GRE Prep Advice and Overview

Emotional Appeals

________- state positions that might be believe but are not discussed in the passage.

Weaken

________- identify the answer that makes claim less believable.

direct quotes

Recycled Language- repeating ________ → most correct answers will be paraphrased.

Reversals

________- stating some sort of contradictory detail.

Extreme Language

________- never, always, none, not, no, must, prove, defend, attack, denounce, contradict, failure.

For math

they try to trick you into doing more math than needed

3 sections

Text Completions, Sentence Equivalence, Reading Comp

Work the passage

have a plan and read actively

Understand the question

break it down

Find info from the passage

support your ideas

Use POE

look out for trap answers

Follow the authors argument

separate claims from facts/other evidence

Identify the subject

helps locate what you need to find and read

Identify the task of the question

what do you need to do with the subject

Primary Purpose

why the author wrote the passage

Main Idea

what does the author want you to believe

Structure

about the general flow of the passage

Tone

evaluate the authors feelings about the sub of the q

Vocabulary

what does the author mean by a certain word/phrase

Retrieval

find info in the passage (typically a paraphrase)

Specific Purpose

why would the author include the sub

Weaken

identify the answer that makes claim less believable

Strengthen

identify answer that makes claim more believable

Recycled Language

repeating direct quotes → most correct answers will be paraphrased

Extreme Language

never, always, none, not, no, must, prove, defend, attack, denounce, contradict, failure

No Such Comparisons

be suspicious of "better, more than, less than"

Reversals

stating some sort of contradictory detail

Outside Knowledge

ONLY rely on info from the passage

Emotional Appeals

state positions that might be believe but are not discussed in the passage