Key VR strategies
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Here are 4 top tips with a proven record of success in Verbal Reasoning:
1. Find the reading strategy that works best for you and apply it quickly and consistently in practice, so that it becomes second nature by Test Day.
2. Identify key words in the question stem or answer choices, then scan for these words in the passage.
- This saves you from reading the passage in full.
- It also ensures you can quickly and accurately find the relevant part of the passage regardless of your preferred reading strategy, as you will generally have to return to the passage frequently in each set.
3. Locate the relevant part of the text before or after the key word.
- This is where you’ll find support for the statement, or you’ll see that it contradicts the passage or goes beyond it.
4. Eliminate wrong answers.
- You’ll often spot quickly that an answer cannot be correct. With three or four answers, eliminating one answer quickly increases the odds of guessing.
- Or you may find it is faster to eliminate the wrong answers than to prove that the correct answer is correct.
It’s one mark for each correct answer, regardless of difficulty or how much time it takes.
A tricky and complicated statement is worth one mark.
A simple and straightforward statement is worth one mark.
More marks = higher score
Keep moving and click an answer for every question.
- Even if you have to eliminate answers or guess – you still have a chance of getting the mark. If you leave a question blank, you’re guaranteed zero marks.
- The computer can’t tell whether you answered correctly by working out the answer or by guessing.
VR isn’t traditional reading comprehension but rather textual comparison.
Imagine a busy doctor tasked with navigating the lengthy records of a patient with a chronic condition. Perhaps they are checking the written accounts of every hospital visit the patient has made, looking for something specific. No doctor in this position would read (or even ‘speed read’) hundreds of pages for a single patient. Instead, they would use the core skill – rapid evaluative comparison of two separate texts – that VR is testing.
The marks are in getting the questions correct rather than in perfect understanding of the passage.
Hence, we recommend focusing first on the questions and using key words to scan the passage.
The vast majority of students will not retain enough information after speed-reading the passage to accurately answer the statements or questions.
Time pressure is immense and most students will need to look back at the passage again to answer the questions or statements.
Therefore, searching the passage for key words is likely to yield better results than attempting to speed read the passage and then clicking each answer without checking it again.
UCAT Verbal Reasoning is not a traditional reading comprehension exercise, but rather a test of your ability to make textual comparisons quickly and accurately.
As such, reading each passage in full is unnecessary in order to score very highly.
There are often subtle shifts of meaning between the wording of a Verbal statement or question, and the information as stated in the passage.
If you have read the passage in full, you won’t have time to return to it while working through each item, leaving you at a significant disadvantage.
As nearly all verbal items require careful, guided textual comparison, we strongly recommend following our scanning for key words approach in your preparation and on Test Day.
Due to the extreme pacing required in the Verbal section, you’ll need to find the reading strategy that delivers the best results for you.
As part of your preparation, try experimenting with these 3 reading strategies:
1. Not reading the passage
2. Skimming the passage
3. Reading the passage in full
Of these 3 strategies, we feel the first will work best for the majority of students, and that the last is potentially only effective for a few.
Using this strategy, you start by reading the question stem.
- For statements, you then go to the passage and check whether it is supported, contradicted or neither.
- For questions, you also read the answer choices then head to the passage to find support or eliminate wrong answers.
In both cases, you can save important time by using key words in either the question stem or answer choices to navigate to the relevant part of the passage.
To get the most from this strategy, it’s important you develop your scanning technique.
It will take some practice, and you must be ready to look for synonyms, paraphrases and restatements. Sometimes, you’ll find a related word or phrase that isn’t a precise synonym, but it’ll be enough to indicate that it’s the relevant part of the passage.
Once you find the relevant part of the passage, read the adjacent sentences more closely to look for support.
Walkthrough activity
Reading strategy 1 with Verbal statements
Let’s try out Reading Strategy 1 with some Verbal statements.
In this approach, you cast your eyes over the passage quickly to hunt for the main idea – that is, the author’s perspective on the topic – and to get a basic grasp of the overall structure or approach of the passage.
As you skim the passage, you are not properly ‘reading’ it. Instead, you are glancing at the passage to try and get a quick grasp of its fundamentals. This approach is intentionally imperfect – but with practice, you can refine your ability to skim a passage with a consistent degree of accuracy.
Your aim is to establish the gist or general tone of the passage, rather than to read for detail or to follow its argument point by point.
This could be of particular use when answering questions that summarise the passage or mention the author’s intention, for example whether they take a positive or negative stance on the topic.
Note that you will still need to go back to the passage as you answer the questions or statements, as you are not going to retain enough detail to answer most items.
Thus, we recommend our scanning for key words approach as you attack each item.
Walkthrough activity
Reading strategy 2 with Verbal statements
In this exercise you’ll be trying out Reading strategy 2: skimming the passage.
Using this strategy, you take a full minute to read the passage and then answer the questions.
- As some passages are short (around 250 words), this strategy may suit the natural abilities of some students.
- For many, spending a minute reading each passage will lead to severe pacing issues and a struggle to finish the section.
Note that students without a photographic memory are likely to struggle with this approach.
Remember, you do not need to understand the whole of the passage.
All question types focus on a narrow part of the passage except one rare type, Summing Up questions. Don’t let these cause you concern, though. We have a specific Medify strategy for making quick work of Summing Up questions, so you don’t have to read the passage to find the correct answer.
Walkthrough activity
Reading strategy 3 with Verbal statements
The following exercise is a chance for you to try out Reading strategy 3.