If Verbal Ability is the first half of the English section of
management entrance tests, then Reading and Comprehension (RC) makes
up the second half. As the name suggests, RC comprises two parts ---
Reading + Comprehension. A CAT aspirant should be able to read at a
fairly good speed and also grasp the material presented in very little
time. In a knowledge-based economy, reading and comprehension skills
would be essential. You would need RC skills to analyze data,
information and take good decisions. Information + RC = Knowledge!
How do you become confident at RC? I am going to suggest these steps,
A. Reading
1. Measure your Reading Speed: You should start by calculating your
reading speed and then working on improving it.
Plenty of websites and software help you measure your reading speed.
Begin by measuring your reading speed on screen using a website such
aswww.readingsoft.com. It will give you a quick estimate of your
reading speed by asking you to read a small passage under a timer. As
you work on improving your reading speed, monitor it using such a tool
from time to time.
2. Improving your Reading Speed: An average reading speed is in the
range of 200 to 300 wpm (words per minute). Reading speeds vary
depending on what you are reading and in what environment. Steps to
improve your reading speed,
a) Scanning: Learn to 'scan' the material you read --- Headings,
titles, chapters and any other relevant divisions that might serve to
break the reading down into blocks.
b) Adjustment: You should learn to adjust your reading speed as you
read the passage. Slow down when you want to be sure about having
comprehended a difficult section. Pump up your speed if you feel the
need to skim through familiar sections.
c) Ignore what is not important: You should focus on the key words in
the sentences. A lot of time during reading is wasted on conjunctions,
prepositions or articles. Eliminate these from the horizons of your
focus.
d) Read in blocks: While reading, try to read blocks of words
together. You can boost your reading speed by absorbing several words
in a line at one time, instead of reading each word or focusing on
each letter of the word.
Instead of reading each word as constituted of individual letters,
store a pictorial image of the words in your mind so that whenever you
encounter that word, its mere shape and visual structure leads you to
identify it instantly, within fractions of a second. Without having
actually 'read' that word!
Having said all the above, the CAT in its online avatar has not been
featuring very large RC passages so the role played by reading speed
has reduced to some extent. But in exchange, the role of comprehension
has correspondingly increased!
B. Comprehension
Here is a suggested workflow to tackle and improve your comprehension.
Step 1. Topic: When you start attempting an RC passage, you need to
quickly skim through it to understand what the author is talking
about. What are the key words in the passage? Is the piece about
theology, geology, economics or something else? Are you comfortable
with it? You have to make a decision here, whether you want to proceed
with solving it or not? If you decide to continue, then jump directly
to Step 2 --- else skip to the next RC passage. In the actual test,
you have the right to choose your RC passages .You dont have to even
solve them in the same sequence they are in the paper!
Step 2. Essence of the first paragraph: Take a very hard look at the
first paragraph of the passage. Your task? To mentally
Paraphrase/Summarise it in your own words! If you find yourself able
to do it, go ahead with that RC passage. Else, I'd advise skipping it.
Step 3. Questions, Data points: Once you decide to solve an RC
paragraph, take a look at the accompanying Questions (without looking
at the answer options. That will confuse you!). Identify the data
points asked for in the Questions. This will put you on the lookout
for those data points when you read the passage.
Step 4: Read the passage: Very simple. Read the piece. Never graduate
to the next paragraph until and unless you cansummarize the current
paragraph in your head. I have known candidates to read entire
passages and not have a clue about what the author was talking about!
Step 5. Answer the questions: Now you come to the crux of the matter.
Either while reading the passage itself or after completing the
reading, you should be able to answer the questions!
Watch out!
1. Do not get into ego hassles over questions: This often happens when
a person has read the full RC passage and managed to answer 3 or 4
questions out of the total 5 very quickly. I would suggest that it is
time to move on. Don't be under the impression that just because you
have read the whole passage you HAVE to answer every single question!
Some questions are there to just waste your time!
2. Practicing GMAT RCs could help because the GMAT is also a
computer-based test and the length of the passages seem to be roughly
the same as that in the computer-based CAT. Besides, there are so many
online resources for the GMAT!
3. Answering by elimination: Sometimes, you can solve the RC questions
by eliminating all the answer options until one answer option remains
which seems to fit in and is your answer.
4. Dilemmas: Often, you would think that you have NARROWED the options
down to two by elimination but can't seem to be sure thereafter. There
is no such thing! It only means that you have not comprehended the
passage well enough. At this juncture, you can either opt to take a
calculated guess (especially if you have been a consistent 90+
percentiler) or just leave the question alone (advised if you have
been consistently scoring below 70 percentile in English).
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