possessives. For example: “The girl’s coat is torn.” (Girl and coat are singular, so the apostrophe goes before the s.) “The girls’ coats are torn.” (Girls and coats are plural, so the apostrophe goes after the s.) When working with plural possessives, form the plural first and then add the apostrophe.
Organization: On the test, you’re asked to correct passages by changing the order of sentences or leaving out certain sentences when they don’t fit. You have to work with passages to turn them into logical, organized paragraphs. You may be asked to work with paragraphs to form a better composition by changing them around, editing them by improving or adding topic sentences, or making sure that all the sentences are about the same topic. The important thing to remember is that the questions all offer you a choice of answers. That means you have only a limited number of options for making the passages better. Read the questions carefully, and you should have no problems.
Sentence structure: Every language has rules about the order in which words should appear in a sentence. You get a chance to improve sentences through your understanding of what makes a good sentence. Extensive reading before the test can give you a good idea of how good sentences are structured and put together. The advice here is read, read, and read some more.
Usage: This broad category covers a lot of topics. Grammar has a wide variety of rules, and these questions test your knowledge and understanding. Subjects and verbs must agree. Verbs have tenses (for example, present and future) that must be consistent. Pronouns must refer to nouns properly. If the last three sentences sound like Greek to you, make sure you review grammatical usage rules. Usage also covers vocabulary and acceptable Standard English usage. People have become very comfortable with short forms used in texting, but “LOL” and “C U L8R” aren’t acceptable in formal writing.

Having a firm grasp of these writing mechanics can help you get a more accurate picture of the types of questions you’ll encounter on this part of the test. The chapters in Part II of this book help you master the basics.

Understanding the format of the grammar and writing component

The grammar and writing component consist of a set of questions, mainly multiple-choice but also drag-and-drop or other technologically enhanced question formats and the occasional fill-in-the-blank question. One type of question asks you to read, revise, and edit documents that may include how-to info, informational texts, and workplace materials. Don’t worry; almost all of the questions are some form of multiple-choice, which means you don’t have to come up with the answers all on your own. And the best part: Practicing for this component helps you understand the grammar and other language skills needed for the Extended Response. It even carries over to the other GED test sections.

To answer the questions in this part of the RLA test, read the information presented to you carefully. Reading the questions before reading the entire text is often helpful because then you know what to look for. And because you’re dealing with grammar, as you read each passage, you can ask yourself, “Can I correct this passage? If so, how?”

Rocking the Reading Comprehension Component

You may not understand why the GED test examines your knowledge of literature comprehension. However, in today’s society, being able to comprehend, analyze, and apply something you’ve read is the strongest predictor of career and college readiness and an important skill set to have. In the following sections, we explore the four aspects of good reading skills: comprehension, application, analysis, and synthesis.

Checking out the skills required for the reading component

The questions on the RLA reading portion of the test focus on the following skills, which you’re expected to be able to use as you read both fiction and nonfiction passages:

Comprehension: Questions that test your comprehension skills assess your ability to read a source of information, understand what you’ve read, and restate the information in your own words. If you understand the passage, you can rephrase what you read while retaining the meaning of the passage. You can also create a summary of the main ideas presented in the passage and explain the ideas and implications of the passage.
Application: Questions that test your application skills assess your ability to use the information you read in the passage in a new situation, such as when you’re answering questions. Application-focused questions are most like real life because they often ask you to apply what you read in the passage to a real-life situation. Being able to read and understand a users’ manual in order to use the product it came with is a perfect example of using your application skills in real life.
Analysis: Questions that test your analysis skills assess your ability to draw conclusions, understand consequences, and make inferences after reading the passage. To answer these questions successfully, you have to make sure your conclusions are based solely on the written text in the passage and not on outside knowledge or the book you read last week. Questions that focus on your ability to analyze what you read try to find out whether you appreciate the way the passage was written and see the cause-and-effect relationships within it. They also expect you to know when a conclusion is being stated and analyze what it means in the context of the passage.
Synthesis: Questions that test your synthesis skills assess your ability to take information in one form and in one location and put it together in another context. Here, you get a chance to make connections between different parts of the passage and compare and contrast them. You may be asked to talk about the tone, point of view, style, or purpose of a passage — and saying that the purpose of a passage is to confuse and confound test-takers isn’t the answer.

Some reading-comprehension questions on the test may ask you to use information in the source text passages combined with information from the text in the questions to answer them. So make sure you read everything that appears on-screen — you never know where an answer may come from.

Breaking down the format of the reading component

The RLA reading comprehension section measures your ability to understand and interpret fiction and nonfiction passages. It’s plain and simple — no tricks involved. You don’t have to do any math to figure out the answers to the questions. You just have to read, understand, and use the material presented to you to answer the corresponding questions.

The passages in this test are similar to the works a high-school student would come across in English class. To help you feel more comfortable with the RLA reading comprehension, we’re here to give you a better idea of what this test looks like on paper.

Most source texts (the reading passages) are presented on the left side of a split screen, with the question on the right. A source text or passage will be between 450 and 900 words. The passages in this test may come from workplace (on-the-job) materials or from academic reading materials. Seventy-five percent of the source text will be from informational texts — nonfiction documents. The remaining 25 percent is based on literary texts, including plays, poetry, short stories, and novels. With each source text, you have to answer four to eight questions.

Text passages are text passages. Although the next section describes what types of passages appear on the RLA test to help you prepare, don’t worry so much about what type of passage you’re reading. Instead, spend your time understanding what information the passage presents to you.

Identifying the types of passages and how to prepare for them

To help you get comfortable with answering the questions on the reading comprehension portion of the RLA test, you want to have a good idea of what these types of questions look like. The good news is that in this section, we focus on the two main types of passages you’ll see: literary and nonfiction. We also give you some practical advice you can use as you prepare for this portion of the test.

Literary passages

The RLA reading component may include passages from the following literary texts (and plenty of questions to go with them):

Drama: Drama (that is, a play) tells a story, using the words and actions of the characters. The description of the place and costumes are in the stage directions or in the head of the director. As you read passages from drama, try to imagine the dramatic scene and see the characters and their actions in your head. Doing so makes drama easier to understand.

Stage directions are usually printed in italics, like this. Even though you’re not acting in the play, pay attention to the stage directions. They may provide valuable information you need to answer the questions that follow the passage.
Prose fiction: Prose fiction refers to novels and short stories. As you may already know, fiction is writing that comes straight from the mind of the author (in other words, it’s made up; it’s not about something that really happened). The only way to become familiar with prose fiction is to read as much fiction as you can. After you read a book, try to talk about it with other people who have read the book.

Nonfiction passages

Nonfiction passages may come from many different sources. Here’s a list of some of the kinds of passages you may see, and of course, answer questions about:

Critical reviews of visual and performing arts: These prose passages are reviews written by people who have enough knowledge of the visual or performing arts to be critical of them. You can find examples of good critical reviews in the library, in some daily papers, and on the Internet. Type in “critical review” into your favorite search engine, and you’ll get more critical reviews than you have time to read.

To prepare for this part of the test, try to read critical reviews of books, movies, restaurants, and the like as often as you can. The next time you go to a movie, watch television, or attend a play, write your own critical review (what you thought of the piece of work). Put some factual material into your review and make suggestions for improvement. Compare what the real critics have to say with your own feelings about the movie, television show, or play. Do you agree with their opinions?
Nonfiction prose: Nonfiction prose is prose that covers a lot of ground — and all the ground is real. Nonfiction prose is material that the author doesn’t create in his or her own mind; it’s based on fact or reality. In fact, this book is classified as nonfiction prose, and so are the newspaper articles you read every day. The next time you read the newspaper or a magazine, tell yourself, “I’m reading nonfiction prose.” Just don’t say it out loud in a coffee shop or in your break room at work, or people may start to look at you in strange ways.
Workplace and community documents: You run across these types of passages in the job- and community-related areas of life. The following are some examples:
- Corporate statements: Companies and organizations issue policies for employee behavior, rules for hiring and firing, goals for the corporation, even statements on environmental stewardship. These assertions tell the world what the company intends to accomplish and what the basic rules of behavior within the company are. The goal statement for your study group may be as follows: “We’re all going to pass the GED test on our first attempt.”
- Historic documents, founding documents, legal documents: These texts may include extracts from the Constitution or other founding documents, extracts from treaties, or legal documents. The founding and historical documents are obviously older materials, with a somewhat different writing style from what you may see in a modern legal document. Other documents may include leases, purchase contracts, and bank statements. If you aren’t familiar with these kinds of documents, collect some examples from banks or libraries and review them. Have a look at the terms in your lease, mortgage, or credit card statement. If you can explain these types of documents to a friend, you understand them.
- Letters: You certainly know what a letter is: a written communication between two people. It’s not very often that you get to read other people’s letters without getting into trouble — here’s your chance.
- Manuals: Every time you purchase a major appliance, an electronic gadget, or a power tool, you get a user’s manual that tells you how to operate the device. Some manuals are short and straightforward; others are so long and complicated that the manufacturers put them on CD-ROMs to save printing costs.

Regardless of what type of passage the questions in the reading component are based on, you have two challenges. The first is grammar. Grammar doesn’t change with the type of passage, so although you should be familiar with the various types of passages, you need to be most familiar with the rules of grammar so you can use them to improve the passages. The second is reading skills. You need to answer questions, using the four skills outlined in the earlier section “Checking out the skills required for the reading component”: comprehension, application, analysis, and synthesis.

Examining the Extended Response Item

In spite of its name, the Extended Response doesn’t consist of a real research essay so much as a series of related paragraphs. You aren’t expected to produce a book-length opus complete with documented research. Rather, you’re expected to write a coherent series of interrelated paragraphs on a given topic and use the rules of grammar and correct spelling. Part of that essay will be an analysis of materials presented to you, and part will be preparation of logical argument. Examiners look for an essay that’s well organized and sticks to the topic given.

In the following sections, we explain what you need to know about the Extended Response and give you some tools for writing a successful essay.

Eyeing the skills covered in the Extended Response

The evaluation of your essay focuses on three major criteria or skills. By having a clear understanding of the main skills covered in this part of the test, you can ensure that you address all of them when writing your essay that will translate into success in terms of your essay score. The GED Testing Service defines the three essay criteria you need to address as follows:

Creation of argument and use of evidence: This criterion refers to how well you answer the topic, including whether the focus of the response shifts as you write. Stay on topic.
Development and organizational structure: This criterion refers to whether you show the reader through your essay that you have a clear idea about what you’re writing and that you’re able to establish a definable plan for writing the essay. The evaluation expects that you’ll present your arguments in a logical sequence and back those arguments with specific supporting evidence from the source text. Remember, you must use specific detail from the source texts; you can elaborate, but your answer must be based on the source text.
Clarity and command of Standard English conventions: This criterion refers to your ability to appropriately use what the GED Testing Service calls “on-demand, draft writing.” That includes the application of the basic rules of grammar, such as sentence structure, mechanics, usage, and so forth. It’s also looking for stylistic features, such as transitional phrases, varied sentence structure, and appropriate word choices.

The evaluation grades your essay on a three-point scale. You receive 2, 1, or 0 points, depending on your success in each of these three categories. You can check out a guide for teachers on the RLA Extended Response at www.gedtestingservice.com/uploads/files/949aa6a0418791c4f3b962a4cd0c92f4.pdf. Here, you can see a sample essay prompt and breakdown of how it’s evaluated. It includes a very detailed look at the criteria and what the evaluators look for in an essay that receives a passing score.

Read the sections on what constitutes a passing score very carefully. If you don’t pass the essay, you probably won’t accumulate a high enough score on the other sections to pass the RLA test, and that means you’ll have to retake the entire test.

Understanding the Extended Response format

This 45-minute part of the Reasoning Through Language Arts (RLA) test has only one item: a prompt on which you have to write a short essay (usually 600 to 800 words).

For this part of the test, you’re given one topic and a few instructions. Your task is to write an essay of three or more paragraphs on that topic. Remember that you can’t write about another topic or a similar topic; if you do, you’ll receive zero points for your essay, and you’ll have to retake the entire RLA test.

The focus for the evaluation of this part of the GED test is on your reading comprehension, analysis and organization, and writing skills.

The test presents you with one or two passages of argumentation. The writer of each passage takes a position on an issue and defends that position with evidence and the power of reason. You must examine the positions, determine which is the stronger and best defended, and write an essay explaining why you made that choice. You have to do that regardless of how you feel about the issue. The point is to analyze and show that you understand the strategies used to defend positions.

As part of that process, you must analyze the arguments for logical consistency, illogical conclusions, and false reasoning. This area is where your critical analysis skills come into play. Does Point A from the author really make sense? Is it valid and backed by facts?

Finally, you must write your answer in a clear, concise, and well-organized response. The evaluation examines how well you write, including the following aspects:

Your style
Varied sentence structure and vocabulary
Use of transitional sentences
Appropriate vocabulary
Correct spelling and grammar, including word usage and punctuation

You have an erasable tablet for rough notes, points, and draft organization. Use it. The computer screen has a window that offers a mini-word processor with some basic functions, such as cut and paste and undo and redo. However, it doesn’t offer a spell-checker or grammar-checker.

Planning to succeed on the Extended Response

The Extended Response essay requires some very specific skills, ranging from grammar and proper language usage to comprehension and analysis skills. If you’ve ever had an argument about who has the best team or which employer is better, you already know how to assess arguments and respond. Now you need to hone those skills. As you prepare for the RLA Extended Response, do the following:

Read, read, and read some more. Just like for the other parts of the RLA test (and most other subtests on the GED test), reading is important. Reading exposes you to well-crafted sentences, which can help you improve your own writing. Reading also expands your horizons and provides you with little bits of information you can work into your essay.

As you read, make an outline of the paragraphs or chapters you read to see how the material ties together. Try rewriting some of the paragraphs from your outline, and compare what you write to the original. Yours may not be ready for prime time, but this little exercise gives you practice in writing organized, cohesive sentences and paragraphs, which can go a long way in this part of the test.
Practice editing your own work. After the test starts, the only person able to edit your essay is you. If that thought scares you, practice editing your own work now. Take a writing workshop, or get help from someone who knows how to edit. Practice writing a lot of essays, and don’t forget to review and edit them as soon as you’re done writing.
Review how to plan an essay. Few people can sit down, write a final draft of an essay the first time around, and receive a satisfactory grade. Instead, you have to plan what you’re going to write. The best way to start is to jot down everything you know about a topic without worrying about the order. From there, you can organize your thoughts into groups. Check out Chapter 8 for more help on planning your essay.
Practice writing on a topic (and not going off topic!). Your essay must relate to the given topic as closely as possible. If the test asks you to write about your personal goals, and you write about a hockey game you once played in, you can kiss your good score on this part of the test goodbye.

To help you practice staying on topic, read the newspaper and write a letter to the editor or a response to a columnist. Because you’re responding to a very narrow topic that appeared in a particular newspaper article, you have to do so clearly and concisely — if you ever want to see it in print. (You can also practice staying on topic by picking a newspaper article’s title and writing a short essay about it. Then read the actual story and see how yours compares.)
Think about, and use, appropriate examples. You’re dealing with information presented in the source text. You’ll find information in the source text for and against the position you are to argue. When you take a position, you need to use materials from the source text to support your position. Use that information. Look for flaws in the logic. You can find good examples of such arguments in the editorial section of a newspaper or in blogs. Look at how the writers develop their arguments, use logic to support their positions, and perhaps use false logic or flawed reasoning to persuade the readers.
Practice general writing. If writing connected paragraphs isn’t one of your fortes, practice doing so! Write long emails. Write long letters. Write to your member of Congress. Write to your friends. Write articles for community newspapers. Write short stories. Write anything you want — whatever you do, just keep writing.
Write practice essays. Check out the diagnostic test in Chapter 3 and the practice test in Chapter 9. The test includes an RLA-style extended response essay with prompts in actual test format. Write an essay based on the topic given. You can also practice essays by taking newspaper or blog editorials and writing rebuttals. Then ask a knowledgeable friend or former teacher to grade them for you. You may also consider taking a preparation class in which you’re assigned practice topics to write about. When you think you’re finished practicing, practice some more.

Preparing for the RLA Test with Tactics That Work

The RLA test requires a number of skills, from knowing proper spelling, usage, and punctuation to reading quickly and accurately. You can master all of these skills with practice. The following sections give some advice on how to do that.

Sharpening your reading and writing skills

To succeed on the RLA test, you can prepare in advance by reviewing rules of grammar, punctuation, and spelling and by familiarizing yourself with the format and subject matter of the test. Here are some of the best ways you can prepare:

Read as often as you can. This strategy is the best one and is by far the simplest, because reading exposes you to correct grammar. What you read makes a difference. Reading catalogs may increase your product knowledge and improve your research skills, but reading literature is preferable because it introduces you to so many rules of grammar. Reading fiction exposes you to interesting words and sentences. It shows you how paragraphs tie into one another and how each paragraph has a topic and generally sticks to it.

You should also read nonfiction — from instructions to business letters, from press releases to history books and historical documents. Nonfiction is generally written at a higher reading level than fiction and uses a very formal style, the kind expected of you when you write an essay for the Extended Response item. Older documents can be a special problem because the writing style is very different from what’s common today. Getting familiar with such documents will help you to better results and even help with your Social Studies test.

Read everything you can get your hands on — even cereal boxes — and identify what kind of reading you’re doing. Ask yourself questions about your reading and see how much of it you can remember.
Develop your reading speed. Reading is wonderful, but reading quickly is even better; it gets you through the test with time to spare. Check out Speed Reading For Dummies by Richard Sutz and Peter Weverka (Wiley), or do a quick Internet search to find plenty of material that can help you read faster. Whatever method you use, try to improve your reading rate without hurting your overall reading comprehension.
Master the rules of basic grammar. On this test, you don’t have to define a gerund and give an example of one, but you do have to know about verb tenses, subject-verb agreement, pronoun-antecedent agreement, possessives, and other basic grammar. As your knowledge of grammar and punctuation improves, have a bit of fun by correcting what you read in small-town newspapers and low-budget novels — both sometimes have poor editing.
Practice grammar and proper English in everyday speaking. As you review the rules of grammar, practice them every day as you talk to your friends, family, and coworkers. Although correct grammar usually “sounds” right to your ears, sometimes it doesn’t because you and the people you talk to have become used to using incorrect grammar. If you see a rule that seems different from the way you talk, put it on a flashcard and practice it as you go through your day. Before long, you’ll train your ears so that correct grammar sounds right.

Correcting other people’s grammar out loud doesn’t make you popular, but correcting it in your head can help you succeed on this test. Also, listen for and avoid slang or regional expressions. Y’all may be a great favorite in the South but wouldn’t work well on a college application.
Understand punctuation. Know how to use commas, semicolons, colons, and other forms of punctuation. To find out more about punctuation and when and why to use its different forms, head to Chapter 7.
Practice writing. Write as much and as often as you can, and then review it for errors. Look for and correct mistakes in punctuation, grammar, and spelling. If you can’t find any, ask someone who knows grammar and punctuation for help.
Keep a journal or blog. Journals and blogs are just notebooks (physical or virtual) in which you write a bit about your life every day. They both provide good practice for personal writing. Blogging or responding to blogs gives you practice in public writing because others see what you write. Whether you use a personal journal or a public blog, though, keep in mind that the writing is the important part. If public writing encourages you to write more and more often, do it. If not, consider the private writing of a journal or diary.
Improve your spelling. As you practice writing, keep a good dictionary at hand. If you’re not sure of the spelling of any word, look it up. We hear you. How do you look up the spelling of a word if you can’t spell it? Try sounding out the word phonetically and look in an online dictionary. Type in the word and select the word that looks familiar and correct. If that doesn’t work, ask someone for help. Add the word to a spelling list and practice spelling those words. In addition, get a list of common homonyms — words that sound the same but are spelled differently and have different definitions — and review them every day. (You need to know, for example, the difference between their, there, and they’re and to, two, and too.) Many dictionaries contain a list of homonyms.
Keep in mind that these questions are some form of multiple-choice. Among the various answer choices, the test questions give you the correct answer. Of course, they also tell you three other answers that are incorrect, but all you have to do is find the correct one! The answers offered may not always be complete, so remember to pick the most correct answer from among those offered. As you practice speaking and writing, you tune your ears so the correct answer sounds right, which, believe it or not, makes finding the correct answer easier on the test.
Take practice tests. Take as many practice tests as you can. Be strict about time limitations, and check your answers after you’re finished. Don’t move on until you know and understand the correct answer. (Check out Chapter 3 for diagnostic questions and Chapter 9 for a full-length sample test.) The time you spend taking and reviewing these tests is well worth it.

Navigating text to comprehend

After you know what to read to prepare for this test, you need to focus on how to read. You can’t easily skim the type of prose that appears on the test. You need to read each question and passage completely to find the right answer. Here are some tactics that will help you do just that:

Read carefully. When you read, read carefully. If reading novels, plays, or historical documents is unfamiliar to you, read these items even more carefully. The more carefully you read any material, the easier it’ll be for you to get the right answers on the test.
Ask questions. Ask yourself questions about what you just read. Could you take a newspaper column and reduce the content to four bulleted points and still summarize the column accurately? Do you understand the main ideas well enough to explain them to a stranger? (Note that we don’t advise going up to strangers to explain things to them in person. Pretend you’re going to explain it to a stranger and do all the talking in your head. If you want to explain what you read to someone in person, ask your friends and family to lend you an ear — or two.)

Ask for help if you don’t understand something you read. You may want to form a study group and work with other people. If you’re taking a test-preparation course, ask the instructor for help when you need it. If you have family, friends, or coworkers who can help, ask them.
Use a dictionary. Not many people understand every word they read, so use a dictionary. Looking up unfamiliar words increases your vocabulary, which in turn makes passages on the Reasoning Through Language Arts test easier to understand. If you have a thesaurus, use it, too. Often, knowing a synonym for the word you don’t know is helpful. Plus, it improves your Scrabble game. You can find a dictionary online at dictionary.com and a thesaurus at thesaurus.com. You can also search for dictionaries by well-known publishers such as Webster’s and Oxford.
Use new words. A new word doesn’t usually become part of your vocabulary until you put it to use in your everyday language. When you come across a new word, make sure you know its meaning and try to use it in a sentence. Then try to work it into conversation for a day or two. After a while, this challenge can make each day more exciting. If you don’t know what you don’t know, you can find lists of important words online. To find such lists, search the web for “the 100 most commonly misspelled or misunderstood words,” “words important to pass the SAT,” “homonyms,” and “common phrases that you’re using wrong.” These lists can be a good start to increasing your vocabulary.
Practice. Take the Reasoning Through Language Arts diagnostic test in Chapter 3 and the full-length practice test in Chapter 9. Do the questions and check your answers. Checking your answers and reading the detailed answer explanations are important because they help you find out why each answer choice is correct or incorrect. Don’t move on to the next answer until you understand the preceding one. If you want more practice tests, look for additional test-prep books at your local bookstore or library. Our GED Test For Dummies (Wiley) includes additional practice tests for all four sections of the GED test, including the RLA, Math, Science, and Social Studies sections. You can also find some abbreviated tests on the Internet. Type in “GED test questions” or “GED test questions + free” into your favorite search engine and check out some of the results. The GED Testing Service also offers free sample tests; check it out at www.gedtestingservice.com/educators/freepracticetest.

Take as many practice tests as you can. Stick to the time limits, and keep the testing situation as realistic as possible. When you go to the test center for the official test, you’ll feel more at ease because you practiced.

All the information you need to answer the reading questions is given in the passages or in the text of the questions that accompany the passages. You’re not expected to recognize the passage or know the answers to questions about what comes before it or what comes after it in context of the entire work. You do not need to rely of previous knowledge to answer the questions. The passages are complete in themselves, so just focus on what you read.

Many people get hung up on the drama passages. Don’t stress. Keep in mind that these literary genres are just different ways of telling a story and conveying feelings. If you’re not familiar with them, read plays before taking the test. Discuss what you’ve read with others; you may even want to consider joining (or starting) a book club that discusses novels and plays.

Prepping for the RLA Test